According to the hit series Mad Men, women acting incapable was glamorous to men in America in the 1960’s and even currently. After watching only a few episodes of this show it is very clear to me that it was expected that a woman acted as if she could not do anything but care for her family. Even common sense was frowned upon for women. I find it kind of disturbing that people around the country are eating this show up and not even realizing half of the demeaning remarks that are made to women. Fashion is, in a way, a cover up for what is really going on in the show. Sure the women look all pretty and the men all sexy, but the way they are acting women all little and inferior and men all rude and dominant in my opinion, this is unattractive. Through this show and many other sources children are getting their eyes on the way society treats women. Even though it’s fifty years later the show is still interesting and in a way still happening today. Teenagers who watch this current show and even though it depicts the past feel a need to live by it. I don’t think it was necessarily trying to portray the image as socially correct but they sure as hell did a good job glamorizing it. If men fell over me every time I acted like I didn’t catch on to their games and acted pleased with the lowest position possible even if I was smartest than most of the top men I may fall into it. From the way the character Peggy was first introduced the audience could tell she was well educated and self confident. But by the time the men in the office get around to her it’s as if she’s almost beaten down. Many times in the show Peggy knows more than her own good but she often gives into her temptation of wanting to be liked. When Peggy took a particular trip to the gynecologist it was clear that it wasn’t something she wanted to do. She was reading a book called “It’s you wedding night.” It is clear on her face that she doesn’t want to give in to what will make her popular at the office but it’s what she has to do to be idealized. The doctor comments that, “easy women don’t find husbands.” Peggy responds “I understand doctor I really am a responsible person.” Peggy understands that in the social world it is difficult to act as someone you are not which is why, even though she is unmarried and getting birth control pills, she still wants to remind the doctor (and herself) that she is responsible. The very next day Peggy gives herself up again to the media’s depiction of glamour and acts incapable of her own say and hooks up with in her eyes a superior man who she works for, Pete Campbell. I am very disappointed in women who are clearly smart and give in and demean themselves so low just because of what a man says. In my eyes the men were scared. They said things and used their power to put out ideas that destroyed women’s self-esteem. They didn’t want to be showed up by a girl so they made it unattractive to be smart or powerful or strong. They didn’t want their wives to leave them no matter how many times they cheated on them so they treated divorced women awfully and made it public that if you left your husband no one else wanted you. Men stick together back each other up when all women do is stab each other in the backs. Women often times backed up men anyways no matter how wrong and hurtful the opinions stated were. Betty was the “perfect” person. She had it all two cute kids a handsome husband and a beautiful home, (what else could a girl want?) In an earlier episode Betty knew how awfully her friends had treated the divorced woman, Helen Bishop, who was new to the neighborhood. So when Helen asked Betty to babysit her kids Betty was a little hesitant and worried about helping Helen out. Betty finally agreed to come over and help but only because she envied this woman’s independence (I mean wouldn’t?) It’s amazing to me how cautious women are about helping each other out because of what might be said about you. While men don’t second guess helping each other out. In my opinion, from the 1960’s when the show took place and 2012 when the show aired things haven’t changed much and that’s why I think it’s such a hit even fifty years later. Men decide what they want from women and do all they can to drill it into women’s minds that thats what they want too. Men have such high roles in the fashion industry deciding not only women’s fashion but also their own. If men can make super uncomfortable and unrealistic styles for women why don’t women do the same for men? Women still have a long way to go in getting back at men, but I think Mad Men is a good reminder that we’re not quite there yet and we need to keep working at it.
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