She does whatever she feels like, with no regard at all.
As a story is being told, you, as the story tellee, ride along with each turn it takes. Feelings and opinions form and evolve.
In some cases, you meet up with an unpredicted revelation (holy-CRAP-the-ventriloquist’s-friend-who-has-been-giving-him-advice-all-along-is-his-DUMMY) and then there is an instant readjustment of those previously formed feelings and opinions, as you apply the new knowledge to whatever you’d understood to be the truth.
On Mad Men there is so much happening, but happening slowly. Information is not always delivered straightforwardly. And in reaction I think that we, the viewers, form these opinions warily; we stave off making a judgment call for as long as possible. But you can’t just completely NOT emotionally invest.
(Tangentially–the characters themselves are, for the most part, distant from their feelings, and we see in them their tension as they struggle to maintain balance. And if you buy into what I’m describing, we, the viewers, are paralleling that; through the season we are stretched very thin and tight so as not to get overly involved, because there is so much we don’t understand. It is a fascinating dynamic.)
As we watched Season Two, we were most anxious to know about Peggy and the baby. We were getting tiny bits of information at a time. We were trying so hard to work it out. Okay, there’s a toddler in Anita’s home. Peggy is drinking. The state was somehow involved. She is distant from her nephew or is it her son. It wasn’t until The New Girl that it was all fully explained. (And as we’ve discussed here, not everyone was convinced, not even once they’d seen that Anita had been pregnant when Peggy was in the hospital, that the baby wasn’t Peggy’s. That’s how hesitant we are to commit to an opinion–Okay now I understand; Anita had a baby too. It’s hers. Final answer.)
Leading up to that moment, there was quite a bit of discussion (among the characters, and also here at the Basket) about Peggy being selfish. Anita thought so. And Anita kept at us. You’re not here with Ma enough, you never come to church, you’re hungover again. And we were also adding, wondering, …I’m here raising your kid while you run around carefree. And we weren’t sure. About anything, and that included her selfishness. We were thinking, Well, yeah. Maybe. Peggy wasn’t saying much, and so she wasn’t exactly wooing us to warm to her side. Peggy isn’t always that easy to like to begin with. And of course, as we kept reminding ourselves, we didn’t have all the facts yet.
Once we learned that no, Anita wasn’t raising Peggy’s baby, the cloud of mistrust about Peggy didn’t necessarily lift for us. And that is unusual. In a classic unfolding like I am describing, that moment would have brought us relief and hugs for Peggy. But we’d been uncomfortable for a long time. And of course, this is complicated. It pushed a lot of people’s buttons that Peggy gave up a baby. And also, perhaps to a degree, we had been influenced by Anita.
Those people in Manhattan? They are better than us. Because they want things they haven’t seen.
Plenty of people may still believe that Peggy is selfish. She has most certainly looked out for herself. She has made choices that most women, especially then, wouldn’t consider making–literally wouldn’t even know to consider it. Look at Joan and how she didn’t get that position in the TV department. Peggy would have fought for that job. Women today choose, more or less, between having careers, having babies, having both. Peggy didn’t have any examples of women making the kinds of choices she made, and yet her path continues to be clear for her; she sees it, straight in front of her. Hard, yes. She is not giddy over having given her baby away. But nor is she regretful.
So I just want to remind everyone that Anita has three children and a laid-up husband and a mom who dotes on her younger sister and insults her cooking. And she is an angry, bitter, disappointed woman. And I don’t blame her. But she is not raising Peggy’s baby.
I was in the laundromat and I took some coins off the machine and used them. I took the Lord’s name in vain three times and, and I’m so angry, Father. I’m so angry at my little sister. She’s causing my mother so much pain. She had a child out of wedlock. She seduced a married man. It’s a terrible sin, and she acts like it didn’t even happen. And I hate her for it. And I feel so guilty about it. But everyone keeps falling all over themselves trying to help her. And she goes on like nothing happened. Nothing at all. What about me, Father? My troubles. What about me being good, for what?
27 Responses to “WAS Peggy selfish?”
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Re-reading that confession is a revelation. At the time I was so angry at Anita for betraying Peggy, for abusing the sacrament of confession in order to "out" her sister. But now, I see how much she really aches with anger and frustration.
Absolutely.
No pun.
Good point. Plus Anita's confession is really the lament of all those 50's housewives. What did they get for all their devotion to husband, home and family? What good is being good, if that's the definition of it?
Also, I feel like I'm retarded lately but where is Peggy's baby? I too thought Anita was taking care of him.
Peggy gave her baby up for adoption. I believe through the state, if I understand correctly.
In The New Girl, you saw a very pregnant Anita visiting Peggy in the hospital. That is why she has a child approximately the age of Peggy's baby. Weiner was messing with us. He's fun like that.
I don't think Peggy was selfish – I think it was a mix of shock and denial. She gave birth to a baby – never having known she was pregnant. Most women have 9 months to get used to the idea. Peggy's denial was thick – and her shock at being pregnant was huge – and I think she just wanted it to GO AWAY – and for life to go on as normal. I don't think she gave any thought to 1) the child, 2) Pete's wishes, 3) being a mom/not being a mom – 4) any consequences – I think she just wanted to FLEE.
Now. Here is where our beloved show is truly brilliant. I think it gives insight into what Don Draper (or more like Dick Whitman) – was up to back in the day. He wanted to flee – he was in shock (after the explosion) – and he never gave thought to the consequences for him, for Dick's family, for Don's family etc. That's why that scene where Don comes to Peggy's bedside (which I thought was a dream the first time I saw it – I had no idea what was happening!) is so beautifully written.
(On a side note about 'consequences' – the only note that has ever not rung true for me with this show is when Betty and Don are in bed talking about his parents/family – and she says something like – 'I'd like to meet them someday'. Ah, what? You are married for like 8 years at this point? Obviously they must have had some GraceKellyesque, Philadephia, with $$$ kind of wedding – and she never met his parents and now wants to? He obviously did not have one DRAPER relative at that wedding. Didn't that give off a red flag? )
Stephanie, good call on their wedding. Unless he came up with some elaborate lie like they're international spies and he has no way to contact them. Which is unlikely.
I guess I thought that when Peggy told Pete that she gave the kid up for adoption she was lying. I really believed Anita was raising him. I don't know why I thought that. Huh.
It is a loaded question. When Anita reffers to Peggy being "selfish" what would be "unselfish"? GIving up her life to eak out an existance with her son? Taking the veil? A secular form of constant self flagellation?
In denying her pregnancy she was not thinking about options regarding the child she made. But she was also denying it because she did not see any options. I assume that she was ignorant of abortion, so she could not ask Joan to reffer her to some one. SC would not have held her job for her if she admit to the pregnancy. She had stopped being on speaking terms with Pete when she realized that he really was not paying attention to her feelings in the relationship. And she was sure that her community in Bay Ridge would not accept her without harsh judgement.
Quietly giving the kid up for adoption was the best option available for all involved.
BTW after careful consideration they could have probably had much the same story with less confusion if Peggy and Anita's children were of different sexes.
Also it is possible that Anita's "doctors did not think so, State of New York did not think so" is just about Peggy leaving the dogma of the Church. She commit adultry then got committted. Shouldn't she now be following everything to the letter now that she has made her mistake?
Ok, I just wanted to make a side comment on the whole baby situation.
So I was reading a book about the history of adoption (I was partially inspired by Mad Men to go to my local library to do some research on American History! Go me!
) and it said during the post-WII era, something around 80% of single, white, middle class working women who had children out of wedlock gave them up for adoption. (I'll have to double check on whether or not it was nationwide or just New England.)
I don't know about you, but I feel like Weiner sided with history when deciding on whether or not Peggy should have kept the baby.
I'm a huge supporter of historical accuracy, so personally, I actually support Peggy's decision.
I also feel that Peggy was a mix of selfishness AND selfLESSness. Selfishness in the things she would gain/keep from her decision, and selflessness in the things she had to give up/abandon.
Peggy being selfish? No. There is no way in that age, when there were still such things as social mores, that keeping the kid would have done any good for her or it. They would have been pariahs. Giving it up not only gave her a chance to get ahead, but let her child have a chance at not being the kid with the "Scarlet Letter" mommy.
Naive? If this had been the question, then yes, Peggy was incredibly naive.
Is it so bad to be selfish, anyway?
Yes, MarlyK. Pardon my French, but Ayn Rand can go fuck herself.
Tom, I don't think that's what MarlyK is asking. Or you're at least extrapolating an awful lot from one question.
Our culture functioned, and to a great extent still functions, on women sacrificing their selfishness. Men have men's lives, children have children's lives, and women have the lives of their husbands and children. Peggy doesn't want an Objectivist life, she simply wants Peggy's life.
Well, the question of the overall thread is whether or not Peggy is selfish because she gave away the baby and is going on with her life, or at least that what the words in the post discuss whether or not the author had a different intent.
Also, I wasn't saying MarlyK is an Ayn Rand fan. That's extrapolating on your part. But the question seemed like one of those frivolous, "Shouldn't there be me-time anyway?" and it just brings to my mind a lot of the sick culture of irresponsibility (i.e. the same kind that will have parents take toddlers to bloody, R-rated movies, other patrons' and their own child's well-being be damned) we have in this country, not any personal belief Marly may have.
There was a documentary about a computer game called Second Life and in it, a mother abandoned her two kids (9 and 13 if I remember correctly) to her parents because she met someone in game. Her excuse? "When was it going to be my time again? When was it going to be about me?"
Umm, how 'bout when your 9-year-old turns 18?
Peggy giving away her baby was for the best all around, not really selfish. The woman didn't even know she was pregnant for Christ's sake, and when she gets forceably shown, her first response is to hop off the table and find a doctor who will tell her different and she's only stopped by her collapse right there in the hospital. Mentally she couldn't have handled the baby.
I came to Mad Men late (season two) but am now a great fan. I would like to go on a little tangent here and point out the one thing in Anita's confession that annoyed the heck out of me when I first heard it. It was when she said about her sister, "She seduced a married man."
First, why did Anita automatically assume that Peggy did the seducing? Why didn't she think that a married man had taken advantage of her sister leaving her pregnant?
Second, why did Anita say he was a married man in the first place when that wasn't true? Pete and Peggy's tryst happened the night before Pete's wedding. If anyone is in the wrong here it was Pete. He was the one who was cheating on his bride-to-be just hours before their wedding.
The underlying belief here is that women are responsible for men's sexual behavior and that "stealing" another woman's man makes it it even worse. I find this annoying because, unfortunately, things really haven't changed. How many times have you read of some bad woman (Angelina Jolie) breaking up someone's (Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston) happy home?
Deborah grokked my meaning when I asked the question. There is good selfishness and bad selfishness. I think Hillel said it best when he asked: "If I am not for myself, then who will be? If I am only for myself, then what kind of man am I? If not now, when?" And for most of history, we women have been encouraged to automatically associate selflessness with goodness, when it is not necessarily so.
I see what you mean.
I hoped you understand where I was coming from. There's an air of people wanting to have their cake and eat it too around, without people realizing that on some things something has got to give, and a lot of times (like having kids for example) you're engaging in unwritten social contracts that override your own petty desires.
La peregrina yes the "she seduced a married man" was presumptuous and accusitory. It showed that her anger was blinding, and just accusitory. It showed she could not understand her sister, and was unable to be a nonjudging, forgiving, or comforting for her. She did not care why her sister slept with a man out of wedlock, and finding out that he was married to some one else just gave reason for righteous indignation.
Simmilarly nothing their mother did indicated that she was caused pain by anything Peggy did other than being in pain. Why demand more mea culpas from her. It was really a lot of misdirected anger, and in that she really paints her sister up as some one ugly. I am going to chalk it up to Anita having a bad, day/week/month, whatever time period. She has reasons to be angry, just not really at Peggy.
But the bigger lie was that Peggy was acting like nothing happened. The anger insident that triggers the confession is that Peggy was called into the office and could not go to Church! Peggy has been all (well almost) work this past season, and not socializing that well within it. There is a kind of self sacrifice going on there, though it is not for the baby, it is sort of about the baby.
MarlyK, Deborah and Tom bring up something interesting, which is that for women it is always seen as noble ot be visibly suffering. The whole weight of the world on their shoulders and they just have to move with it giving no thought to direction or whatever. The idea is set up that they will be awarded for the noble suffering in heaven. It is a very narrow view of how to demonstrate faith, and it can be as selfish as any other action.
"She is not giddy over having given her baby away. But nor is she regretful."
I don't know that she isn't regretful. She's very contained, and she would have to be a lot colder than I believe her to be for her to have no regrets, and to not miss and wonder and possibly even ache for her child. Peggy is also very smart and practical, and given the times and her age and situation, it was in the best interest of the child to be placed for adoption.
But, does Peggy know for a fact that her child has been placed in a loving home, rather than still awaiting adoption at an orphanage? In all likelihood, she has no idea where her child is because the concept of open adoptions probably wasn't around then. Plus, she was in an extremely fragile state after she had the baby, so meeting with and agreeing on a specific couple to take her child also didn't happen.
I don't think Peggy was selfish at all. I think she did the right thing by giving her child up for adoption, and she knows it, but I think she has suffered a lot after the fact, for a variety of reasons.
I think it is pretty clear that Peggy has been suffering all Season Two, not only with her decision to give her baby up, but also with the mental after-effects of the denial of the pregnancy in Season One. We only see her truly at peace after she confesses to Pete, and perhaps abandons all dreams (no matter how limited or fanciful they may have been) of a life with him. At the end of Season Two, her life is truly her own – she has stood up for herself, transformed her working relationships with Don, Pete, and Joan, made peace with her decision and regained some level of her faith, and even worked with the Church on her own terms.
Peggy was dealing with the aftermath of the whole baby situation–not just "giving him up." (Did she really never suspect her condition, lying in bed, unable to sleep? But she was on The Pill & Just Couldn't Be Pregnant. So she ignored & denied it as long as possible.) At the end of Season 1, I expected she would let the kid be adopted. (Quite anonymously.) I remember those days–keeping the kid would have been impossible outside of certain Bohemian circles. Especially since she would have lost her career as a result. Yes, she might have gotten some grudging support from Pete. A very broke Pete, since knowledge of the affair (however brief) would probably have ended his financially beneficial marriage.
Then they sprung that unidentified baby on us. Sometimes illegitimate kids were "adopted" by the family, with a fake story about some cousin across the country who died in a car crash. But the show-runners were only teasing us–he was Anita's!
Peggy may have regretted letting Pete in so easily. And has, no doubt, studied up on exactly how birth control pills work. But she knows she probably made the right decision in that particular situation–which she hopes to avoid in the future. She's getting on with her life.
Roberta, that first line may be the most devastating thing ever said on television – and Elizabeth Moss just nails it. The maturity her Peggy has achieved this last season is truly amazing – even better is that the show does not shy away from showing what it's cost her.
[...] stephanie had kind of a brilliant observation: …the only note that has ever not rung true for me with [...]
[...] stephanie had kind of a brilliant observation: …the only note that has ever not rung true for me with [...]
I think Peggy IS regretful of giving up the baby. She does what a lot of us do when we hurt: push the feelings away and focus on something else. She works hard and long, not just because she has had a taste of success, but to fill a void in herself. We see her vulnerable, too. Think of the scene in Maidenform (I think) when she is in the bathtub. Here, she is allowing herself to feel. And her words to Pete that Roberta quoted? There is less of her now.
She may be selfish, but what choice does she have?