There’s been a great deal of discussion in comments about Betty calling herself her father’s “little girl,” and behaving like one, even eating the peach that had been bought for the real little girl. And Basketcases are asking, What happened to the Betty of the latter half of Season 2? The Betty that stood up against Don’s relentless denial, kicked him out, and told him things weren’t that different with him gone?
I don’t think Betty has regressed because of pregnancy. I think she chose. Helen Bishop told her, “The hardest part is realizing you’re in charge,” and ultimately, Betty couldn’t take it.
Francine (come back, Anne Dudek!) knew of a doctor in Albany; that’s only a two-hour drive. Betty seemed ready to go. Instead, she had her fling in the back of a bar, ate some chicken, and invited Don back home. She placed a cap on her flirtation with freedom and went back to the way life had been. She told Helen “Sometimes I feel like I’ll float away, if Don isn’t holding me down.” She chose not to float away and now she clings to that, just as she clings to being Gene’s “little girl” while he tries to pry her grip loose long enough to show her that folder.
77 Responses to “Betty made this little girl choice”
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I think her father observed that about her, too. During their conversation about his arrangements, he made a remark about her choosing to marry Don instead of fulfilling her potential…but in a way that indicated she did it because she was scared or didn't want to leave the security of being out on her own (or something).
I think she is the person this season who will take until the end to reveal something interesting, like the aftermath of her affair. Matt said it changed her but it won't be visible right away, I'm guessing we won't see that change until after the baby. Betty, for me, remains the most enigmatic, frustrating, and bizarre character on MM. Her actions are always strange.
If I had a nickel for every time an adult referred to him- or herself that way in time of crisis with a parent, I'd be a rich woman. Heck, even with a sibling – during my uncle's serious illness, I remember my mother sadly saying, "He's my baby brother." We never completely shed the familial roles were born with, and they rear their heads in time of crisis.
During my grandmother's last illness, a bunch of us (now adult) cousins stayed with her, camped out together on the floor like we had as children, The years melted away as we giggled and reminisced.
I have always felt this way about Betty. She did, after all, go to Bryn Mawr. Bryn Mawr is no finishing school. Some intellectual pedigree, or at least promise, has to be demonstrated to get in and stay in. Betty brought with her the early damage of whatever her home life was, but she also had – or acquired – tools of her own. She must have had some idea what her options were coming out of Bryn Mawr. She chose modeling. She initially did not choose to go out with Don. And then she accepted the fur, and Don, and the peopleless stranger he was. We can fault the times, the mores, Don’s sex appeal and lies, and we can also fault Betty – if only for choosing imperfectly and unwisely.
We've seen occasional flashes of "gutsy" Betty this season, e.g., when she told Don in Episode 3 "Oh we're going" when he rather meekly suggested that they skip the Roger-Jane soiree. But in general, I think your observations are dead on, she has "regressed" and it's not simply because of her "condition." For Betty, being a little girl is more convenient and less upsetting than being Helen Bishop, alone and single, with all the neighbor women pointing and staring. It's also better than being a model wandering the streets of New York looking for work, and probably even better than being a Butterfield 8 type girl than her old pal Juanita Carson. Plus, there is the fact that Don brought home a boat load of money when PPL bought out SC. Betty likes her creature comforts and enjoys having a certain amount of "status." And Don is suddenly so compliant — siding with Betty, trying not to cheat, being more of a parent, taking in Grandpa Gene, etc. What's not to love? I do think her pregnancy factors in to the extent it gives Betty an additional reason to postpone making some decisions about life and her marriage.
I think of Betty as someone who lives in a bubble. Sometimes life inside the bubble is just fine, like it seems to be right now. The bubble keeps out unpleasant things and you can pleasantly float along. Remember how she told Don in Episode 1, "I want our baby to come into our home at its best." The bubble is fantasy and when you're in the bubble floating along, you can dream all you want. But every now and again, somebody sticks a pin in the bubble (like Grandpa Gene did when he forced Betty to sit down and deal with his arrangements). And sometimes she sticks a pin in it herself, like when she threw Don out. But generally, life outside the bubble is grimy and to be avoided.
She's Gene's little girl because he's the character we've seen on screen. But from all the references to her, Ruth seemed only concerned about Betty's looks and ability catching a man. And Betty seems to treat Sally in much the same way, and I don't think it will end well. I was surprised that Ruth was such a independent career woman in her youth. I wonder what (the Depression? the War?) changed that she would raise Betty into someone so different.
I cannot think of anyone less likely to go to Bryn Mawr than Betty. It graduated some truly sterling women through the years, least of which Katharine Hepburn, and was not a place from which you went to NYC and became a model.Her father's comment that she failed to achieve her potential is telling.
I wonder if she decided to accept Don's courtship because she had been in over her head at college, couldn't keep up afterward and did not want to go home to Philadelphia with her tail between her legs. Besides being gorgeous, life with Don meant she could escape her upbringing.
I don't think that's true–the early '50s were very strange historically. Capable women opted out of education and into early marriage and childbearing. I am not sure what drove it–part of it may have been anxiety about the Depression "coming back" and so women were actively encouraged to leave the workforce so that men could have the jobs.
Family wage jobs were readily available to men–educated or not–so they were free to marry and start families because for the first time ever it was easy for a young man with a high school education to support a family. Then there was the postwar fatigue and the domesticity fad–maybe that was it.
Anyway, Betty is not the only underachieving woman of that era–I see her as the poster child for the misery that drove Betty Friedan to write "The Feminine Mystique."
I read on another MM site that Betty married Don because he is quite simply the hottest thing she's ever seen–the stereotype of a wife of her class and general neuroses is that she'd be shutting him down all the time, but she can't get enough of him. She's with Don because of sheer animal physical desire–that's kind of shameful for a woman of her class and era, and she's unwilling to admit it to herself.
Some fans have stated that the most recent manifestations of Betty's attitude is the result of an unwanted pregnancy. I'm sure that her exceedingly pregnant state is affecting her, but her Big Choice last season was not End the Pregnancy or Keep it. Her choice was Divorce Don or Take Him Back.
Abortion, which she discovered was possible if inconvenient, was part of the Divorce Don package. She would still have 2 kids. Perhaps the deal would allow her to keep the house, leaving her a divorced pariah in the Burbs. But on a smaller budget–no riding, little shopping, less Carla. Work? She's a bit up in years for modeling & has no other qualifications. (And certainly no other interests.) She & the other suburban wifies laughed at Helen Bishop for working in a shop. Dating? Slim pickings out there, and anything she might "catch" would be another Cheating Cheater. Her "test" with Arthur & Sara Beth proved people were Cheaters, which she confirmed with the guy in the bar. Yes, she could still attract men–more Cheaters.
Taking Don Back meant continued financial security & help with the kids. He would be chastened enough to be faithful–or at least discreet. Her evenings would include adult company–with Don in her bed at the end. Yes, she still wanted him.
Don came back from California wanting to make a new beginning. But her ever-inarticulate greeting made him think the pregnancy was the only reason she took him back. No further discussion was allowed. Could some event in the rest of the season wake her up? Might flashbacks explain more about her condition?
#9 That's a really good observation. Now that she knows all people are cheaters (according to her test), even herself, maybe Betty has on some level accepted Don's cheating. And if she accepted the cheating it would be really easy to just regress back and not risk losing your status, the riding, Carla, et al. But I do hope something does wake her up this season.
Ultimately, Betty has to confront Don about it again, and really get the truth on the table this time. Is that even possible at this point, and does she have the strength to do it? She seems to have no one to back her up at this point, if in fact she ever felt like she did – she's really in it alone.
Otherwise, she will never be able to move forward from all that betrayal — the cheating, the lying, the betrayal of confidence and trust with the psychiatrist (her husband and her doctor conspiring against her — talk about Betty having nowhere to turn after that!)
I'm really sympathizing with Betty all of a sudden. She's trapped.
The dam has to burst soon.
"I was surprised that Ruth was such a independent career woman in her youth. I wonder what (the Depression? the War?) changed that she would raise Betty into someone so different."
Yeah, that took me a bit aback, too. Maybe Ruth didn't enjoy her pre-motherhood successes as much as Gene admired them – maybe she thought of work, even a profession like drafting, as something a woman did to pass the time until she took up her "real" career of marriage and motherhood.
Or, Ruth might have simply transferred all the thought and energy she used in her old job outside the home to her new one inside it. Only instead of turning out the product of perfect technical drawings, her job was to trun out perfect children.
First of all, as I have stated in other threads, I hate the way Betty's been written this season. But MW has made the choice for her to be written this way, and he must have some reason for it, which will become apparent, hopefully, by the end of the season.
That said, is this regression really a choice? Or is it just Betty's only way of dealing with the Hobson's Choice she made in taking Don back last season?
We've gotten glimpses that neither of her parents were particularly nurturing of Betty as a child. They pretty much molded her into what their vision for her was. She may have come from money, but her parents were nouveax riche. No way a Main Line Philly woman would ever have worked as a draftsperson, nor would a Main Line Philly man joke about the Clap. Her father was self made and probably wanted to coddle and spoil his "Little Girl." Her mother's obsession with weight and appearance had to have a profound affect on her self image and psyche. She may have chosen to model because she didn't believe she was fit for anything else, as aside from a degree from Bryn Mawr, her looks were her only offering to the world. Then when she starts to make her way, her mother calls her a prostitute. Betty's looks have cursed her as much as they've helped her.
I think her outburst with her Father was as much about her inability to deal with the fact that she was soon to be parentless and become the senior generation of her own family. She's only 32-ish. That's a scary thing. Especially when you're not particularly close to your only sibling, and the family you married is a man you know virturally nothing about, who "has no people."
As for taking Don back, Betty showed tremendous fortitude and strength throwing him out in the first place. Even as she confronted him, he gas lighted her and lied right to her face. He wanted to come back several times and she refused him. So, he runs away. Betty had no idea where he was, and would have been right to think he may have been gone for good. She didn't break down, in fact, at that point she seemed to step in and try and mother those children, by baking cookies with them and buying Sally the riding boots and telling her the truth of what was going on. The decision was made and she was alone.
She finds out she's pregnant. Still has no idea where Don is, or if he's ever coming back. She enquires about an abortion. Yes, they were possible in 1962. But they were still illegal, and still "back alley" even if a doctor did perform it. And the stigma and guilt would have been a powerful influence. So what does she do? She goes horseback riding. A passive-aggressive abortifacient. Don returns and asks forgiveness, pleads with her to come home. She knows she's pregnant, but refuses him. She takes the kids to him. He asks her again to be together, she refuses. She goes to a bar and either in a "can't beat 'em/join 'em" moment, or one of revenge she has a one night stand with a stranger. Then goes horseback riding again. The world is in an uproar thinking nuclear armageddon is imminent. Don writes her an amazingly persuasive letter at which point she seemed to concede. Sometimes, the Devil you know is better than the Devil you don't. Did she really ever have a choice?
As for the regression? Is it the hormones? The fear and pain of the past year combined with the death of her parents? Is it resignation to her fate? Is she passive-aggressively rebelling against putting her marriage back together and having another child? Or all of the above?
I don't imagine killing the baby because it is inconvenient would be a typically early 1960s thing to do.
It is a shout out to the show that we get so involved in its characters. I don't think there is anything Betty can do that a large amount of the online communicty wouldn't find fault with. She is drawn rather extreme, and she is a woman that mostly women love to hate.
For example, how do we know that Betty maliciously eats Sally's peach thereby providing yet more proof of what a wretched mother Betty is? How does Betty know that the peaches were bought specifially for Sally and no one else should eat one? Betty is criticized if she doesnt' eat, then when she eats a healthy piece of fruit, she is criticized for practically committing child abuse by eating "Sally's" peach. Did grandpa buy only one peach?
Abused women typically try to leave abusive relationships many times before they actually do. Leaving that marriage at that point in time would have been foolish. How would she survive financially and of course she was not raised with the tools to survive emotionally. It can take some time to develop that, doubly hard while living in a world of gas lighting.
Marylou, you seem a little overwrought. No one has said that eating a peach is malicious or proof of bad motherhood. It's symbolic; we often see symbols on Mad Men; we can wonder (as we do in another thread) what destroying the ant farm means—perhaps a destruction of workers? That doesn't mean Don purposely destroyed the ant farm in order to destroy workers. Discussing the metaphorical meaning of things is part of what we do here. Eating Sally's peach can be symbolic of Betty taking something from Sally, or taking the child's role, without it being intentional on Betty's part, or being perceived that way by the real characters in the situation (just by the audience).
Whatever you may or may not imagine about abortion in the early 1960s, it was not uncommon. It was more dangerous and sometimes deadly, but for a wealthy woman it was accessible. There were legal ways to get an abortion for wealthy women; either travel (as Francine mentioned) or going to the right place. In 1963 there was one legal abortion for every 10,000 live births, and that doesn't include the illegal ones.
I agree that it is common for abused women to stay in the situation. It is terribly hard to leave.
For example, how do we know that Betty maliciously eats Sally’s peach thereby providing yet more proof of what a wretched mother Betty is?
WHAT??? What? She "maliciously" ate Sally's peach? She knew that the peach was for Sally?
We don't know that. In another thread, Betty was criticized for eating "Sally's peach" as just one more of the litany of criticisms at Betty for being exactly what she was raised to be and what society wanted from women at the time (and to a large extent still).
We were never shown that Betty knew the peach was for Sally. Betty was criticised for this (elsewhere) in line with (again in another thread) pulling a "cold bitch act" because Betty could not deal with the funeral/end of life arrangements talk, etc., etc.
Betty is in a situation women often find themselves in – damned no matter what she does and damned for being exactly what she was taught she should be.
What an insulting tone of voice. "what I may or may not imagine" "you seem overwrought."
You have just lost a reader and a former fan of the site.
I'm going to go a little further than Marylou. Betty is being criticized and deemed immature for staying in her marriage to Don. Yet, I don't recall anyone criticizing Don for clinging to a marriage that obviously does not satisfy him. He could have divorced Betty and continued to take responsibility for Sally and Bobby. I have only come across one thread that has criticized Don for his obssession in maintaining appearances. I have only come across one thread that criticized Don's failure to connect with Sally following his father-in-law's death.
Peggy has rarely been criticized for her superficial attempts to be the ultimate Manhattan career woman or her insecurities regarding her sexuality. No one has criticized Joan for making what I believe is the biggest mistake in her life by marrying the very man who had raped her, because she was desperate to acquire the illusion of wedded bliss. No one. The only ones, aside from Betty, who are heavily criticized for their mistakes and immature behavior are Pete, Paul and Roger. And Betty is the only major female character who is heavily criticized. I'm not claiming that Betty is perfect. But sometimes, the criticisms directed toward her come off as mindless bashing, because she doesn't adhere to the early 21st ideal of perfect motherhood.
Rosie, you were specifically banned, by me, from ever again mentioning "perfect motherhood" in relation to Betty. This is your last warning. Future posts will be deleted.
I agree with Rosie and Marylou that Betty gets way too much hatespeech directed at her on the blogs. I believe Marylou is reacting to the overall tone of various blogs, not specifically this one, and may come across a little enthusiastic, but I don't think her ideas are off.
Don can do all kinds of horrible things and he gets a pass or elaborate rationalizations, Betty can't do anything right.
My take on Betty is that it's a combination of being pregnant and having made the decision to stay with Don. She must have a buttload of shame to have caved in so completely after trying so hard to come to grips with her marriage. I have seen it before – you think you have the strength to stand up for yourself and you get dealt a curveball (unwanted pregnancy) and it tips the scales towards staying with the familiar.
It's hard to watch Betty this season, but I still have compassion for her situation. As usual, I have less for Don, but I'm obviously in the minority on that one, bigtime.
Donny and everyone else: Roberta and I don't have enough time to manage Basket of Kisses. There are all sorts of lovely improvements we'd like to make but that take too much time.
Therefore, we certainly don't have time to read other Mad Men blogs.
If you come here and continue arguments that are not happening here, you will confuse us, and if you are angry for no apparent reason (because it didn't happen here) you will probably piss us off. If it's not happening here we don't know what you're talking about.
Be fair. Argue the argument that's happening here, and if you've seen something that bothered you in another blog and would like to discuss it here, provide a quote and/or a link. You really can't blame me for having a strong reaction when you're bringing in ammunition from someone else's war.
Permanent change it hard. I could imagine that going from being the somewhat cosseted and kept wife of a succesful executive and standing on your own two feet entirely, would be a scary prospect. And though I fortunately haven't had to experience losing a parent, let alone both, it must be hard to go from being someone's child and at least knowing that there was someone who is "in charge" of you even if in reality the power has shifted, it is very powerful symbolically and psychologically. So, although I was stunned and yelled at the tv "you're a grown woman! You are being selfish, he's trying to help you, silly!" during the "arrangements" scene. Then, after some reflection, I became pretty sure the very idea of being 100% on your own as an adult must be a very scary prospect. So after losing her mother, and being separated for awhile, she is retreating to what is natural and more comfortable, which is being a kid. I think that most adults, in someways still feel like children at times and it can take a LOONNNNNGGG time to feel like a "real" grown-up no matter how old you are, or how many responsibilities you have, or as someone once told me "we are all immature sometimes". So in a way it makes sense for Betty to tell her father that she is still "his little girl" even though she is standing in her house, where he lives and has to be taken care of almost as much as a child, is 8-9 months pregnant and is the mother of 2, soon to be three. So, I'm not sure if she is truly "regressing" in the truest sense, but doing what we all do, moving forward a bit, stepping back a bit, sometimes to retreat, to go go what's safe.
Betty is a very complicated woman and is very fascinating to watch. She seems confident on the outside, but also seems very uncomfortable in her own skin. She is underselling herself in many ways, some of her own choosing and some of it is just the times she lives in. Also, although, someone pointed out that Bryn Mawr graduated many astounding women, I wonder if you looked at most of the graduates of the school from Betty's era, how many of them would have been career girls at that time and how many were married and had children and stayed-at-home. Even well educated women often had few options at that time for employment, and from what I understand it wasn't as easy for women to gain professional positions in keeping with their education (look at Joan). I'm also not even sure if most well-off parents were sending their daughters to college with the expectation for them to go out and work and "use" their education or if it was more of an advanced form of finishing school. Also, although Bryn Mawr was a girl's school, I would think they had a "brother" school and some parents were sending the girls to get their "M.R.S" as much as for their BA or BS, even if they did go to a girls school (and lots of the Ivy, Near Ivy and other high or even mid-tier schools still weren't taking women in Betty's day). I thnk Betty will be the most interesting to watch as the storm of the mid to late 60's come and how much she is willing to ride the wave of change or stick to what she was raised with and remain a wife and mother.
Also, as for her mothering, I'm sure she loves her kids very much, but she probably doesn't really know how to express it, or to be the warm, fuzzy, caring Mom we usually see, and prefer to see on tv. I'm sure she is doing her best, she is modeling what she saw her parents do. I mean even though we have given Gene credit for being a good grandpa, with Sally mostly, we also saw how gruff he was with the kids. I recall how after the $5 affair, how roughly he told Sally "get in here" when he wanted her to read and she really wasn't in trouble and at the time I thought, no wonder Betty barks at the kids, that is exactly how she was spoken to as a child. And even though Betty seems to want to go back to being a little girl in someways, as others have pointed out, so much of her dealing with Sally must be driven by her being ridiculed by her own mother (and probably other kids) for being "fat" as a child (hard to know how big she was b/c what we might consider just a little big or somewhat average today they would have called fat). Despite her icy veneer, I really do feel for Betty. She is as trapped by her looks (that she had to fight for in a way by becoming so slim) as much as she is trapped by her gender.
Sorry for the ramble, guess I had a lot to say today.
Dark Peggy, I had a conversation with my mother about her "arrangements." I know about her will and such. I could handle the conversation dispassionately, because I focused on paperwork and it was like doing my taxes or something. But if I actually form a thought about her eventual demise, I recoil and cry and recoil some more. You have no idea how complicated it is to type this without forming thoughts.
It is hard to watch Betty this season — but not impossible. I find I just have to watch her more carefully, catch the little things.
The way she slumped against that faux-Colonial pillar, when the cop told her Gene had died: I watch her for things like that.
I watch Betty this season the way I once watched my own mother, for signs — any sign at all, really — that she was engaged in her life. That she had any interest in continuing her role as my mom. My mom seemed a little better in the months each year when my Grandma arrived and stayed with us: one more body in that tiny house. Those crowded months gave my mom the help, and the emotional lift, that I think she needed.
Betty is withdrawn. She has been withdrawing a little more all the time, the way Don is withdrawing from work. She doesn't want to be pregnant; there are many times she doesn't want to be a mom, period. (Remember the scene of her talking with Arthur at the country club? Remember Don noticing? Remember what happened right afterward — the kids running up, shouting, "Mommy!"? I doubt that was an accident.)
But she has no choice: and now her life is filled with these unhappy reminders, not just of her "condition", but of her role, the very adultness of it, the fact that it is no one's but hers. There is no one else to whom she can delegate those kids, the fine details of their lives, the husband she's not even sure she likes anymore, the father she depends on who now depends on her … and who, so suddenly, just died.
Betty did not sign up for this. This is not the life she wanted with Don. She is monumentally disappointed, and unprepared, and she feels a sense of loss so deep she can't even mention it to anyone.
I don't doubt that Betty loves her kids. I never doubted that my own mom did, either. I always thought she was doing the best she could. But great pain creates a kind of emotional hibernation, and I think that's what we're seeing here.
Like Marylou, I'm leaving this site. It's apparent to me that Deborah and Roberta do not tolerate those views that do not adhere to theirs . . . especially when it comes to the character of Betty Draper. I will be sure to post this lack of tolerance on their part to other forums and websites.
It is one of the most unappealing things about Betty, this tendency to retreat into a pre-adult stage. She lets everyone around her make all of the decisions. She hates the setup but is unwilling to change it. It drives me crazy that she isn't even given agency over her house. It's "Don's house", therefore she can't let people in, discuss air conditioning, wear a bikini, reject his boss's advances. It reminds me of Henrik Ibsen's Doll House. She's not in charge. Her house isn't hers. Her money isn't hers. Her children aren't hers.
It's going to catch up with her soon. Drugs to lose the baby fat? Depression and nervous breakdown with the extra kid?
But now I think Don is catching on to the fact that Betty doesn't really want to be a mother. She's not really good at it. She finds the kids irritating. Some people are like that. I don't think it necessarily makes her bad mother of the year. How are you going to really know how you'll be as a parent until you've done it? But it's becoming obvious that she's not digging the mom thing.
I can picture Betty snapping one day. Maybe she'll contemplate leaving them.
But yeah, the infantilism in Betty drives me nuts. She could have had an abortion. She should have had one. But she went right back to being the child in her own house. That day in the doctor's office was one of Betty's turning points in life. She made a wrong turn and she's going to pay for it.
#22 Fair enough, Deb. But sometimes it's hard to remember where you read specific things and one can be driven to "speak louder" when there's a feeling one's views are being shouted down wherever you look.
What I love about BoK is that's it's where we pleasantly and respectfully discourse upon the ideas in MM. It's not where people flame each other.
#25 I think lots of people disagree with Deb & Roberta. They often disagree with each other.
Thst's it! I just cracked the Weiner code. He's replaying Henrik Ibsen. Don Draper is Peer Gynt, Betty Draper is Nora from A Doll's House, Joan is Hedda Gabler. It all makes perfect sense now.
riverdaughter,
In the early 60's, a home did belong to a man. If a woman worked, her wages were not considered part of taxable income. The entire structure of society was different.
I think that it was an immensely frustrating time, as Dark Peggy says. If you were female and you did go to a good university, you took courses that suggested that you could have an exciting and full life of your own. Business Management; Economics; Philosophy; Journalism (those last two were my mother's choices). You could imagine, even as you saw your college girlfriends peeling off and dropping out to marry and have babies, that something different was possible for you.
But the restrictions of the time still nudged most women towards the center of the same old corral. Most of them still ended up living in homes owned by their husbands, having more children than they had discussed having or planned to have, giving up their dreams of advanced degrees or great jobs.
Let's borrow the language of another great battle, and remember what can happen to a dream deferred. Let's imagine the children growing up around the dreamer, not knowing that they are the ones who aided in deferral of the dream.
My mother's dream actually did "sag/ like a heavy load." But we kids never knew what it was she was carrying, or why she was upset. We just knew that something was wrong, and that it had to do with us. I would not wish those feelings — hers, or ours — on anyone.
I remember Betty's day in the doctor's office. And at the beauty salon. And riding the horse. She searched for help, flat out asked for it, everywhere. She did everything she could. Being this pregnant is truly not her fault, and I feel for her.
If Matt weiner called me up tomorrow and asked me to write a happy ending for Don and Betty, I would have them sell the big house and move into the city. Betty would join the glamorous Met committee with Trudy in addition to riding in Central Park. The hours Don now spends commuting he would be able to spend at home, and Betty wouldn't feel like she was so cut off from him every time he went to work. They would have lunch together once a week, and Sally could visit Daddy at the office. Don can certainly afford to send the kids to whatever private school the Pryce kids are attending.
Of course, that would be the end of the series.
@30 Anne B
Nope, not buying it. I *know* that is the pressure of the times and all and what was expected of her. But we all gow up with family expectations. I am a child of the 60's-70's and I too had to buck a lot of expectations. It can be done even though there is a lot of pain associated with it. It's how women made progress in the 60's. We saw a similar thing happen with Peggy this season. She decided she didn't want Betty's lifestyle. She didn't want kids(right now), she doesn't want to be just a secretary and she doesn't want to live near her mother. She had to stand up to her mother and become an adult, which she does, admirably. Peggy is the kind of daughter *Gene* would have been proud of. She doesn't have to rely on a man to make her happy and secure.
Subverting the dominant paradigm is never easy but Helen Bishop did it. Peggy is doing it. Betty could have done it. She didn't. Can we stop making excuses for her? Sooner or later, she's going to have to grow up.
I'm not going to criticize Betty for doing what was expected in the 50's. She gave it the old college try and it simply doesn't work for her. But I *do* fault her for not having agency for herself. She could have had Don eating out of her hands if she had just not had an extra kid.
Too late for that.
Melissa, LOL.
… And one night, while packing for the move, Don and Carla are talking. They inadvertently invent yuppie day care. Early the next year, Carla opens her own, the first in the Northeast, right there in Ossining.
I see the beauty.
LOL! The more I think about the Ibsen connection, the more I am sure it is true. The references to Norwegians throughout the series makes sense.
Betty telling Arthur she's not sad, it's just that her family is Nordic.
Peggy telling her mom her new roomie is Norwegian instead of Swedish.
Too funny.
OMG! Peggy and Pete is a reverse, double toe, triple flip Miss Julie by Swedish August Strindberg! What a hoot!
"Subverting the dominant paradigm is never easy but Helen Bishop did it. Peggy is doing it. Betty could have done it. She didn’t. Can we stop making excuses for her?"
I personally don't make excuses, because I don't think any need to be made. Why can't every kid who grows up in the slums go on to be a Fortune 500 CEO? Why can't every medical researcher find the cure to a major disease? Why can't every blind person climb Mount Everest?
It's great and laudable when someone is able to achieve something extraordinary, but I don't hold it against the ordinary person who doesn't.
We're not talking about the ordinary person. If we were, there would be nothing even remotely interesting about Mad Men. Anita is an ordinary person. Hildy is an ordinary person. They are minor characters.
We are talking about beautiful and smart Betty Draper. She is the classic sufferer from the Feminine Mystique. She's the one Betty Friedan was talking about. And if it weren't for people like Betty, waking up from their torpor and leaving the husband and kids behind, figuratively or metaphorically, there would be precious little of a feminist movement in the 60's and 70's. Remember, there had to be women who broke through the suffocation of the times to serve as examples of how it was done. They had to summon up the courage to be their own persons even if it meant abandoning their children. Those of us who were children in that time period overheard our mothers talking about women like that. They weren't ordinary. They were examples, to be shunned or admired.
That's where Betty is headed. But first, she needs to go through a long winter of discontent.
Betty has spent 9 months gestating more than that baby. She seems like she's about to burst in more ways than one.
I'm not going to feel bad when strident, difficult people choose to take their strident difficulty elsewhere. We have thousands of readers here, many of whom are capable of being polite, engaged, and rambunctious in a good way. I'm not even going to apologize for sometimes being snarky — I get paid extra for that, you know.
It's not a matter of argument or disagreement and never has been. I think the vast majority of our Basketcases know that. To the best of my recollection, we have banned a total of four people who couldn't play nice, and three more (including the two today) have left voluntarily because they didn't like our way of doing things. That's seven out of thousands upon thousands over the course of two years. I'm comfortable with that track record.
Okay, so we've discovered the secret meaning behind Joan's Ibsen reference? I'm good with that.
So I thought I'd research Bryn Mawr for a bit of Betty Background–found this little tidbit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryn_Mawr_College
Bryn Mawr College now celebrates May Day on the first Sunday following the end of classes. Somewhat akin to a mini renaissance festival, it is a day long celebration in which students and faculty participate. The students dress in white and begin the day by feasting on strawberries and cream. Students then perform in a myriad of traditional parades, plays, and concerts including various cultural dancing display such as Maypole and Scottish Country dancing. Like Lantern Night and Parade Night, May Day ends in a Step Sing and then is concluded with the traditional showing of "The Philadelphia Story," starring alumna Katharine Hepburn.
It doesn't say how old the custom is there, but Sally's teacher could be an alumna of Betty's school.
Shit. I can't believe I missed all this.
Well, to me it's interesting to see ordinary people in extraordinary situations. Absolutely there had to be women leading the way, snd I'm grateful for them every day of my life, especially when I see how much further women have to go. But the women who just struggled along, doing the best they could with the tools they had to work with, facing dramatic problems like being married to someone as extraordinary as a Don Draper – that's dramatic and intersting to me, too.
Melissa, I agree. I don't think every woman has to be a trailblazer, and I have a great deal of sympathy for anyone who finds she or he is not, after all, heroic. I dislike Betty as a person; if we met, we would not be friends. But I have sympathy for her failure to be bigger than she is, for her little girl lostness, for having "the problem that has no name." I even have sympathy for the fact that she's not a good mother; she was really ill-prepared for motherhood, and maybe if there had been more choices open to her, she never would have had her first child at 23.
I dunno if it has to be that complicated not_B. I have pictures of me dancing around a maypole in nursery school around 1960 or so. I think it was a more widespread custom at least back then, not just a tradition at Bryn Mawr College (which by the way was my mother's alma mater. She ended up doing the Betty thing too, being a Main Line housewife staying home with the kids, although she was a lot more loving to me than Betty is to her kids!)
In Katharine Hepburn's "Me" there are pictures of her on May Day at Bryn Mawr. It was an interesting choice for her: she grew up in Connecticut and was much closer to other Seven Sisters schools — Vasser, Radcliffe, Wellesley — but she chose Bryn Mawr because of its reputation for high educational standards and because its women did things after graduation. (KH also married Ogden Ludlow Smith, but she went into acting and he trailed her.)
I'm totally fascinated by the idea of Betty as underachiever. A lot is making sense all of a sudden.
On the subject of maypoles, they're also an annual tradition at Matt's elementary school in Baltimore, which is also my daughter's alma mater. I'm new to the site–is there a thread somewhere about Betty's relationship with Viola and the way she leaves so much of the mothering of her own children to Carla? I'd really like to see more of Carla.
I'm going to guess that more women than not who graduated from Bryn Mawr, Vassar, and the other 7 Sisters in the 1950s became housewives. Of course some went on to exciting careers, but I highly doubt that Betty was considered an underachiever in those days.
Ah, Betty Draper: The Missing Years. Of course many of her classmates married right after college. They married the right sort of fellow, supported his career, raised cultured children & did volunteer work. Perhaps they dabbled in the arts. Instead, she went into modeling; her mother disapproved. Then she married Don: her father disapproved. For this they sent her to Bryn Mawr?
When did Happy Betty become Sad Betty? When did Don start having affairs? Did she ever wish she had paid more attention to the bluestockings who talked into the night about what they wanted to accomplish?
It should be said today – thank you, again, Deborah and Roberta for continuing and moderating basket of kisses for those of us who find MM so compelling. Betty's character brings out the pain and probably hits home to many of us on more than one level even though a generation or two are between us – watching MM we are voyeurs to the secrets we may have lived too – husbands cheat? self-sabotaging smart girl? unwanted pregnancy/walking coma? -annoying children? one night stand? hmm? Many of us can relate to Peggy too but we can really feel something is going to blow with Betty. You can only do things you are supposed to do, things good little girls are expected to do – for so long -marry, have a baby, be a mommy again and again, go to the hairdressers, make a nice house and when that's not really 'you', you figure 'that's life', until pow — the thunderbolt goes off — 'if I have enough guts I can start over!' That will be the end of Betty as daddy's little girl. (Unless Don takes this S&M thing to Betty and she role plays- ha!- not likely). She inherits enough money now to start over. This season is the calm before the lightning bolt. Not as exciting TV as last season right now to be in the 'calm' mode, but will set the contrast for what happens to the country from the assassination and Beatles on, in next 4-8 months – maybe that's next season. When the counter-culture hits home it WAS revolutionary if you lived in NYC, Boston, Berkeley areas. I was Sally's age and had a mom like Betty, fair beauty and all. Thanks to all for your wise comments, as always.
It will be very interesting to see Betty's response when The Feminine Mystique is published. I've thought for awhile that she has the potential for an instant transformation, leaving her marriage and family behind to become a feminist, searching for her own identity. At least that's what I thought last season when she had the strength to stand up to Don, but now I don't know. Giving her the benefit of the doubt, she may feel trapped by her pregnancy & may yet have the backbone to escape her unhappy life after the baby is born.
If Betty followed Peggy's path, I doubt she would be happy. I doubt she would be successful either. She's not dumb, obviously (I loved the malicious yet delightfully clever way she manipulated Sara Beth and Arthur into having an affair) But what field would suit Betty? I don't know. She's past modeling (and only a pawn to get Don during her failed attempt in S1). I don't think she would succeed as a copywriter.
She's not mature and doesn't "get" things like Peggy does. Her reaction to confronting Don about Bobbie Barrett: "She's so OLD!" shows was very superficial. She doesn't understand why anyone would pursue someone less attractive (Interestingly, as Don having a fling w/ an older woman, Roger was after a much younger woman). It will be interesting to see how she was treat baby #3 compared to Sally and Bobby. How she raises this kid will give us insight into how her character has changed, grown or regressed.
I think it was deliberate that it was a peach that Grandpa bought for Sally and Betty ate, because Peggy's mother calls her "Peaches". In the episode where Betty is orphaned, Peggy moves away from her mother.
I had no idea that Betty's school was considered so prestigious. She told her psychiatrist that her mother wanted her to find a man and that was it, so I'd assumed that was all her father wanted for her too. Maybe it wasn't?
Good input here – so many good posts it really has me thinking.
Betty is (in my opinion) the most interesting and enigmatic character on the show – yes, even surpassing Don. Her outlook and motivation absolutely fascinate me and I really root for her character.
We can look at her background and upbringing but ultimately we have to look at her actions to try and divine what is going on here. In S1, we see her venerability (the scene with Glen Bishop in the parking lot is heartbreaking) and ability to out fox the shrink. In S2 we learn that Betty’s power is something you can turn on and off – and she is well aware of it. She can set things in motion with a power Tony Soprano would envy – just ask Sara Beth. What we mostly learn is that she is a smart and intentional and wound up tight with no release. A smart, deep, compassionate, powerful character all wound up – well shoot, that is always interesting.
What doesn’t add up is the kids. She related to Glen but not Bobby or Sally. From the start the kids have been mostly annoying furniture to Betty (yet I agree she does love them). Something is going on here and I believe more is on the way.
So why does she keep the new baby? Not-bridget and Aran are right – her options are very limited after she stands up to Don and we know from interactions with Helen Bishop that she is more than smart enough to see into that crystal ball. She keeps the baby because it allows her to make her point and also deescalate the situation. Yes – kind of like the Cuban Missile Crisis. Like the Soviets and US, Don and Betty care about the appearance, the reputation, the humiliation even beyond the offensive action.
I’ve learned to trust MW – he is also smart and intentional. He has more up his sleeve developing Betty. Anne B is on target. We just have to wait and see and watch carefully.
She inherits enough money now to start over.
You’re assuming Gene didn’t leave it all, including the house, to Gloria. Maybe those fur coats are Betty’s inheritance. That’d be a blow, huh?
I second your praise, j-smad. As usual, by the time I get here and read all the comments, most of my thoughts have been covered, so I have little to add. One thing though, as j-smad mentioned, I can relate to both Peggy and Betty. I think they have some similarities regarding the sheltered upbringing thing. Mine was that way as well. I didn’t grow up to be the mom but to be the “career girl” as my parents would put it. I was expected to be the the other, however. Regardless, I can see the break coming for both of them. Peggy through her wall of doubt about her own sexuality and place in the world; and Betty once this third child is born and perhaps even with some of Daddy’s money as her very own nest egg.
One other note, way off topic: I was thinking about Sally’s driving in “The Arrangements.” She seemed to relish in the power of that skill and control. In season one, Betty’s hands gave out while she was driving. Then later that season, I believe it was in “The Long Weekend” Betty and Don are arguing about when he’ll head up to Cape May and Betty said to him: “You hate the way I drive? My father taught me.” It seems he started to teach Sally as well.
Just an off the wall observation. Back to your regularly scheduled programming.
I really love this idea of Betty as the underachiever too. It opens so many excuses for me to rewatch the series!
About Betty’s choice to stay with Don: I think we saw the very moment she made that choice at the end of S2 when the words “I’m pregnant” catch in her throat at the dinner table. I’ve always read that scene as though she intended to tell Don that she’d had that tryst and wanted out: “I … [clears throat] Iii’m pregnant.” She had that moment that so many of us have — the words she wanted and needed to say just wouldn’t come out. Betty’s scene contrasts so starkly with Peggy’s with Pete, where Peggy tells him about her own pregnancy and his “lost” child. Peggy follows through; Betty falters. Peggy moves ahead in S3; Betty stagnates. I think her disappointment with herself (contempt for herself?) within that moment at the table with Don is the seed for her indifference or cruelty to everyone around her, especially Gene and Sally.
I do think, though, that in S3, we see Don and Betty working together in a way that we hadn’t before. To me, Betty seems more powerful, but in an uncomfortable, blunt, grumpy way. Maybe the reason so many find it hard to watch her this season is that she’s tapping into a disillusioned, bitter place we’ve all been in (or seen our mothers and fathers in) but don’t want to recognize.
I find Betty really interesting and so emblematic of the Age of Anxiety, maybe because I just recently watched Revolutionary Road (to be honest, I preferred the book to the movie). She also reminds me of the unhappy mother in The Hours (who had a _good_ husband, but nevertheless went off the rails), and the Julia Stiles character in Mona Lisa Smile (who gave up going to law school at Yale to be a housewife). Truly, the problem that has no name. But I can't say I'm on board with the "Betty is an underachiever" theory, not that it's not interesting. But underachieving in comparison to what standard? By all accounts for that time period, she did very well–she had a fun early 20s going to Rome, modeling, etc., and then she settled down in the country with a beautiful house, two kids, and a successful husband. Remember Juanita's remark to her update "of course you do." I don't think she's dumb–I think she's emotionally numb (her conversion disorder is numb hands). Maybe it's just the book snob in me, but her reading choices–F. Scott Fitzgerald (Three Sundays) and Katherine Anne Porter (some other episode) are quite good, and with KAP, she's really up to date with the contemporary fiction of her time. It's Don who's told "you wouldn't like it" when he sees a Frank O'Hara book, and we hardly see him read anything but newspapers.
She may have a very enigmatic interior life, but she has an intellectual life–we just don't see it expressed much. Who would she talk to about her books and thoughts? Don, her similarly emotionally repressed husband? Francine, her gossipy friend? (I hope Francine is more developed as a character). I wish she had become friends with Helen Bishop. Both are cosmopolitan, well traveled, interesting women. But we only see her emotional, interior life in distress, so we see her reach out to boys and men who seem to see the sadness within (Glenn and Arthur) rather than her intellectual abilities. I do wish she was less curt with the children (and this curtness has increased steadily from S1 to S2 to S3), but now that I've watched other examples of motherhood from the Age of Anxiety, Betty seems to have the most to deal with, and yet is actually the least monstrous. Well, until she explodes. Which I am kind of waiting for. I hope for happy endings. But right now, they're not very likeable people, but they are sympathetic and interesting.
Belle Lettre, you make a good case for Betty having an intellectual life. Good catch. Thanks for pointing out her reading habits. But then you go on to ask who would Betty talk about books with? Um. . .how about her husband? Husbands and wives, in good marriages, are companions to one another, sharing interests. I have decided that Don's affairs are primarily motivated by two strands: in one, he'll have sex when it's offered and/or easy but in the other, he is attracted to powerful, intelligent women. He likes women. He likes women with spark. I think he spotted Peggy, in the secretarial pool, because he spotted spark in her. I think he'd love to have an intellectually exciting relationship with Betty. I think he checked out because as he gradually realized he ahd married a girl-woman, he drifted away. What does Betty care about? People ahve to take responsibilty for their own expereinces in life. Other people can't make us happy. We have to decided what we want for ourselves and then go about creating it. Don wanted a financilaly successful, stimulating career, a beautiful wife, a happy family (at least I think so) . . and he is wondering now why he has the externals but his life is not coming together and there is a big gaping hole where his life compainion could be. Betty makes no effort, that we see, to engage Don on any level other than having Don admire her appearance, treat her like a princess. . . I have never seen her ask for intellectual exchange with Don. I guess I haven't seen Don turn to Betty for intellgent company . . . but I have decided they have long since checked out of trying to relate to one another. . .
I think it is just fine that Betty is querulous while she is pregnant, raising a family, tending to her senile/then dead father, trying to trust her unfaithful man once more . .not all women have smooth pregnancies. Some pregnancies really suck.
I like how Don is nice to Betty, letting the dad move in, offering to run out for the chicken, going to the party even ethough he didn't want to because Betty wanted to .. these are small, floundering steps to be a good husband. .
sometimes marriages have been too wounded and couples can't find their way back to one another. Sometimes couples find that they never had the kind of connection they thought they had. I think this might be the case with the Drapers. They chose their life mates for wrong reasons. Neither of them began the marriage with the foundation of having seen a happy marriage. .
a comment about Betty's mother being a draftsman. . . Lots of women had short careers before marrying and/or starting to have children, even if they only worked professionally a few years. I don't htink the fact that Betty's mother had a job that required some professional skill made her a feminist. My grandmother graduated from college in 1922, she worked a few years, then married my grandpa and had my mom in 1929. . . my grandmother had a professional 'career' but she never worked outside thehome once she married. Lots of women worked like Betty's mom. My grandma's baby sister? She got a Masters degree in the 1920's, married, never got pregnant but wanted to and because of the no babies, she worked in the world, as aprofesisonal, until she retired at 65. But my great aunt effie would have become a homemaker if she had gotten pregnant. She liked working and my great grandparents sent aoo their nine kids to college . but the women never expected to work. . . . some of them did. . another great aunt quite work, had kids, but when divorced, she was forced to work and then she did. . .
women have always made choices that were not ALWAYS homemaker. . . women always worked some if they wished and needed to . . . but we can't draw a lot of specific meaning from Betty's mom having worked. . . working then staying home was a very normal pattern for Betty's mom's generation.
In general, people did not encourage girls to pursue lifelong paid employment. Gosh, I graduated collge in 1975, law school in 1979. . . then I had a kid in 1982 and . . stayed home with her. I was raised to think I would go to school, then work . . . UNTIL i decided to stay home. . .and I was raised in Sally Draper's generation. I was born in 1953, Sally probably born in 1954. I am confused when so many people nowadays seem to think at some point all women changed and stopped wanting to stay home.
I think women still want to be home with their kids and they work because they need the money. I know few mothers who place more importance on their professional job than their mothering job. I don't understand why in discussions about Mad Men people seem to think all women want to work now. They don't. The ones that do are just about as rare as Peggy Olson seems to be. . if anything has changed, it is that women aren't assumed to make the homemaker choice. . .
Deborah, I don't want to get banned from this site after just having discovered it . . . tonight, the past hour or so, is my first exposure to this wonderful blog about MM. . but when I read your observation, explicitly directed at Mary Lou, suggesting she was overwrought, I was taken aback. that seems a little heavyhanded to me. I did not get, at all, that Mary Lou had cross some kind of line. She said what she was thinking and apparently you have different thoughts: how does that add up to overwrought?
I have not read Rosie's past history on this blog but you mention that she had been warned about talking about Betty being perfect and now she was banned. Does this mean if I talk about Betty being perfect that I would be banned? or if I share thoughts that you disagree with, that I would be banned? I like it when blogs are monitored and disruptive people, flamers, are banned . . but I did not experince Rosie's comments in this conversational thread as the least big flaming.
So now I am on edge, wondering what kind of environment this blog is. I guess I'll find out. My habit, when posting on blogs which I do a lot, is to speak politely but to feel that I am free to disagree so long as I do not attack other commentators when I voice divergent opinions. But your comments here sounded like, maybe, I'm not sure, I guess I'm asking, that people whose ideas are different form yours are overwrought and should be banished. Am I understanding you? This blog looks fun and if you are getting thousands in your traffic counts, you are doing something right. . . but this your comments in this one thread make me uneasy. Am I free to say what I think?
tizzie, as I stated, we have banned very few of the thousands who post here. Rosie continued to as "why you all" (always accusatory, always "you") thought Betty had to be a perfect mother. We had a long discussion about it. She asked again. I counted a total of 10 posts in 2 days asking the same question, no matter how many times we discussed it. (She did this with other topics as well.) I told her to drop the subject. She didn't.
If you're worried about how strict the moderation is, even after all that, all I did was warn her a second time. She left voluntarily.
"About" has our comment policy.
tizzielish: Just an somebody who posts here, I'd like to mention that (1) nobody was banned yesterday and (2) the person who was chastised (and her sidekick) had repeatedly (and boy, do I mean repeatedly) complained about the ideas that other people were "allowed" to post. Using the same phrases, over & over, she complained about other posters' opinions–not the excellent show most of us are here to discuss at this very friendly site.
The main offender threatened to cause trouble for this site at other sites as she flounced off. I doubt she'll find allies since, under other user names, she has posted identical criticism of other posters' ideas on several Mad Men sites. Again, using identical words, posted repeatedly! In fact, a mod at TwoP asked her to "discuss the show, not the Boards."
If we had official mods here besides the estimable Lipp Sisters–who are very busy–I might be accused of Junior Modding. I'd like to repeat that these are just my personal observations.
Please, do read some of that history!
not_Bridget, I didn't know that about TWoP. I kind of feel better now.
tizzielish: No, women do NOT really want to give up their careers at some point and stay home with their kids. Some women like their kids and their careers and don't want to give up either for the other, just like men. I love my kids. Truly I do. As much or more than moms who stay home. But if I were cooped up in the house with them 24/7, just to prove a point that I am a *good mom*, I would be stark raving nuts within a few weeks. I'm sorry but the intellectual life of the suburban stay-at-home moms is about as stimulating as brick. I HATE going to neighborhood parties where all the guys hang out around the beer ball and all the women sit in the living room around the most newly delivered mother and talk about labor stories and menstrual periods. Like there is nothing else going on in the world. And god help you if you cross the line of demarcation of the sexes. This is the 21st century and the suburbs have not changed substantially from Betty and Francine's days. Well, except for the chain smoking and plastic bags. I take that back. Now, we do give these women something to do. We make them obsess over every physical threat to their children from playground equipment to abduction. No hypothetical scenario is too remote or improbable. He have a nation of stressed out women looking for the predator and danger in every encounter and product. That's what suburban women spend their time doing. They out rival each other in the safety area. What a colossal waste of college educated career women and lawyers.
You couldn't pay me enough money to spend time with them. And I'm sorry if that offends anyone on this blog but I do not envy your lives one single iota. I do more in my day that you guys do in a week and I cherish my kid. But she doesn't need me to be home and miserable when she is in school and, happily, I have no reason to be home.
@59: I'm not sure that Don would ever have sought intellectual companionship from Betty. Remember what he tells the first Mrs. Draper about Betty: "I like how she looks at me." He wins this model with a fur coat, after all. I don't get the impression that Betty ever presented herself as intelligent, nor does Don look for it under the surface.
@62: I'm a single woman without kids, but I moved recently from a university town neighboring a major metropolitan area to a medium-sized city smack in the Bible Belt for a job. The thing I miss more than anything else — family, non-chain restaurants, a living music and arts scene — is someone to chat with about the media and literature we're consuming on a level beyond "I liked it." (So, thanks to this blog for making up for a little of my brain-drought!)
This is the best site on Mad Men & its only problem is the lack of an Edit button. (Which is probably expensive…notes "Donate" button….)
If I could, I'd edit the last sentence in my note to tizzielish thus:
Please, do read some of that history if you want to understand the recent dustup. Or be glad you missed it and just tell us more about what you think about our favorite show.
I have no idea how to allow users to edit comments. I don't think this software allows for it.
yikes portia. tell us how you really feel.
If you ask me, that other site takes the modding a bit too far. After the episode where Greg and Joan try to work out the etiquette for the dinner party, they quashed a discussion on the history and purpose of etiquette because they only want discussion of what was on the screen. They quashed a discussion comparing and contrasting Betty to real-life mothers for the same reason. If they disallow context being brought into the discussion, it dooms it to superficialities.
There are times when I'm of the minority opinion here, and times when I truly don't understand where other commenters are coming from. But I've always done my best to be respectful and have always received the same and more, in return. I absolutely treasure that atmosphere.
I was treated quite rudely simply for expressing my opinion, which opinion admittedly is in the minority. I am not a "side kick" of anyone, nor do I even personally know anyone on this site. And I have not posted much at all, being quite busy with work, usually reading and NOT posting. Despite personally disagreeing with much of the opinion, including Deborah's, I have been polite and quite supportive and happy for the Lipp Sisters' success with this blog, even congratulating Deborah just yesterday on her news paper article. Only to be called names and insulted for having a strong opinion that differs from the majority.
In looking for other blogs, hopefully to find a place where views that differ can be expressed, I came upon an article highlighting this very issue of fan hatred toward the Betty character. I am not computer savvy and cannot do a link, so the web address is below. Others have noticed the misogynistic Betty hatred and the vitriol directed at fans who question that.
http://ashmh.livejournal.com/96254.html
Marylou, you said you left. Yet you are here. You are welcome to be here, but please don't create a lot of drama on the boards by complaining about how you are treated. We are all here to discuss Mad Men, its events, characters, plots, and subtexts. We are not here to bitch about the rest of the Internet, including other Mad Men discussions.
I have not called you any names, nor do I think I was rude. I may have been snarky. I'm pretty confused as to how anyone can read this blog and expect a Lipp Sister not to be snarky. I called you "overwrought," which you disliked, yet you were clearly using strongly emotional language: "malicious," "wretched," "practically committing child abuse" — this is not "upset, excited"?
You were also upset that I said "may or may not imagine" in response to a comment that began "I don’t imagine."
You will be very happy here discussing the show, and considerably less happy complaining about how other people discuss the show. I very much like what they said at TWoP — discuss the show, not the boards — and I will be incorporating something like it into our own comment policy.
The Internet is a great place. People can post about TV shows they love. Or go elsewhere & post about fans of those TV shows.
Freedom of choice!
Thinking about Betty, I recalled two movie characters, Laura Brown from "The Hours," and Elena Hood from "The Ice Storm." Laura Brown was played by Julianne Moore. She was an unhappy '50s housewife, pregnant with her second child. Eventually, after she had her second baby, she left her husband and both kids. I suppose it's unlikely that Betty Draper, after baby #3 comes, would do this — I still think she is in her bubble and likes the financial security Don provides — but with Betty, there is an element of the unpredictable where you just never know what she might do. Then, in the Ice Storm, Joan Allen plays Elena Hood, a bored '70s housewife. The movie is set in 1973, so ten years past where we are now in Mad Men. In some ways, I think Elena Hood is just like Betty Draper, just ten years older — a very attractive woman with an education and alot of potential that seems not to have been used, uncertain about her identity and place in the world, and in a not great marriage. Elena's husband, played by Kevin Kline, is a philanderer like Don Draper, and Elena "gets even" by having a quickie fling with a neighbor. The story is set in the Connecticut suburbs, so not too dissimilar to Ossining.
Where is Francine, anyway? Four episodes and we haven't even heard her name, let alone seen her? Is she going to be the new Dale?
Would Betty have taken Don back if she hadn't gotten pregnant? Probably — that note was pretty persuasive. But now she knows she's pretty much stuck, and thanks to the stick pin, she probably knows he's still screwing around, and she can't do much but stew (sorry) about it. Betty probably could have gotten divorced because infidelity was considered "fault," but having to come up with enough evidence in court (would the stick pin be enough?), putting the kids through all that, getting snubbed by her friends — I don't think she could have gone through with it. She probably wouldn't have to work, since Don is loaded, but it's entirely possible she doesn't know that, and pictures herself with some dreary retail job like Helen Bishop's.
There is also the way that pregnancy makes you feel so vulnerable. I never felt so in need of help and protection than when I was teetering around with a giant belly (and then with a tiny fragile infant). That in and of itself can make you feel like you want to retreat to the safety of being a little girl, with men who will love you and take care of things for you.
I think not_bridget has great insights.
Wow, also find Portia's comments a little too intense and personal for this blog. And hurtful to women who are not in fact dumb and boring but do stay at home with their kids.
jeesh.
I am always late to the party, especially when it concerns Betty!!
Betty is my favourite character. She strikes me like an invisible queen, looking over her realm and silently furious at Don's consistent infidelity.
I hope I am not the only one who wants Betty to have an affair with the bloke from 3×03.
And 100% co-sign with #55 who talks about how Betty isn't dumn. CO-SIGN!