I'm starting to find it painful

[maevele]

to read big discussions of Mad Men, where people talk about how awful, or unloveable, horrible mother, bad person, or cold and distant Betty is. I read Betty as a depressive, in a major way, and all the things people use as examples of what a horriblebad person she is, look to me like signs and symptoms that are really familiar to me. So if she's so horrible, what does that make me?

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I'm with you about Betty Draper. More than anything, I feel bad for her and want her to be able to do what she really wants. She reminds me a lot of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, or even the protagonist from The Awakening...women who ended up with a husband and kids because that was what they were supposed to do, not necessarily what they wanted. When Betty and Don were married (late 40s/early 50s?), it was still common practice for women to get jobs until they got married, and then quit to be homemakers. For Betty, a woman who seems to thrive in places with opportunities to be social, particularly where she can be valued as an individual with good ideas and talents, a home where she essentially only bosses around a nanny/housekeeper is not the place for her. She is entirely unfulfilled, and yet can do nothing about it because it would be completely unacceptable for her to break outside of her life. Just look at how the divorced woman down the street was treated.

Instead, Betty is forced to conform to the standards set before her, while have control over only a very small arenas in here life: the children, the household, and her own feelings. The children and household, representing essentially her prison, are of little interest to her. This is why she comes off as being a bad parent ("go bang your head against a wall" isn't considered genius advice for 10 year olds, though this kind of "go away" parenting seems like it was way more common in the 50s and 60s than is it today). Her only true freedoms come in the form of social activism and extramarital indiscretions. Although she doesn't always act on her desires for other men, she has, more than once, at least been tempted to do so. While Betty by nature may not be a sexually promiscuous creature, she uses sex as a method of control over her life.

Is Betty a bad parent? I think by today's standards, probably, but it's unfair to judge someone from a different time period in this way. Today we have BabyBjorns. Can you imagine Betty or, god forbid, Don walking around with a baby strapped to them for supreme closeness and maximum bonding? That shit just wouldn't fly back in the day. While I think there is a lot to be said for current American parenting trends, I also think there are some delightfully simple things about 60's parenting that provided children with a sense of independence, boldness, strength, and creativity that not everyone encounters today. Of course, you could still smack your kids around a whole lot in the 60's, so it's not like we gave up on a perfect system or anything.

As far as your last question goes, I obviously don't know anything about how you are as a parent, but the fact that you're worried about what kind of parent you are says a lot. It's like they say: if you ask "am I crazy?" then the answer is no...the people who never ask are the ones you have to worry about. Being depressed or otherwise having emotional/mental difficulties does not make one a bad parent, it can just make life harder for you and possibly your offspring. You can be similar to Betty Draper and still be miles ahead of her in parenting. Non-parents (yo!) often assume that every single decision and action that a parent makes/does must be 100% for the benefit of the child or else it is a selfish, douchey move. People in the real world understand that if you live your life entirely for the child and never take care of your own needs, you will burn out and go nuts. It's a delicate balance, yes, but it's one that is obviously necessary. Betty Draper can't find that balance because she is not allowed to. Fortunately, things are at least slightly better for women today than in the 60's, so you at least have the opportunity to be a creative, independent creature that Betty can't be.

Amber
P.S. I'm several episodes behind, so I'm sure I'm missing out on a huge chunk of relevant material.

[vee-ecks.livejournal.com]

She's not just depressed, she acts out in weird ways: sexually, with that kid in the first season, remember that? There's abusive secret crap all over her family, clearly, and...she's a little sociopathic. She doesn't have a job, somebody else takes care of her kids, and she likes to fuck with other people's lives a little when she's bored.

Or that was the case until recently, anyway. Everybody's gotten way too niced up and together, lately, on that show, and I'm starting to lose interest.

[vee-ecks.livejournal.com]

Oh, and if we're half-assed guessing diagnoses: borderline.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

I think me seeing it as depression may be a matter of when all you have is a hammer, things look like nails. depression being what i know best, and seeing behaviors I recognize from my experience, it reads as depressive behavior to me

[lady-alyria.livejournal.com]

I never made it past episode 5 of that show. I just couldn't get into it.

[pretzelcoatl.livejournal.com]

How do they find Don in comparison?

[maevele.livejournal.com]

as a charming asshole, mostly, some pity him, some think he's just an asshole, some actively hate him, but I haven't seen the level of disdain that Betty gets thrown onto Don. or perhaps it is there, but I don't see myself in Don as I do in Betty by seeing her as a depressive. either way, the things she is demeaned for, say over at twop, are the things where I recognize my symptoms in her.

[pretzelcoatl.livejournal.com]

Lol, TWOP definitely attracts that kind of thing. I got sick of reading the forums because there was a higher than average amount of "snark" relating to how the actresses in different shows look. Gross.

[vee-ecks.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they niced up Don, too. Like I said, dunno if I'm going to keep watching.