Gentle readers, you may have realized by now that your MatchGirl is a big fan of NPR and, living in Brooklyn, spends loads of time listening to WNYC on her lonely days off (which, being unemployed, is pretty much every day).At the moment, I am catching the end of today's Leonard Lopate show - a fascinating conversation about women in the workplace, as depicted in film from Baby Face from 1933, to Woman of The Year (Katharine Hepburn is always one of my favorites, especially when matching wits with Spencer Tracey) from 1942, to 9 to 5 from 1980. In between there are bits of conversations between Leonard, Molly Haskell and Barbara Ehrenreich about the leading women in more current (timely?) movies such as Knocked Up and The Devil Wears Prada, always realizing that their man, no matter how wimpy or dorky or doofus-y, is worth more than the career they have been striving for their whole lives.
Now, my dear ones, please do not misunderstand. I am a single girl, but I am definitely looking to meet Mister Right - I just think (raised by the strong, yet very happily married, mother that I have) that any guy who asks you to give up something, without compromise, that is so very important to you - that you have worked so hard to achieve - cannot be Mister Right, can he?
clearly you have not found a dorky enough doofus yet.
ReplyDeleteha! No. I haven't, though I'm into dorky (less so doofus-y).
ReplyDeleteI just think any relationship involves compromise on both parts - and in many of those films, the women drop everything that they have been striving for to please their man and the guy just keeps on keepin' on, never meeting the heroine even part way. That seems like a pretty unbalanced relationship to me ...
I don't think "Knocked Up" is a good movie to look at when considering relationship issues anyway.
ReplyDeleteSo I found this blog while trying to find if there are any clothing swaps still going on, and I also happen to have that book that MatchGirl/StickBoy is from so I think we should be friends.
ReplyDeleteI think that no one should demand/expect/force that you give up something, but if two people are weighing their options and mutually decide that one partner sacrifices something, another sacrifices another in order to reach a common goal- is something else.
ReplyDeleteI have working almost 8 years, nonstop out of college, for my "career", and this financial crisis made me I realize that I want to be a good partner for my geek-boy, and someday be a good mother. If that means life doesn't look like what I expected at 24, I'm cool with that. Social scientists argue that good family (and social) life makes more happy than a good career. Does that sound anti-feminist? gah. I think being critical of our hyper-productive/hyper consumptive work culture is more radical that buying into the claims of 1970s 2nd wave feminism.
I love your blog, BTW.
Love the blog. I'm also unemployed in Brooklyn. lol
ReplyDeleteMy blog is www.truetalesofanactress.blogspot.com
To clarify, I totally think that having a partner, a family, is very important. I want both of those things. I just don't think that one should have to sacrifice everything (compromise, sure, but sacrifice, no) in order to have it.
ReplyDeleteIf you listen to the segment, one of the guests makes a point that some of the endings were supposed to be different, but they tested poorly with audiences - most of whom were women, who wanted to see the heroine carried off in the arms of the leading man.
Meanwhile, I was a kid in the late 70s/early 80s and grew up with books like the Paper Bag Princess and a tool box, as well as Barbie in a business suit (pink, though it may have been), when we were told we could do anything the boys can do and that we didn't need to give up.
That's all I'm saying.