Gender On Television: It's Like Feminism Never Happened

[lucindabelle]

Yes I think carrie was kind of like Jennifer Aniston in t hat she seemed to want kids theoretically at least but it just never happened. It would be interesting to catch up with those characters now in terms of age stereotypes, because carrie would now be 45 and samantha well over 50... But the movies went weird directions and in the end women in their 40s don't get to be cute, fashionable flirtatious. I agree about the older characters on the good wife but frankly a woman who is over 60 and I have zero in common. Different generations entirely. I'm not a baby boomer, didn't smoke pot in the sixties, I was a toddler. As was Sarah jessica Parker. Who in real life is 48, a few months younger than me.

I'm not Meryl streeps age. Not helen Mirren's age. Don't want to be lumped in with them, wonderful as they are, it's just another way of discounting women my age (not saying anyone here is doing that, just saying).. Helen Mirren was born in 1945, Streep in 1949. It's the same old lumping women as older women once they're over 40. almost 50 & almost 70 are not in any way the same. Christine Baranski was born in 1952, 12 years older than me. I don't look at her and see anything like myself.

I'd just love to see someone LIKE me on tv, not someone 12-20 years older or 12-20 years younger. Tami taylor is great but again, a mom.literally carrie is the only example I can think of and the show ends before she's 40.

I appreciate the examples of future role models. But, just not the same as seeing someone like you, I loved SATC because those girls were my age, among other reasons. Now it's off the air and the characters just stopped aging, I guess.

Edited July 3, 2014 by lucindabelle

[Irlandesa]

Archie Panjabi is 42 and her character isn't a mother.  I have my issues with The Good Wife but all three of the main female characters are past their forties with the mother and mother-in-law putting in significant appearances as well.  That should be commended. 

 

And Baranski may be older but is Diane her age? 

Edited July 3, 2014 by Irlandesa

[lucindabelle]

It's good to see older women on tv. No argument. I'm just saying that 48 and 62 are completely different experiences. I don't know how old Diane is supposed to be but it isn't within five years of me, I know that for sure.

(Similarly, 19 and 32, or 29 and 42).

It's just the 50+ syndrome I was talking about before where every age gets a fashion reccomendation in a magazine (look great in your 20s, 30s, 40s, 50 plus) until it's 50+ as if 50 and 70 are the same in any way. I don't think I've ever seen one solitary woman character in her 50s who isn't also a mom. Let alone one who is just like Sarah jessica Parker next year (ok, she is a mom, but what I mean is, fashionable, trendy, young). I live in NYC and know a lot of actresses my age and a few years older who constantly get taken for early 30s because society has no image of women who are neither senior partner like Diane nor nubile young thing. I guess panjabis character is a start. And Liz lemon who I did not realize was in her 40s in huge series.

No doubt when I am 60, there will be loads of images of women in their 50s, because that's how my life seems to work ...

[mansonlamps]

I don't think I've ever seen one solitary woman character in her 50s who isn't also a mom.

Wasn't Samantha (SATC) in her fifties?

[Bella]

Wasn't Samantha (SATC) in her fifties?

 

She was in her late 40s or early 50s in the last season of the show - a bit younger than Kim Cattrall, who portrayed her.

 

Talk about a character who sent mixed signals, that was Samantha! 

[galax-arena]

The cast of Supernatural tackles a question about its gender issues (skip to 37:50) -

 

 

I always knew that Jared was a dumbass, so his remarks come as no surprise to me: "There are so many shows that deal with romance that there needs to be a show that doesn't deal with romance. That's why you have Supernatural." Because obviously women are only relevant as love interests. 

 

But I'm disappointed with Aisha Tyler. Really, a show focusing on the interior lives of men is "rare"? What planet is she living on?

Edited July 28, 2014 by galax-arena

[ethalfrida]

I believe one factor is the number of posters coming here from TWoP, where discussion of fan reaction to things seen on television - rather than strictly things seen on television - was verboten.

 

One of my biggest irritants is use of the word "bitch" as if its definition is "any woman who does something one does not like."  Casual use of that particular gender slur on television doesn't sit well with me, either, but sometimes it seems ubiquitous.

Amen... especially disappointed when women use it. Like Dina on New Jersey Housewives.

[Niuxita]

 

I side-eyed Joss when he revealed his plans for Inara on Firefly.

 

Agree so hard. It's that storyline that makes me take offense whenever someone praises him for his "feminism".

[tennisgurl]

Niuxita, I`m pretty sure I know what your talking about (as in, a possible storyline that Joss had in mind for Firefly) but just to clarify, what plans are you referring too?

[Niuxita]

 

Niuxita, I`m pretty sure I know what your talking about (as in, a possible storyline that Joss had in mind for Firefly) but just to clarify, what plans are you referring too?

 

I should clarify first that I am not a Whedon fan and haven't watched any of his works (least of all Firefly, whose sheer ubiquity and worship has rendered me completely tired of it without having seen a single episode). However, I've read several accounts and analyses from people more well-versed on it than I am that have pointed out all the problems with race and gender that everyone seems to gloss over. Anyway, this particular storyline had to do with Inara being gang-raped by some sort of evil creatures (their name escapes me right now but I'm pretty sure it started with R) and that was a catalyst for her to finally earn Mal's respect. Now, I don't know how accurate that last part is, but I still believe that no so-called "feminist" in their right mind would think this was an OK storyline to subject one of his female characters to, least of all to service a male character's development. (I have this same beef with George R. R. Martin and his penchant for having female characters raped, yet he gets worshipped because in one interview he said he thought women were "people" like it was such a groundbreaking thing to say.)

[galax-arena]

This is what Tim Minear had to say about that:

She had this magic syringe. She would take this drug. And if she were, for instance, raped, the rapist would die a horrible death. The story was that she gets kidnapped by Reavers and when Mal finally got to the ship to save her from the Reavers, he gets on the Reaver ship and all the Reavers are dead. Which would suggest a kind of really bad assault. At the end of the episode, he comes in after she's been horribly brutalized, and he comes in and he gets down on his knee, and he takes her hand. And he treats her like a lady. And that's the kind of stuff that we wanted to do. It was very dark. And this was actually the first story that Joss pitched to me when he asked me to come work on the show. He said, 'These are the kind of stories we're going to do.'

Yeah, um, no. Thank you to whoever put the kibosh on that particular storyline. 

[FurryFury]

I'm a big Whedon fan, but I definitely agree it's gross and I'd never want to see it. But still, it never really happened and may have never happened even if the show wasn't canceled. During the creative process, writers get all sorts of ideas, many of which never make it to the finished product, which is the only one that should be judged, imho.

[Wiendish Fitch]

I don't know if I should post this here, but here it is anyway:

 

Someone should have told Joss "Blah, blah, I'm a feminist, you're not, blah" Whedon that Inara didn't have to do a damn thing to earn Mal's respect, especially get gang-raped. Mal should have respected Inara to begin with. Someone should tell Joss a real man knows how to treat a lady. A real man treats people with respect, even if he doesn't agree with them (see Mal's treatment of Inara and Simon). I think I'd like Joss's "strong women" better if he'd learn how to write strong men first. I don't mean men who know how to use a gun or who have a good, slow-mo swagger. I mean a real man, who is flawed, but who is also brave, kind, and isn't riddled with archaic madonna/whore issues. 

 

I've said it before, I'll say it again: Marcus Cole from Babylon 5 would kick Mal and Jayne's asses to next week. He was heroic, witty, charming, and above everything else, he knew how to treat a lady. That, to me, is a real man. 

Edited September 12, 2014 by Wiendish Fitch

[FurryFury]

Mal should have respected Inara to begin with.

 

Mal was flawed. That was kinda the point. I don't think he was supposed to be a consummate gentleman.

 

Oh, and Ivanova and Delenn could totally mop the floor with that tiresome, Manic Pixie Dream Girl Kaylee

 

Personally, I found Delenn unwatchable and quit the show because of her. Simply a visceral reaction. I don't even remember why, but it was quite strong.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

 I think I'd like Joss's "strong women" better if he'd learn how to write strong men first. I don't mean men who know how to use a gun or who have a good, slow-mo swagger. I mean a real man, who is flawed, but who is also brave, kind, and isn't riddled with archaic madonna/whore issues. 

I don't know if I should say this, but here goes.

 

For all the criticism that Xander Harris gets, I'm glad that he never ended up with either Buffy or Willow. Given how both of them turned out by the end of the series (Buffy slobbering after the unrepentant serial murderer that tried to rape her and Willow getting shackled to an at best annoying little brat like Kennedy) I think he escaped a pretty harsh fate. Further, I notice that for all the talk of him being a Nice Guy, the concept of which is IMO right up there with mansplaining, because he dares to criticize Buffy for dating a hundred and fifty year old corpse, there's not nearly as much of a rush to slap Willow with the Nice Girl label for blasting Xander when she finds out he's secretly dating Cordelia. "You'd rather be with someone you hate than be with me."? Very nice, Willow.

 

Edited to make it make sense, because Willow was not actually dating Cordelia.

Edited September 13, 2014 by Cobalt Stargazer

[Niuxita]

 

Someone should have told Joss "Blah, blah, I'm a feminist, you're not, blah" Whedon that Inara didn't have to do a damn thing to earn Mal's respect, especially get gang-raped. Mal should have respected Inara to begin with. Someone should tell Joss a real man knows how to treat a lady. A real man treats people with respect, even if he doesn't agree with them (see Mal's treatment of Inara and Simon). I think I'd like Joss's "strong women" better if he'd learn how to write strong men first. I don't mean men who know how to use a gun or who have a good, slow-mo swagger. I mean a real man, who is flawed, but who is also brave, kind, and isn't riddled with archaic madonna/whore issues.

 

Thank you. I'm so glad I'm not alone in my distaste for him. 

 

Also, I seem to remember that Mal's "thing" was calling Inara a whore even though she expressly told him that she didn't like it. Disrespect for women is so romantic!

[manbearpig]

If you haven't seen any of his shows, Niuxita, where does your distaste for Whedon come from?

[MaryMitch]

I think one person who is missing on TV is the smart middle aged woman who is good at their job and is a "normal" size. I mean, I love me some Brenda Leigh ("The Closer"), but she's a teeny blonde. Where's the female older cop/scientist/executive who actually looks the part?

One character that I loved was "Elaine" ("look what Elaine found!") who played the ex-CIA agent on "The Closer" episode "Serving the King". I wish we had seen that character again.

Older woman characters are interesting since they had to fight for their place in the working world. Maybe you can tell I'm one of them. Where are the characters I can identify with?

[CoderLady]

Older woman characters are interesting since they had to fight for their place in the working world. Maybe you can tell I'm one of them. Where are the characters I can identify with?

 

They're all on British TV shows, where professional women look like women who actually came up through the ranks on merit and hard work instead of looks and attitude and the ones over 40 are still there kicking ass and taking names.

[lucindabelle]

Exactly, I feel the same way. And not just cop shows. Most publishers, school principals etc are going to be late 40s-50, which is NOT decrepit at all... Had to laugh when someone said on another sites boardwalk empire thread that the dates didn't work because Nucky would be pushing 60 when in fact both the character AND the actor are 57. I love seeing Patricia Arquette on that show, she is 46 and looks it meaning looks great but not teensy and not 29. Which is believable since she owns a club. I know I'm a broken record on this, but Sarah jane Parker will be 50 this year, as will Marisa tomei. That's what it looks like, and you just never ever see that.l. But you do with men in their 50, which is (rightly) considered a mans prime.

You never see a CEO on TV of a man who's only 20/30, unless it's a tech start up. Because the men all know that it takes some time to get there.

The young woman at the top of her career thing is irritating, and unfair... Makes women feel inadequate, I think.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

What, no Kay Howard love? Say what you like about Melissa Leo's Oscar chase, which I didn't find all that problematic anyway, but Kay was a wonderful example of a working cop in an overwhelmingly male environment.

[selkie]

And then NBC made them dump Kay Howard and her amazing hair for not being conventionally pretty enough.

 

Leo was also very good as a middle aged (and looks it) lawyer in Treme.

[lucindabelle]

Yes men are allowed to be middle aged on American TV. Not so much women. To the point where people don't know what 50 or 60 even look like, confusing it in their minds with 80. Heck, Paul mccartneys 72. And looks it I think. 62 looks younger and 52 is Jon Stewart. People just don't know.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

And then NBC made them dump Kay Howard and her amazing hair for not being conventionally pretty enough.

 

Leo was also very good as a middle aged (and looks it) lawyer in Treme.

 

 

Yes men are allowed to be middle aged on American TV. Not so much women. To the point where people don't know what 50 or 60 even look like, confusing it in their minds with 80. Heck, Paul mccartneys 72. And looks it I think. 62 looks younger and 52 is Jon Stewart. People just don't know.

Please understand that I mean no disrespect to either of you, but I don't think a network has any idea of who actual television viewers think is attractive. Or is too old. Maybe to someone who just turned twenty, the fifty-three year old Leo is older than dirt, but I'm only eight years younger than she is. I think if the networks asked a wider range of people than they do in their focus groups, they'd get answers that surprise them about who and what people want to see. Maybe Kay Howard was never a sexpot, and that's a little debatable since I wouldn't have turned her and her amazing hair down, but there should be a modern-day version of her now. I'd certainly welcome her.

[Raja]

I think one person who is missing on TV is the smart middle aged woman who is good at their job and is a "normal" size. I mean, I love me some Brenda Leigh ("The Closer"), but she's a teeny blonde. Where's the female older cop/scientist/executive who actually looks the part?

One character that I loved was "Elaine" ("look what Elaine found!") who played the ex-CIA agent on "The Closer" episode "Serving the King". I wish we had seen that character again.

Older woman characters are interesting since they had to fight for their place in the working world. Maybe you can tell I'm one of them. Where are the characters I can identify with?

Well when The Closer morphed into Major Crimes Captain Raydor fit the bill. But then they brought in the sexy Commander McGinnis on the back door pilot for Special Operations Bureau

[Irlandesa]

Well when The Closer morphed into Major Crimes Captain Raydor fit the bill. But then they brought in the sexy Commander McGinnis on the back door pilot for Special Operations Bureau

The actress is sexy but I think the spinoff was doing it better so far than many other shows.  The actress is 44.  The character always wore a uniform (not very sexy), had her hair up and didn't wear much makeup.  I think Captain Raydor has a more outwardly sexy appearance with her tight skirts and excellent hair.  They deemphasized what is normally emphasized.  [Life did this as well in their first season with Sarah Shahi.  No makeup, hair up, no heels...but then NBC seemed to order a change in wardrobe for her in the second. ]  She's not in her fifties but I wouldn't say the spinoff is doing it wrong.  My opinion could change if things change in the spinoff.

 

I think Jane Curtin is someone who looks her age and plays someone at the top of her field on Unforgettable.  Sadly, she's only a supporting player.

[Bella]

 

I think Jane Curtin is someone who looks her age and plays someone at the top of her field on Unforgettable.  Sadly, she's only a supporting player.

 

But who, having seen the original SNL and watching that OTT cast, would have picked her to have such an enduring career? The woman has staying power in a competitive field, a 40-year marriage, and an apparently normal life away from work. Very impressive!

[Bastet]

I think Jane Curtin is someone who looks her age and plays someone at the top of her field on Unforgettable.

 

My mom watches the show precisely for that reason.

[Irlandesa]

But who, having seen the original SNL and watching that OTT cast, would have picked her to have such an enduring career? The woman has staying power in a competitive field, a 40-year marriage, and an apparently normal life away from work. Very impressive!

Very impressive indeed!  But who would have predicted any of them would have been a success?  They were such a rag tag group of performers back then.  SNL wasn't known as a launching pad for talent the way it is now. 

 

As for Jane, she was quite a utility player so maybe not predicted to have huge success but I'm not surprised she's still working.  Hell, she's the reason I watch Unforgettable and I'm much younger than she.

[kiddo82]

Dana Delany's been around fairly consistently since her Desperate Housewives resurgence. I literally just saw her in an Amazon.com pilot. She's got to be in her late 50s and is looking fab as ever. Although, the thing is, she usually seems to play younger. Not that that's a bad thing, good for her, but is the message "We'll cast a woman close to 60 if she can pass to be in her 40s"?

Edited September 15, 2014 by kiddo82

[Cobalt Stargazer]

kiddo82, I looked it up, and Dana Delany is fifty eight. Speaking as someone who slogged through Body of Proof for her, I think she looks great, but I don't know about playing younger. What is her Amazon pilot about, and do you recommend it?

[lucindabelle]

I just realized that Julianna Margulies is 48. I feel a little better.

But point taken about Dana Delaney, it's like the guy complaining that no way could Nucky, Steve Buscemi can be pushing 60- when in fact both he and the character are 57.

Cuz you know, it's what 60 looks like.its not ancient. It's not walkers and hearing aids. That's 80 or even 90 these days.

I saw an ASRP commercial that cracked me up it was for age of Aquarius people and about bone density. Groovy!

Edited September 15, 2014 by maraleia
spelling

[galax-arena]

I think Jane Curtin is someone who looks her age

Jane Curtin is the best! Her SNL days were a bit before my time, but I “discovered” her on 3rd Rock from the Sun.

there's not nearly as much of a rush to slap Willow with the Nice Girl label for blasting Xander when she finds out he's secretly dating Cordelia.

While Nice Girls obviously exist - look at Taylor Swift’s discography, namely “You Belong With Me” - and I think any sense of “you should date me because I’m so nice” is an unwarranted sense of entitlement that deserves a swift kick in the crotch regardless of whether it’s a Nice Guy or Nice Girl, people are understandably more sensitive to Nice Guys because they’re a much bigger problem in RL society. The Nice Guy attitude often encouraged by television shows just fosters the pervasive sense of male entitlement in our culture. Elliot Rodger was a Nice Guy taken to its most extreme. 

 

And anyway, there are much bigger things to get on Willow’s case for. Like the fact that she violated Tara by mind-wiping her. At least the show portrayed that as wrong, but still… I wish Tara hadn’t gone back to her.

[Princess Sparkle]

I just realized that Julianna Margulies is 48. I feel a little better.

But point taken about Dana Delaney, it's like the guy complaining that no way could Nucky, Steve Buscemi can be pushing 60- when in fact both he and the character are 57.

Cuz you know, it's what 60 looks like.its not ancient. It's not walkers and hearing aids. That's 80 or even 90 these days.

I saw an ASRP commercial that cracked me up it was for age of Aquarius people and about bone density. Groovy!

Referring to the bolded, as I watch reruns of The Golden Girls, it always boggles my mind that the ladies are supposed to be in their late 50s/early 60s on the show, just because they dress so....old, for lack of a better term.  Maybe that was just the style then, but they look so frumpy - it absolutely makes them look like they're supposed to be WAY older than they're supposed to be.

[lucindabelle]

wild. Bea Arthur was in her mid-60s when the show began, as was Betty White, but yeah, they dressed them as if they were 70s. Rue McClanahan was only 51 and when you consider that's just three years older than Julianna Margulies is now, the mind boggles.Kind of shows yout hat TV did NOT know what to do with women over 40 because by no stretch of the imagination is 51 "the golden years," it's not even officially a senior citizen.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

Referring to the bolded, as I watch reruns of The Golden Girls, it always boggles my mind that the ladies are supposed to be in their late 50s/early 60s on the show, just because they dress so....old, for lack of a better term.  Maybe that was just the style then, but they look so frumpy - it absolutely makes them look like they're supposed to be WAY older than they're supposed to be.

PrincessSparkle, there is much talk in the Golden Girls section about the clothes the ladies wore, especially since the show was set in Miami and yet they always wore layered outfits. Some of that can be put down to eighties fashion, since Dynasty and to a point The Facts of Life also helped popularize huge hair, shoulder pads, and being way overdressed for just hanging around the house. If the show was on today, they'd likely be dressed in an entirely different way, as fifty is the new thirty.

[lucindabelle]

I think if you called it "golden girls" you'd have to make them older to start with... to me that suggests senior citizens, 65 and up. At least Mick Jagger's age, y'all.

[Wax Lion]

To go along with this discussion, Fox's Red Band Society just cast Mandy Moore  as the Chief of Staff.

 

ETA: I was pretty young at the heyday of The Golden Girls, but I think that partly reflects how we thought you should be after 60 in those days. It was a lot more common for people to retire much earlier and I think we don't give enough credit to the show for changing our view of people over 40 continuing to be sexual. I remember the idea of Rose having sex with other men was a little radical, back then you though of a "nice" widow like Rose as sexless and only wanting companionship out of a man now that she can't have children.

Edited September 15, 2014 by Wax Lion

[ChaseMCP]

One thing that always bothers me when watching a crime show over a set of years is how every year the females end up looking more and more dolled up despite it being completely unnecessary. A few examples that come to mind are JJ in Criminal Minds and Ziva in NCIS. Specifically Ziva, as when she started the show she had wild, frizzy, curly hair and dressed casually. The way she looked matched her attitude considering she wasn't super girly. Then in the later seasons she has straightened hair, make-up caked on, and is dressing in fashionable shirts (I get that people change over time, but year by year each thing that made the character different seemed to be stripped away). As for JJ, I just can't help but notice in later years she seems to have more and more make-up caked on as well. With this you'd think they'd aged significantly, but these women are both in their 30's. They are both naturally beautiful, there's no need to hide it. The closest I've seen this happening with male characters is in some cases I've noticed some actors with hair that has obviously been dyed. Though I don't know if that's the network pushing it on them or if the actors decide to do that, so even that may or may not work.

 

This made me think of another pet peeve as well with women and crime shows. I am so tired of seeing women who are on the field and are either chasing down suspects or gathering evidence and are doing it all in high heals, with long hair blowing in their faces, and in some cases wearing clothing that is really inappropriate. Someone mentioned Sarah Shahi as Dani on Life and I adored her character in the first season specifically because she actually looked like a cop without sacrificing her femininity. Then season 2 happened and that changed. It's not that I want to see these shows make these character less feminine - I just want to see them be believable at their jobs.

 

I don't expect realism, but I feel like this narrows down how women are expected to look in these types of shows. Ziva and Dani were unique, but slowly became more and more bland because of the need to make them more "feminine", and frankly more effort should be pushed into allowing their femininity to show in other ways that don't change their entire characters. 

[janie jones]

Please understand that I mean no disrespect to either of you, but I don't think a network has any idea of who actual television viewers think is attractive. Or is too old. Maybe to someone who just turned twenty, the fifty-three year old Leo is older than dirt, but I'm only eight years younger than she is. I think if the networks asked a wider range of people than they do in their focus groups, they'd get answers that surprise them about who and what people want to see. Maybe Kay Howard was never a sexpot, and that's a little debatable since I wouldn't have turned her and her amazing hair down, but there should be a modern-day version of her now. I'd certainly welcome her.

I totally agree with that.  I was a teenager when Homicide was on, and I loved Kay Howard.  I liked her better than the characters who replaced her.  But I'm pretty sure teenage girls weren't their target audience anyway.

[selkie]

Over time, NBC forced the purging of a lot of the original H:LOTS detectives, a number of men as well as Kay,  in favor of more attractive sorts. They kept wanting it to be more like Law & Order because that's where the ratings were better, but it just was too different.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

I think if you called it "golden girls" you'd have to make them older to start with... to me that suggests senior citizens, 65 and up. At least Mick Jagger's age, y'all.

The thing is, in the eighties fifty was old. I was a teenager in the eighties, and times have definitely changed. Dorothy, Rose and Blanche were nothing like my mother's friends, particularly Blanche with her free-wheeling sex life. She was responsible about it, but she also dated around a lot. That wasn't as common back then, at least I'm pretty sure it wasn't. That's what made it such a groundbreaking show, and its why even today younger people enjoy watching it.

[lucindabelle]

Nonsense. I was a teenager in e 80s too. That meant our mothers... Well mine anyway as I'm the youngest... Was in her 50s. She didn't dress like that or act like that, she was a busy woman and still young. Attitudes to age may have changed but golden girls being 51 is a tv invention, always.

Granted some of the golden girls were in their sixties but I think our seeing it differently now is just that were older now and realize how ridiculous it is. When I was 20 years old I wrote a play with a character who was a has been, hanging around campus though he was too old. I made him 24.

That's because I didn't know better, not because 24 used to be old.

[Aquarius]

The thing is, in the eighties fifty was old. I was a teenager in the eighties, and times have definitely changed. Dorothy, Rose and Blanche were nothing like my mother's friends, particularly Blanche with her free-wheeling sex life. She was responsible about it, but she also dated around a lot. That wasn't as common back then, at least I'm pretty sure it wasn't. That's what made it such a groundbreaking show, and its why even today younger people enjoy watching it.

 

I sort of agree with this.  I am now the age my mother was during the 1980's, and I am so very happy that I don't have to dress the way she used to back then.  Of course, there were no Fashion Police or anything, but the styling of mature women's clothing was very different.  Dowdier.  My mother wears skinny jeans now, but back in the 1980's she would have looked somewhat ridiculous if she'd worn something that "young."  Also, hairstyles, etc. - it's all gotten more acceptable for older women to be more young in their style, if you will. 

[callmebetty]

But attitudes and styles have changed from the 80's regarding how people look.

I was also a teenager during that time and even our fashion and hairstyles weren't the greatest.

The Golden Girls was a product of it's times. And while it is prevalent to have characters, old or young, talk about their sex lives on tv now I think it was still "shocking" back then or at least passed off for laughs.

we think of 50 or 60 being old when we are younger but things radically change when you start nearing that number.

luckily advertising and marketing people realized and had an influx of baby boomers because styles of clothing and hair are much better and health care, etc. 50, 60,70.... are not what they use to be perceived as and that is a good

thing.

I have further opinions but they are OT.

I think it comes down to times have changed, attitudes have changed and Golden Girls has become Hot in Cleveland.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

 

 The Nice Guy attitude often encouraged by television shows just fosters the pervasive sense of male entitlement in our culture. Elliot Rodger was a Nice Guy taken to its most extreme. 

 

And anyway, there are much bigger things to get on Willow’s case for. Like the fact that she violated Tara by mind-wiping her. At least the show portrayed that as wrong, but still… I wish Tara hadn’t gone back to her.

I do think that guys like Elliot Rodger should be stopped before they go homicidal, and the fact that the cops apparently screwed the pooch in neither conducting a weapons check or viewing the videos he made has me looking askance at them. And I'll get to Willow in a minute. As for Xander, I think what often gets brushed aside is that it's seen as a black mark against him that he didn't leap to validate Buffy's often shitty relationship choices. To this day, people (read: usually shippers) insist that it's all because of jealousy that he happened to think it wasn't awesome that she was dating a hundred and fifty year old dead guy. Who was at least physically twenty-five if not thirty, in comparison to Buffy's fifteen. Who later tried to kill them all. Angel's emotional infancy never comes up, or hardly ever. His jealousy of Xander gets pooh-poohed and/or seen as romantic because wah star-crossed lovers. Because Angel is the hawt sexay love interest, the fact that his relationship with Buffy kind of ends up stunting her gets ignored in the rush to excoriate Xander for not being Captain Forehead's biggest fan.

 

Re: Willow. I think the whole of her getting "addicted" to magic was particularly asinine, since everyone and their dog were casting spells in the early season of the show, and with the possible exception of Giles, none of them ever got "hooked" on it. When I'm feeling tin hat oriented, I think it was all part of the Great Season Six Blackwash, which was done to make another of Buffy's shitty relationship choices look valid, and don't even get me started on Spuffy. If her friends didn't totally abandon her to deal with their previously non-existent problems, she'd have had no reason to start banging Spike. None. But Spike was the new hawt thang, so Marsters started chewing his way through the scenery every week. Unfortunately, Willow mind-wiping Tara is still canon, and no I don't like it and I don't care why she did it, especially when she promised she could give up magic for a week and then turned right around and did the spell anyway. Blech.

 

Nonsense. I was a teenager in e 80s too. That meant our mothers... Well mine anyway as I'm the youngest... Was in her 50s. She didn't dress like that or act like that, she was a busy woman and still young. Attitudes to age may have changed but golden girls being 51 is a tv invention, always.

Granted some of the golden girls were in their sixties but I think our seeing it differently now is just that were older now and realize how ridiculous it is. When I was 20 years old I wrote a play with a character who was a has been, hanging around campus though he was too old. I made him 24.

That's because I didn't know better, not because 24 used to be old.

With respect, I never said twenty-four was old. I said that to a teenager, in my experience, fifty was seen as being old, not that it actually was. But times were different then. My mother certainly didn't sit around the kitchen table eating cheesecake and talking about sex. Hell, my mother still doesn't sit around the kitchen table eating cheesecake and talking about sex, lol. But the Girls also had jobs, they were always doing charity-related things, and they often talked about the perspective of other people who saw them as old ladies when they actually weren't. The Golden Girls was a picture of what happens after your husband dies, how you can move on and still be active and vital. That's all I was trying to say. :-)

Edited September 16, 2014 by Cobalt Stargazer

[lucindabelle]

I never said you were 24. Please read what I wrote. I was making the point that when you are young you don't always really know what any age older than you is like,

Similarly, small children think. 14 year olds are about to get married.

Edited September 16, 2014 by lucindabelle

[Bastet]

But the Girls also had jobs, they were always doing charity-related things, and they often talked about the perspective of other people who saw them as old ladies when they actually weren't.

 

I think that's a factor in the multi-generational appeal of the show -- yes, it's so refreshing to see women their age portrayed as, gasp, real people, but it's refreshing just to see women, period, with ideas, concerns, interests, friendships, foibles, passions, etc., who talk about what's going on in the world and myriad other things in addition to men and sex.

[kiddo82]

kiddo82, I looked it up, and Dana Delany is fifty eight. Speaking as someone who slogged through Body of Proof for her, I think she looks great, but I don't know about playing younger. What is her Amazon pilot about, and do you recommend it?

I guess what I mean by "playing younger" isn't so much that Megan on Body of Proof was supposed to be 45, but she was also not *not* 45, if that makes any sense. The show exactly didn't go out of its way to say this is what 55 is and it's not old.

The Amazon pilot is Hand of God and it's worth a look. Ron Perlman plays a judge who has a breakdown after his son's failed suicide attempt and claims that God is compelling him to perform vigilante justice. It kinda reads like Joan of Arcadia but it's much more sinister. (I'd imagine anyway, I never watched Joan of Arcadia). Dana Delany plays his wife and I got a Lady MacBeth vibe from the character. I'd like to see it get picked up for the cast alone.

[tennisgurl]

She had this magic syringe. She would take this drug. And if she were, for instance, raped, the rapist would die a horrible death. The story was that she gets kidnapped by Reavers and when Mal finally got to the ship to save her from the Reavers, he gets on the Reaver ship and all the Reavers are dead. Which would suggest a kind of really bad assault. At the end of the episode, he comes in after she's been horribly brutalized, and he comes in and he gets down on his knee, and he takes her hand. And he treats her like a lady. And that's the kind of stuff that we wanted to do. It was very dark. And this was actually the first story that Joss pitched to me when he asked me to come work on the show. He said, 'These are the kind of stories we're going to do.'

Yeah, um, no. Thank you to whoever put the kibosh on that particular storyline.

 

Yeah...that's what I thought was being referred to. I have heard about that being a possible plot line, and I am really REALLY glad that never happened. I mean, its possible that, even if the show wasn't cancelled, they wouldn't have gone through with it, but if they had, that would have been pretty awful to watch. I mean, there isn't a way for Mal and Inara to get together, without her being gang raped by monsters? I mean...really? It just sounds gross, and I am really freaking glad that they never got there. And I adored Firefly. I was never that bothered by Mal being a jerk to Inara, mainly because Mal was written to be a jerk. One with a heart of gold, but still a jerk. But that storyline just sounds like it would have been terrible to watch. Not even just because its hard to watch rape storylines, but because I feel like it would be terribly done.

 

Honestly, for all the feminist themes in Joss Whedon stuff (and I have loved a lot of his shows, but I admit that he has a lot of problems in his writing), his stuff has never really done rape stories particularly well. I can only cringe at what would have happened with that Firefly story.