There are two things that really bother me about it. The first, as I said, is the sexism, especially the way the women police each other to reinforce it. As an independent, single twentysomething, I can't help but look at that and think how absolutely miserable I would be in that world.
The second is that the Drapers are disturbing like my grandparents. My grandfather also fought in the war and got a purple heart. He also worked in midtown Manhattan, and commuted by train to a nice suburb an hour out. In fact, they still live there, in the house they bought in 1952, that still looks like the Draper house. The decor has been meticulously maintained from the mid-fifties. My grandmother dressed like Betty and was a homemaker like Betty (she even got a feature in a ladies magazine for her interior decorating). In 1960, my dad and his siblings were 3, 6, and 9, spanning about the same age as the Draper children. As people, they are very, very different (not least of which that my grandmother was absolutely in charge of that family, while my grandfather wrote humorous limerics in quiet protest). But as far as culture, values, fashion, just the whole world being depicted in the show, that's my grandparents. And it's really hard to watch Mad Men and see any comparison between the people on the show and my grandparents.
As I said, the appeal to me is to look at the world of the 1950s (okay, 1960), which very much influences today, especially in my own family. So I am very curious about peeling back the layers of that time to try to understand the older generation. I just don't want to be shown, when I peel back the layers, that these people are what it was actually like.
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The second is that the Drapers are disturbing like my grandparents. My grandfather also fought in the war and got a purple heart. He also worked in midtown Manhattan, and commuted by train to a nice suburb an hour out. In fact, they still live there, in the house they bought in 1952, that still looks like the Draper house. The decor has been meticulously maintained from the mid-fifties. My grandmother dressed like Betty and was a homemaker like Betty (she even got a feature in a ladies magazine for her interior decorating). In 1960, my dad and his siblings were 3, 6, and 9, spanning about the same age as the Draper children. As people, they are very, very different (not least of which that my grandmother was absolutely in charge of that family, while my grandfather wrote humorous limerics in quiet protest). But as far as culture, values, fashion, just the whole world being depicted in the show, that's my grandparents. And it's really hard to watch Mad Men and see any comparison between the people on the show and my grandparents.
As I said, the appeal to me is to look at the world of the 1950s (okay, 1960), which very much influences today, especially in my own family. So I am very curious about peeling back the layers of that time to try to understand the older generation. I just don't want to be shown, when I peel back the layers, that these people are what it was actually like.