Scrubs is giving me a complex.
No, I don't mean the guilty yet gleeful procrastinatory buzz I get from the fact that I've been watching episode after episode online instead of attending to the more sober business of graduate school. That's all quite ordinary. What I've got instead is a gender issue identity crisis brought on by the interactions I've been observing between the male and female characters. Freud would be so proud of me.
The show's two heroines, Carla and Elliot, are gossipy, scattered, grudge-bearing, emotionally needy, image-obsessed, and frequently lacking in self confidence. They have other, totally positive qualities as well, of course, and are absolutely sympathetic and likable. But what I've been realizing this week is that the show's comedy frequently centers on these negative and stereotypically female qualities. These are the things about women that we laugh at.
Scrubs isn't unusual, either. You'd be hard-pressed to name an American comedy in which the female characters aren't ridiculed for their overtly feminine, nagging, emotional ways. From Elaine to Marge, it's the same old story.
Now, this isn't to say that these women don't have redeeming qualities – they're often the most sympathetic characters, even as they play the straight man to their male counterparts. And I'm not interested in dishing out a post-feminist diatribe about gender relations on American television. We laugh at the men, too. Body image issues aside, all's fair(ish) in love, war, and must-see TV.
My revelation this week came from the fact that I discovered suddenly that I'd been taking all those laugh tracks to heart. Somewhere in my male-friend festooned adolescence I had decided that those joke-inducing stereotypical female qualities were things I shouldn't admit to having. I could (and do) embrace the nurturing, emotionally sensitive aspects of femininity, but as far as demanding that my female nature be embraced in its entirety? No thanks. I'm not going to be that girl.
So what's been happening to me for years is this free-floating anxiety over the fact that not only do I get happy when someone gives me flowers, I'm a little sad when they don't. You'd have to ask the men in my life if my subconscious self-inflicted program of "let's not be annoying and give cause for ridicule" has been working or not: I suspect that it's just been making me annoyingly passive-aggressive. And probably giving me ulcers.
Ultimately, I find that I always forgive the men on these TV shows for their foibles and stereotypical masculinity. And I really do like Carla and Elliot, even while some of their lines make me cringe in shameful recognition. These days, I'm navigating the wild dark forest of a new relationship, and it seems as good a time as any to learn to stand my ground and come with all my femininity fully on display.
I'm a little scared. It's not easy, unlearning old patterns. So I'm watching lots of Scrubs for pointers. Hopefully this tall, kind man in my life will appreciate the fact that I'm the sort of girl who makes him dinner sometimes, and who sometimes demands that he buy her flowers.
He can laugh at me. I'm okay with that.
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5 comments:
Very observant comment, Blue-Eyed Wonder. I hadn't ever thought about the gender stereotyping that you mentioned, because I have always been more attuned to the show's pairing on the other side of the gender line.
Turk and J.D.'s relationship has always struck me as going against the stereotypical male macho relationship. In a culture where getting "too intimate" with another man automatically connotes a sexual relationship, J.D. and Turk are a model of how two guys can form a real and substantial relationship. And even though the relationship is often belittled on the show for the sake of humor, the viewer gets the sense that it is nonetheless real. Guys watch it and think, "Why don't I have a friend like that?"
It's amazing - guys are filled with the exact same representations of femininity and beauty as women are. Yet it means something so different to many of us. I don't pause for a second when Elliot asks if a top makes her look fat. The greatest victory of these images is that 99% of viewers never even think to analyze it - it just seems like that's the way things are. Period.
"Scrubs" and related shows capture something both stereotypical and deeply true about the sexes: that's probably why they're so funny, after all. You can identify with the characters and laugh at them for all their extreme gendered moments (because you, after all, are NEVER an über-Guy or Girl). Chris said it best, years ago: "All girls are stupid and all guys are assholes." It's great to see people on screen who both embody this dictum and prove why this dictum is a joke. Or at least it's a good way to distract yourself from doing grad school work.
Wow, I'm always amazed at how the off-hand comments I make years back come back to haunt me :)
Sorry Chris! It just popped into mind (and it has a deal of wisdom to it.) You should develop it into a full-fledged theory.
Mindy, it took me a while to get to reading it, but I really like what you had to say. I'm proud of you for taking an ordinary event such as watching a sitcom (a really good one, though) and turning it into a life lesson.
I'd like to add one thing to the discussion - not as a disagreement, but as another facet. Nearly all entertainment, particularly comedy, uses hyperbole as its primary and sometimes only device. Ever notice that there isn't a single normal person on that show?
And to go straight to the heart of the matter, I'm betting that Dr. Cox's name is no accident. He's as wrapped up in his own manhood as the two ladies are in their femininity. Turk and J.D.'s relationship is literally made ok by its uber-femininity. It's like when the LGBTA movement found their cheer much more effective when they changed, "We're here. We're not queer. Get used to it," by taking out the "not."
I wonder...are the feminine issues more pronounced on the show? I don't feel like I can know.
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