Premise:
If you don’t like the word “feminism”, don’t be shy and change it.
Use “egalitarianism”, which is the same thing anyway.
Shakespeare agreed as well, “That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet”.
(Altough if you’re interested in understanding why I use the word “feminism”, I’ll send you back to this section of the site)
Despite the quantity of words per minute that, dear me, don’t help us in getting rid of the stereotype of women speaking too much, I’ve always loved “Gilmore Girls”, because every once in a while it proposed some extremely interesting ideas.
Episode 14 in the first season goes by the name of “Modern women” (*)
The storyline (in short and skipping all the boring love affairs):
Lorelai, Rory and her boyfriend Dean are watching on TV “The Donna Reed Show”, an american sitcom starring a typical housewife (Donna Stone) who cooks, washes, cleans, takes care of the husband and never asks questions.
While both of the Gilmore girls make fun of that stereotype of woman, Dean states he wouldn’t mind having a wife like that.
A few arguments.
Eventually, Rory does some research and finds out that Donna Reed not only is the actress, but is also the producer of her own show, breaking down the prejudice she had built on herself, in other words a woman who preserve the anacronistic stereotype of a defenceless housewife with no opinions about the world.
So she puts the apron on and prepares a perfect dinner for Dean, as saying “this is not my ideal of lifestyle but if you like it, I can do that for a night”.
Credits.
Now, how many and what questions can rise up in us after watching this episode?
I’ll list mine, in the hope to find the answers together:
Feminism supports firstly the freedom of women of being women in their own way.
When did we decide that being a housewife is not acceptable?
Why can’t we think that maybe being a houswife is not the consquence of a terrible patriarchy-ruled world but an independent choice?
Why can’t we accept the different ways of being woman?
And why, on the other hand, I who can’t cook have to be referred to as “less woman”?
Why a man who enjoys the idea of coming back home and find the dinner on the table is a damn selfish but a woman who likes the same idea is a fighter for egualitarism?
The issue is valid only if the man takes for granted the dinner is and has to be ready as soon as he comes back home, not if he thinks it’s an enjoyble thing. Anyone would find it enjoyable.
Can we just stop filling our minds up with slogan of the ’70s, start following Rory’s lead and do research before judging too fast?
Here you go, some ideas for you, as a starter.
For my dinner though, I’ll go with a takeaway.
(*Translation note: Italian translators feel the urge to change every single name for episodes and tv shows 99% of the times, just to be original and show how brilliant they are in renaming stuff. The actual name of the episode is “That Damn Donna Reed”. Just so you know how crazy they are, the show has also been renamed in something like “A mum as a friend” – Genius, don’t you think?)
