TV Sitcoms, Gender Codes, and Media Manipulation

Introduction: Friedan's Critique and the Media–Reality Relationship

As noted in "From Rosie to Lucy," Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique was, to some extent, concerned with the image of women as presented by the mass media. What Friedan reported was a kind of transformation — from the woman depicted in 1930s magazines like Ladies Home Journal to the woman of the 1950s, embodied in the hare-brained, ditzy persona of I Love Lucy. This paper examines that relationship, which struck Friedan so forcefully — the relationship between media and reality — and argues that media tends to manipulate gender codes.

What Friedan observed in the magazines of the 1930s was a professional woman much like the nurses of Florence Nightingale's corps: devoted to an activity that was respected and necessary. What she observed in the television sitcoms of the 1950s was something else entirely. Both men and women were degraded: men were portrayed as clueless but charming, and women were portrayed as "young and frivolous, almost childlike; fluffy and feminine; passive; gaily content in a world of bedroom and kitchen, sex, babies, and home." Friedan suggested that the reality of the 1950s was being shaped by the way media was representing gender codes. Ultimately, Friedan would help ignite a revolution against those media representations — a revolution that became known as the Women's Movement. That movement, however, has to a large degree evolved into something quite different in both reality and in today's media.

From the 1930s Professional Woman to the 1950s Sitcom Housewife

If the woman of 1950s television was an idealized figure who never really existed — one who only served to create a shallow, superficial, and unsustainable environment that would be rejected in the 1960s — then the woman of today's TV sitcom is, in a way, a combination of several archetypes: the powerful, professional woman of the 1930s; the soft, feminine woman of the 1950s; and the sexually liberated, somewhat vulgarized and crass representation of the contemporary woman, acting in ways that mirror the crude male characters of yesterday's sitcoms. Today we witness the rise of provocative lesbian dramas like The L Word and frank portrayals of teenage pregnancy in The Secret Life of the American Teenager.

The iconic parent-couples of 1950s and 1960s television have largely disappeared. Today's sitcoms focus on teenagers and young professional adults whose lives are relatively free of the kind of existential malaise that Walker Percy described in his fiction across several decades. While the media fails to depict a realistic parent-couple in today's TV sitcoms, today's parents are indeed less commonly found in committed, long-term relationships.

Today's TV Sitcoms and the Evolution of Gender Codes

Gender codes today are being pushed in a significantly different direction. I Dream of Jeannie, which ran from 1965 to 1970, portrayed a household in which a man was served by a genie who also posed as his wife. Jeannie wore revealing clothing, was perfectly obedient, and yet always seemed to have the upper hand. Today's woman, as represented in How I Met Your Mother, is no less witty, charming, or attractive — but she is somewhat less idealized in domestic terms. What has been idealized, however, is the sexual nature of today's television relationships. The lesbian characters of The L Word, for example, are depicted more as sex objects in the mold of Jeannie than as reflections of real-life lesbian experience.

In fact, the once-famous parent-couples of mid-century television have given way to a media landscape that centers youth, sexuality, and professional ambition while leaving questions of aging, family, and long-term partnership largely unaddressed. The gender codes being reinforced are thus less about domesticity and more about desirability — a shift that carries its own set of distortions.

Conclusion: Media Manipulation and the Unfinished Revolution

The L Word and How I Met Your Mother are accurate reflections of the way we view sexual relationships today, but as for reflecting real-life personalities and the full complexity of human experience, they fall short. What they represent are the same sexy, one-dimensional characters seen in I Dream of Jeannie. Real-life situations are rarely depicted, nor do they appear to be what today's viewers demand. Male and female roles in contemporary culture are not clearly delineated or defined, and male–female relationships are more complicated than ever. The natural and social dimensions of sexuality are set aside in favor of its pleasure aspects. The result is that mainstream erotica is on the rise, and new questions are being raised as to whether this trend is beneficial — for individuals, for identity groups, and for society as a whole.

Works Cited

"From Rosie to Lucy: Retreat from Revolution: The Role of Mass Media."

Krauss, Tina. The L Word: Love It or Leave It. Rhizomes 14. 2007. Web. 3 July.