On lives of single women, and art imitating life...

Although the influence of network TV has been on the decline for decades now, it must be said that TV series (of networks and even on cable channels) still play a large part in reflecting the lives and times of the contemporary.

Earlier, I was reading the Los Angeles TImes article on various TV offerings focusing on single women as protagonists.  I haven't had - or needed, or wanted - a TV for closer to two decades now, and I haven't felt the urge to go back to it.  I was one of those in the TV generation who literally grew up with TV.  Shows like Murphy Brown indeed demonstrates the kind of feminist and girl power that one, as a woman, does feel exhilarated and liberated.  Afterall, Murphy Brown was successful, she called the shots, she's funny, she made her own agenda, and she's a force of her own.  I must admit Murphy Brown was a pseudo role model (even), unlike the earlier generations when women are subjugated under male influence and control whose sole angst and life goal was to snatch a well-off husband.  So lame.

You can thus see how I lament the fall from grace of women of our younger generations, in shows like Girls (HBO), when the very single, young women are such a whinging bunch, that are nothing but losers in life.  Surely, I must have sounded really harsh, in particular, to those supporters of such shows, saying that such is the generations who, unlike the prosperous 1980s, face one of the greatest economic challenges in more than 70 years.  Surely, these girls deserve some help, and we should cut them some slack.

Perhaps girls like this on TV shows are from a younger demographics (in the age group of 18-21, perhaps?), I might be more forgiving.  But, for goodness sake, we're talking about women - yes, I wouldn't use the very stupid term of girls to describe women in this age group - in their 20s.  Has the academia come up with a stuck-in-the-middle psychological and emotional state to describe anyone in the early-through-late-20s as something that should be treated differently, much like the much-lauded identification of adolescence?

It's depressing to just read through the synopsis of these TV shows about the challenges faced by single women.  There is no more sugar-coating of successful single women looking for sex (Sex And The City), just so women can be on equal footing with sex crazed single men stereotype.  There isn't even gorgeous single women looking for love, treasuring friendship more than anything else (Friends).  Be that as it may, one almost consistent theme that courses through those single-women's show - if you can call it that - in the earlier decade, is that, they are funny and even lighthearted.  I can't say the same about those in this decade, though I could still be proven wrong, since we're still earlier in this decade in 2012, and we have 8 more years to go, before we can close the book on this decade - though I have subconsciously written off this decade as a lost decade, much as the financial cohorts would say about the lost decade of any financial gain and economic turnaround since the economic collapse in 2008.

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Thinking back my own days as singles, I do recall the almost unspoken anxiety and wonderment, of whether the right man could ever be found.  By jove, I wasn't even looking for a wealthy husband who could afford me with a life without work, nor a handsome prince who would scoop me off of my feet and ride with me to the sunset on his horse.  No, I am, and have always been, a working woman and I treasure my career and financial independence too much to wish myself a life without work.  Neither have I ever put too much stock in the looks department.  But if you are to ask any single, sensible woman of the challenge along this line, you would realize how hard it is, to find a sensible, reliable, and good, honest man who is also compatible with you, with bonus of a sense of humor.

I have long resorted to try consciously not to think about these kind of challenges.  Afterall, the harder you look, the more desperate you try, the more difficult it'll come by.  I just take it as it comes.  I'm sure I'm not alone in my approach.

One thing I find rather befuddled by young women, single or otherwise, is their ease to bed with any men.  Is it really just me, alone in thinking that sex - and sex alone - can't sustain a long term relationship?  Nor do I believe in a relationship in which sex comes before love.  Perhaps I'm too old-fashioned; maybe they don't want a long term relationship.  Everyone just wants to have a good time; or maybe everyone feels like they're stuck in a limbo in this lousy economic with no prospect, and sex is an easy relief, as the Girls have shown us.  I'm unable, though, to subscribe with such a notion.

Before I lay this topic to rest, my disclaimer is in order.  Given all those I've said above, I strongly condemn the GOP's repeated assault on women's rights.  Case in point, Todd Akin.  It's unbelievable and incredibly condescending for GOP to try to revive arguments against basic women's rights like contraception.  Whatever it is that the arts on TV try to reflect the life of our times, what GOP does is inexcusable.  I wish to just let any GOP out there who care to read or listen, I would vote for Obama just on that issue alone (though I'm hardly a single-issue Independent voter).  I rest my case.