BoomerGirl Diary

“He wants to know what is wrong with the modern woman.”

“The modern man.”

"More Than A Secretary" — Jean Arthur, George Brent (1936)

There are more than a few answers to this, and more than a few ways to take the question. Is it: “what is wrong”, as in why is she all screwed up; or, “<iwhat is wrong”, as in why isn’t she happy? Is she the object or the subject? He probably meant the former, while she clearly took it as the latter.

Kansas State Senator Kay O’Connor has one take on it. She says women’s suffrage is a sign of decay, it is evidence of unhappiness. Being an elected official, I don’t think she means it’s wrong for women to vote, she must mean something else. I haven’t spoken with her about it, but maybe it goes back to Aristotle.

What are we? In the movie "Castaway," Tom Hanks’ character was so unhappy being alone he took a great risk, so great it was virtual suicide, to have even a chance of getting back to society. Do you think it was to watch TV or play video games, or taste good champagne? I don’t. He was incomplete, a single organ unhappily existing outside the organism. Pure Aristotle; the hermit or outcast from society is either a monster, or terribly unhappy. He needed family. Biologically, what is the basic family unit? Nature’s answer is: the pair of a male and a female. (Note: Nothing here is intended as a statement concerning the legal, as opposed to the <ibiological possibilities of same sex couples. We’ll have to save that for later.)

Yet, our “modern” view is that each of us is an individual, each is a self-sufficient organism. Our happiness in the world, our salvation in the hereafter, are ultimately matters of purely individual concern, individual responsibility. The Pilgrim, the hero, and moral paragon of "Pilgrim’s Progress," abandons his wife and children in fleeing the City of Destruction and seeking the City of Salvation. As if eternal salvation can ever compensate for the loss of family. It reminds me of "Seinfeld’s" George Costanza trampling old people, children, and a birthday clown, to be the first out the door after someone yells fire. Yet isn’t the Pilgrim our modern model in the journey through life?

Is Sen. O’Connor saying the basic unit of society is the family? Is she saying that each unit should have one vote, and that the potential of husband and wife politically cancelling each other out violates nature? Is she saying that men/husbands, acting primarily for themselves, as individuals, have left women with a sense of insecurity, and necessarily unhappy? Is she saying the woman who is forced to act individually and politically is necessarily unhappy?

What do you say?