I never thought I’d feel sorry for Maureen Dowd, but her article in this Sunday’s New York Times Magazine – What’s a Modern Girl to Do? – made me feel some sympathy for the woman whose bourgeois political snarking (cum fast and loose use of ellipses) on the Times’ oped page is usually about as appealing as sea slugs without Szechwan sauce.
But this time Dowd is baring her soul in a sense, trying to make heads or tales of the fact that some attractive, intelligent, powerful women like her find themselves alone in their fifties. Men, as she tells it, are threatened by them and would prefer to marry the likes of the Latina maid in “Spanglish.” Dowd seems to have missed the key detail that the maid’s daughter was headed off to an Ivy League education, but no matter. The movie wasn’t Brooks’ best anyway. Meanwhile, to augment Dowd’s view, she trucks out some statistics to show that feminism is dead and that we’re all sliding back to the land of Ozzie & Harriet. Evidence of this is that a few more women these days are staying with their maiden names after marriage. Ms. is out and Mrs. is making a comeback.
Well, maybe. But whatever the case, Dowd seems to have missed the most astonishing statistic to be revealed lately. Fifty-seven percent of the college population is now female. Men are going to have to get used to intelligent women or turn celibate. An incipient social revolution may be in the cards that will dwarf the bra burning of the sixties.
I realize personal stories may have little relevance in the grand scheme of things, but from my own experience I’m highly suspicious of the assertion that most men are looking for dumb, unsuccessful women as mates, whatever statistics might say (I’d want to have a serious look at the questions that were asked). In my case it’s quite the reverse and I doubt that I’m that weird (well, a little weird). Almost all of us have made a few mistakes in our lives, but serious adults – male and female – finally come to the conclusion that if you marry someone, you’re going to have to live with him or her for a long time. You’re going to have to talk to them before and after sex, negotiate and share thousands of things. In my case I always preferred intelligent women. And they’re a hundred times sexier, especially after the first twenty minutes or so and maybe even before that.
I don’t want to make any comment about Dowd because I have not met her. But being intelligent and powerful may not be the whole story for why she is alone.
hmmm–MODO as “attractive, intelligent, powerful…” That unassuming self appraisal suggests why she is living la vida sola–I only know her from her writing, which I find tedious, snarky and medacious–That evidence, coupled with what apparently is an out of control ego, suggests she is a diva of the first order. And the only diva I would have preferred is Maria Callas.
“baring her sole”…shouldn’t that be covered up so as not to lead to inappropriate sexual excitement?
Men, as she tells it, are threatened by them
I venture guess that rather than that, MoDo’s matrimonial status has more to do with her whiiiiining about men over the past several years.
I don’t like Dowd’s opinions or writing, and she comes across to me as a fairly unpleasant person. But I understand that she was good friends with Michael Kelly (the “Atlantic” editor who was killed in Iraq), and I think Kelly was a really good buy (confirmed by a credible source who knew him pretty well)
So maybe there’s more to her than meets the eye.
If she’s baring her sole, she should probably consult the Manolo for help.
I think that her observation about men and women is backwards. I’m a strong, independent, intelligent man (do my own cooking, sewing, plumbing, painting, have my own business as a free-lance SW developer, am an accomplished musician, etc.), and my experience is that at least a substantial minority of baby-boomer American women are threatened by that.
Well, I’m a woman and Dowd scares me.
Who would want to sign on for decades of conjugal life with this judgmental, sarcastic, and condescending woman?
Off point:
Why is Tim Russert on this morning’s “Meet the Press” talking about the leak case when he is the prime witness for the prosecution?
The press has no shame or sense of juridical propriety. Russert should recuse himself from commentary or what might be described as “reporting.” He is not a reporter, but a media celebrity who has a vested interest in estabishing his credibility on the subject to the detriment of Libby.
Actually men are staying in the crafts. You can make a good living as a contractor, electrician, plumber,etc. I have yet to meet a women doing any of these jobs. Not that they don’t exist, I just have not met one.
My new next door neighbors are classic. He is an electrician with no “formal” education beyond highschool, she as a Masters degree. One of my student’s husband built my house. She now has a BA. I have no problem with more women being in school than men, the jobs they want require more formal education (though in many cases I can’t imagine why). One of my collegues at my college was a Mr. Mom for his four boys, he is also smart and engaging.
If Modo wasn’t such an elitist snob she might of found a wonderful man to spend her life with. She has no one to blame but herself for her being single at 50. Cry me a river.
Two comments:
1. Please consider the case of Condoleeza Rice. Her personality defects are not apparent to me.
2. “Ms.” is in decline, if not disappearing.
Interesting comment from David above.
In my personal case, my mother was a Phi Beta Kappa from Denison and my father was a 10th grade high school dropout and baker. They were married for over 40 years very happily. the interesting thing is that my father was, if anything, the brighter of the two. He was able to make very good observations. The only difference is that he did not know the technical terms for the observations.
The problem with people like Modo is that they really can’t equate true intelligence without having a paper trail to show the way. If you keep your eyes open and you mind free to observe what is going on, you can be very intelligent without having to have the piece of paper. What this shows is that Modo and people like her really have some inflated idea of their abilities and thoughts, ideas that are not borne out in fact. That alone is enough to chase any potential suitors away in droves. It has nothing to do with feminism. It has to do with being an insufferable snob.
Intelligent men prefers intelligent women. Even better if they are attractive. But even looks and brains are not enough if personality repells.
I think Maureen’s problem is not that she is powerful or successful. When you read her material she seems to confuse insults and snarkiness with logic and reason. I would find a relationship with someone like that intolerable, regardless of her status or success.
BTW: My wife is a PhD psychologist, who manages to be loving and caring despite her success. It is just hard to visualize Dowd fitting that description.
Modo just doesn’t get it. We men are very simple creatures for the most part–a good meal, a cold beer, a roll in the hay, a little peace and quiet, some time with the boys, that’s all we need for the most part.
Scintillating conversation can be a bonus, so long as it’s not with a competitive snarky (rhymes with witch).
My god, that picture of her alone at the bar drew a horselaugh! All it lacked was the cigarette; but this is after all, the Times.
Of course this article is something of a rehash of stuff she’s written in earlier columns, which amount to “It’s not my fault that I’m single!”
She talks a lot about how men should look up, but not at all about how she has looked down. Has she? I recall her romance with Michael Douglas; don’t know if that’s typical of her past.
BTW, Dowd says that more women are taking their husband’s name indicates the decline of feminism, not keeping their maiden name. Personally I see it as a sign that particular manifestation of feminism was largely a fad.
Feminists believe that women are oppressed and exploited by men thus they harbor resentment and anger towards men in general. Along with resentment there is an underlying belief that women are superior to men (when God made man she was only fooling).
This is the classic leftist oppressor vs. oppressed meme with all the implications of the former’s evil nature and unjustly coopted power over the righteous but victimized underdog class.
Substitute angry, vengeful, and selfish for attractive, intelligent, and powerful and you’ll find the formula responsible for the plight of these lonely women.
Marin county is full of them.
MoDo is taking the “It’s not me, it’s them” defense. It’s quite possible that she just hasn’t met the right man. It’s also quite possible that she’s arrogant, condescending, etc.
As for Condi still being single, that’s been her choice. She gets marriage offers all the time (granted many are from strangers). Her standards seem to be impossibly high. She likes football players. She also likes scholars. Many football players are quite smart, but few of them have PhDs.
couple notes for MoDo:
at 50,you’re no longer a girl.
that’s likely half
your cognitive-disconnect.
as for the other half,my personal rule is:
“don’t argue with bitchy women.”
PS-(is this how Libs celebrate “victory”??)
LMAO.
Roger: Dowd seems to have missed the most astonishing statistic to be revealed lately. Fifty-seven percent of the college population is now female. Men are going to have to get used to intelligent women or turn celibate. An incipient social revolution may be in the cards that will dwarf the bra burning of the sixties.
Wrong! Intelligent men with status (and presumably a good job) will continue to attract younger women – educated or not. Celibacy is not in their future. Men are more attracted to physically appealing feminine women and most don’t mind that much whether they are educated or not. (Let’s not confuse education with intelligence. There are plenty of smart stay at home wives/mothers – they just lack the pretensions and attitude of Maureen Dowd).
The real problem women like Dowd have is that they talk about feminism and equality and all that yet the vast majority of them are not willing to settle for a man who lacks the status they desire- ie they won’t ‘marry down’, so to speak. Men have no problem ‘marrying down’ as they care more about physical appearances, having children, and companionship from a woman than status. Few men also want to feel like they’re in competition with their wives either.
Did you know Maureen Dowd used to go out with Michael Douglas? I laughed when I read this http://www.isteve.com/05JanA.htm#maureen.dowd.michael.douglas
The link pretty much sums up Dowd.
Around the time of the ’04 elections, Dowd was being interviewed on Fox(I forget by whom) and the interviewer seemed overly impressed by her. At one point, he brought up a question that his demeanor suggested he had been told to ask: ” Why do your fellow reporters refer to you as the Cobra?”. She simply stared coldly at him until he prompted that it must be because of her bite, to which she assented. I had never heard this before, but my immediate thought was that it was her habit of spitting venom.
A Martin Mull line from some old comedy seems apropos: “you have being liberated confused with being a bitch.”
photoncourier “Good friends.” Yep, that would explain why she spent so much of her eulogy at Kelly’s funeral talking about his premarital sexual activity in front of his widow and children.
Trust me, being too smart for the room is not why MoDo’s single in her 50′s. A sense of self-centeredness approaching singularity might have something to do with it.
I wanted to dance the Continental like Fred and Ginger in white hotel suites; drink martinis like Myrna Loy and William Powell; live the life of a screwball heroine like Katharine Hepburn, wearing a gold lame gown cut on the bias, cavorting with Cary Grant, strolling along Fifth Avenue with my pet leopard.
Who wouldn’t?
You know, that sounds like an interesting case. Why don’t you take it?
I haven’t the time. I’m much too busy seeing that you don’t lose any of the money I married you for.
from The Thin Man (screenplay by Albert Hackett & Frances Goodrich from the novel by Dashiell Hammett)
Nick Charles is a favorite fictional character. It goes without saying that Myrna Loy is Nora.
Pretty girl.
Yes. She’s a very nice type.
You got types?
Only you, darling. Lanky brunettes with wicked jaws.
The NYT Michael Kelly obit (to give some context to the comment above):
http://www.irishabroad.com/irishworld/irishamericamag/junejuly03/features/TheBestPossible.asp
Fillet is the first word that comes to mind when I see sole.
Whenever I have seen Dowd on a show interviewed I always found her to be very sexual in nature, the way she carried herself… she really puts out the I’m the cat sexual vibe. I thought she was kind of sexy and I typically don’t find women over 30 to be very sexy… but again it was tv so she likely doesn’t look in real life the way she did on tv?
I didn’t read her article yet but I doubt we’ll ever go back to the Ozzie and Harriet days. Just turn on the tv, people today would laugh at a show like that now. TV is more sexualized, cynical and well…. real.
Although she herself is a complete nut job, Roseanne is still one of my favorite shows, the ANTI Ozzie and Harriet fantasy.
I imagine, though I don’t know of course, that if Dowd can’t get a mate it likely has a lot to do with herself?
Mike
Ahem–we have only Modo’s word that she is intelligent–her writings dont support her assertion, and she hasnt posted her SATs, GREs or Benet IQ scores–And since we already know she is a liar of the first order……………
Intelligent? nahhh
Attractive—debateable
Powerful? I dont recall when the last time was she did anything resembling power.
Excuse me—I can do better at the local watering hole at 2 AM on a sunday morning.
“Men are going to have to get used to intelligent women or turn celibate.”
You’re pointing your judgement in the wrong direction, Roger! It’s successful women who are going to have to get used to finding less successful men attractive, lest they wind up like La Dowd. And celibacy isn’t the penalty for either, it’s merely childlessness and a middle-aged dating scene.
Or worse, they’ll have to act out this.
“from my own experience I’m highly suspicious of the assertion that most men are looking for dumb, unsuccessful women as mates”
So, is your (second?) wife smarter and (more to the point) more successful than you?
from the article:
Moe seems especially peeved
that the 20-something-girls
know more about dating than she does,
and explicitly reject the
feminist “rules” of the seventies.
My html skillz are nil.
Here is the url I tried to link:
New York Magazine: “Alpha Women, Beta Men- when wives are the family breadwiinners”
http://www.newyorkmetro.com/nymetro/news/features/n_9495/
The verdict of Manhattan women on their less successful husbands?
“Freeloaders”
Intelligent? nahhh
She’s too conventional and yuppiefied to get a handle on this. Not an original thinker, for sure.
Attractive—debateable
I like redheads. I just can’t help it.
Powerful?
Lacks money. Played out of her league.
Excuse me—I can do better at the local watering hole at 2 AM on a sunday morning.
You exaggerate — 10 pm saturday night, maybe, if you’re lucky.
Most people find arrogance a turn-off. The self-annointed “elites” still haven’t figured that out. I doubt there is a huge difference in her and my SAT scores, but I’ve always felt my opinion was worth approximately the same as anyone else’s – one vote.
How intelligent can she really be if she hasn’t figured out why men don’t like her? It’s either “there is something wrong with all the men I’ve met” or “there is something wrong with me.” Let Occam’s Razor be your guide, Ms. Dowd.
“baring her sole”…shouldn’t that be covered up so as not to lead to inappropriate sexual excitement?
Sounds fishy to me.
Why is Dowd in Washington, anyway?
The references to Hollywood glamour women from the forties are a persistent feature of Dowd’s prose over the years. Her interests, and her talents, are focused on Vanity Fair-style gossip and dish rather than intelligent analysis of policy or society, which is to say the woman has spent her career on the wrong coast in the wrong town, and with the wrong media outlet.
Not for nothing does DC have such an extraordinary over-representation of nerdy, grinding brainiacs: lawyers, economists, biologists at NIH, policy analysts of every type. Plus all the crunchy NGO types. In short, DC is about as tone-deaf in matters of style and glamour as Hollywood is when it comes to searching argument and analysis, which must make it extremely tough to find a match for a woman like Dowd who is less intelligent than her peers in the upper ranks of the DC journalism scene but not nearly so attractive as the anchorette types and political groupies available to the nerds.
She should have opted for an LA-based gig on Entertainment Weekly or People and found herself a middling, gently sarcastic West LA screenwriter.
My RA in college was a Phd candidate in, I believe, Biochemistry–married to a big burly guy who worked for a rail company. They were a great couple.
I don’t inflict Dowd on myself very often–but to understand where she’s coming from, just look at the pop culture fantasies on offer to today’s ‘strong single woman’. Romantic comedies generally show an unconscionably boring, mediocre woman who is never sufficiently attractive to threaten the mainly female audience. An improbably attractive, even more improbably patient man lands in her lap, and most improbably of all falls in love with this woman. The man never makes himself difficult in any way–the woman never has to put herself out for him or consider his feelings (unless to torment him with some psychobabble disguised criticism), she certainly never has to pursue him or make an effort to be attractive to him: the ideal man is almost a surrogate father, who is always gentle and considerate regardless of the number of temper tantrums and glaring personality flaws he’s subjected to, who always finds her attractive. Or look at the modern sitcom, wherein women who relentlessly tear down their husbands are lionized and made out with scarcely an exception to be ‘always right’ to do so. Look at Sex in the City, where a woman who waltzes around destroying marriages and breaking hearts indiscriminately is not portrayed as a louse and a bastard, as any man who did so would be, but as some sort of feminist hero. Popular feminism seems to conceive of a woman’s freedom as existing without any parallel concept of responsibility–what in the old days was called, for a man, ‘honor’ or ‘chivalry’.
I take issue with the idea that anything Victor describes above is “feminism.” I’m not saying it isn’t true; I’m just saying that’s not feminism (“Sex and the City”–are you kidding?) The Ph.D married to the rail company guy is true feminism–in other words, a woman who simply found another person she wanted to be with, and wasn’t defining herself by the man she married. All the other stuff described is the same old “war between the sexes,” and yes, in that respect, we’re right back to the 50′s.
Part of what’s happening now is that women approaching 50 realize they are tired of playing that game. Maybe men do too, I don’t know. I’ll be 50 next summer, and having been in a marriage which lasted nearly 20 years, and having raised a son, I’m enjoying being on my own–having my own house, money, hours, friends, music and pasttimes. Sex and romantic love are not all there is, and it’s not all a woman should want or define herself by, any more than a man should. I think Modo is being a little adolescent here.
What Shel said. The adolescence of the boomer generation has lasted about thirty years too long.
A particularly adolescent notion is the fantasy that marriage is about romance. It’s a life partnership for the twin purpose of a) eliminating loneliness (especially in old age) and b) bearing and raising children who will take care of you in your old age.
Dowd needs to put away the Fred and Ginger videos and grow up.
My wife got to heart of the matter immediately.
“Who wants to be with someone who is so self-centered?”
I’m sure many of us here have experienced relationships with such people and they are always plagued by discord and dissatisfaction and inevitably devolve into a power struggle.
Life’s too short.
“It’s a life partnership for the twin purpose of a) eliminating loneliness (especially in old age) and b) bearing and raising children who will take care of you in your old age.”
That’s it? I feel sorry for you, and sorrier for your spouse.
From Coisty’s link, it looks like a lot of the guys who dumped Mo were Jewish – Douglas, Bernstein, Sorkin. Is that why she’s turned into such a fanatic antisemite? I’m sure it didn’t help that her Irish buddy Lewis married a Jewish girl, or that rival Judith Miller finally got married.
Maybe you should give her a ring, Coisty.
> I’m sure it didn’t help that her Irish buddy Lewis married a Jewish girl,
Meant Kelly, not Lewis.
The interesting thing about her essay is that, other than a few anecdotes, everything is about the media. The bulk of the essay is based on movies and magazine articles – or covers! A net surfer in Mongolia with a decent pirate movie collection could have written largely the same essay.
No, Paul, that’s of course not all there is to marriage, as those of us who are in love and happily married know.
But while love is essential to marriage, it’s not exclusive to marriage. You can have a satisfying love life without marriage, and increasingly, plenty of successful people find happiness without ever being married.
Dowd’s complaint is not that she can’t find love but that she’s not married. I suspect that’s because, like her tedious and juvenile prose, her understanding of marriage (and perhaps love as well) is shaped mainly by Hollywood images and snippets from Dorothy Parker.
The other problem with the woman is that she vastly overestimates her own wit. There are plenty of accomplished and witty Washington women journalists who’ve been able to marry well and happily: Andrea Mitchell, Cokie Roberts, Mary Matalin. But each of those women is genuinely talented and intelligent– a woman of substance, so to speak. The first two are journalists. Dowd is neither a reporter nor a novelist, dramaturg or a brilliant essayist. She writes adolescent junk of the sort Wonkette would write if her output had to comply with a ‘G’ rating. It’s hard to imagine a suitable Washington counterpart for Dowd.
Gary Rosen – you’re thinking of Michael Kelly. Yes, Washington men value intelligence above snark. Dowd’s simply in the wrong town. She’d do far better in a provincial blue-state outpost where the (intelligence) bar isn’t set so high.
Feminism has split into so many different branches over the years, that in calling anything a manifestation of ‘feminism’ one’s bound to be at least partly wrong. But I think all of these shows and films are at least feminist in their own estimation–this is certainly true of ‘Sex and the City’, which was definitely if ham-handedly rah-rahing the idea that a woman can have sex ‘like a man’, which is to say, like the worst kind of man. Or, one might say, they are feminist as feminism has filtered down to popular culture–which is to say, they’ve just switched over from ‘Father Knows Best’ to ‘Mother Knows Best’. It’s no smarter a transition than moving from ‘Amos n’ Andy’ to Sidney Poitier (or similar portrayals in modern popular culture of the saintly gay or lesbian character which are also aimed, however clumsily, at righting past wrongs). But I don’t really credit Maureen Dowd with a much more nuanced or intelligent conception of feminism than this, given my past experience with her columns. Indeed, when last she raised this issue (when some article was published, showing that the more education a woman has, the less likely she is to eventually get married) with suitable outrage at the plight of intelligent women in our age, I recall thinking that it was certainly generous of her to get so angry, seeing as she herself didn’t really have a dog in this fight.
A gal can have 3 Ph.D.s and be the Queen of Lichtenstein — as long as she’s got a good rack and can give a good, uh, lovin’ — who’d object? No guy I know.
Dowd’s beef is with men who are her peers or betters, status-wise. Period. I rather doubt that she tried her luck dating a high school english teacher who found her “intelligence” attractive, or a male nurse, etc. I wonder why?
Seinfeld outlines one of the fundamental differences between men and women in a more succint manner than Dowd:
JERRY: Women need to like the job of the guy they’re with. If they don’t like the job, they don’t like the guy. Men know this. Which is why we make up the phony, bogus names for the jobs that we have. “Well, right now, I’m the regional management supervisor.” “I’m in development, research, consulting.”
Men on the other hand, if they are physically attracted to a woman are not that concerned with her job. Are we? Men don’t really care. Men’ll just go, “Really? Slaughterhouse? Is that where you work? That sounds interesting. So whatdya got a big cleaver there? You’re just lopping their heads off? That sounds great! Listen, why don’t you shower up, and we’ll get some burgers and catch a movie.”
Eh… she always struck me as shallow, and very bitter. That perennial high-school junior league bitchiness wears pretty thin after a while. I kind of agree with Shel— about having your own place, and your own life, and Thibauld about her being in the wrong town… and Tsol about being too damn picky.
And I am fifty, not likely to marry my SO (whom I have been with for a decade), who is a lovely man, a good bit older than me and a retired high school music teacher.
Frankly, I’m not inclined to be terribly sympathetic with someone who is pissed off because her life hasn’t turned out to be a romantic movie.
It seems to me that at least part of MoDo’s problem is not her IQ or feminist gripes in general, but rather an individual deficit– her incapacity for contentment with whatever is genuinely good in her life. I have several close friends, not one of whom would say that their life has turned out as they hoped it would, but who have nonetheless learned to savor what’s positive in their lives rather than focus on what they don’t have. Some are men, some are women, some are married, some are single, which suggests to me that neither gender nor marital status is an automatic guarantee of satisfaction (or dissatisfaction) with one’s life. My grandmother would have said that MoDo is the kind of person who finds a fly in every box of ointment. I’ve often thought, after reading one of Dowd’s rants about men and being single, that if she had succeeded in tying the knot with one of her boyfriends, she’d now be writing columns about the hassles of living with an actor’s big ego, a journalist’s Messiah complex, or whatever.
If this was a tickler to get me to pay $50 to peek under the e-page veil it didn’t work. Pretty soon the NYT is going to have to pay people to accept delivery.
Put the nose down and giv’er the gas boys. It’ll be over before you know it.
“I’m a strong, independent, intelligent man (do my own cooking, sewing, plumbing, painting, have my own business as a free-lance SW developer, am an accomplished musician, etc.), and my experience is that at least a substantial minority of baby-boomer American women are threatened by that.”
Hey, Jim, sounds good to me. Let me know if you’re available!
Both my mother and father never finished high school, because they spent those years fleeing the Nazis. (They met after the war.) But my father built a successful business and they both read a lot and supported the arts and were vwery well-spoken.
Neither of them were good with their hands, but I have always been attracted to men who can make things and fix things.
I never assume someone is less intelligent or articulate or interesting because they didn’t finish college or high school.
Rick -
“If this was a tickler to get me to pay $50 to peek under the e-page veil it didn’t work.”
this will:
http://www.bugmenot.com/
get a login name and password,
and give it a go.
the article i read had seven long pages worth.
There have always been intelligent women, and college may make them better educated, but think twice before equating it with intelligence.
The Scarecrow had one great idea after another, got a degree from the Wizard, then uncorked “the sum of the square roots of any two sides of an isosceles triangle is equal to the square root of the remaining side”. Maybe the degree was in journalism, or maybe there was a Scarecrow Studies program teaching impressionable, young Straw-Americans the finer points of navel-gazing and victimology.
Men don’t like “intelligent women”?
Hmmm…I got a doctorate at age 22, but managed to find a husband at age 40 (before then, I was not looking, due to my career, and discouraged suitors…)…and I’m (for lack of a better word) fat…However, I LIKE men, and don’t put them down…
So I suspect the the problem is not intelligence or competency…her problem is anger.
I’ll put her on my “marriage” prayer list: “Saint Ann, send her a Man as soon as you can”…
Man, I can feel the hate vibes right through my keyboard. All someone has to do is mention “Maureen Dowd” on a center-right-or-right blog and its llke the witch trial scene in “Search For The Holy Grail”.
She truly is a gifted writer, but she long ago sold out to the Georgetown set. With guiding lights like Katherine Graham and Mary McGrory, and with her prose trapped in 1980′s boomer-lib amber, MD is now out of place. I long hoped that one day she’d let ‘er rip and write something powerful that would upset her pals, distress her editors, and cause her loyal fans to down boxes of Dove bars. But that dream died long ago.
And now for the good news! When’s the last time a Tom Friedman column was the topic of discussion on a major web site?
Immured. The whole sorry bunch.
At least it seems long ago.
A few things Roger –
Mrs seems a status symbol (“I got married and you didn’t) like summer in the Hamptons. Hard to draw much conclusions from that status seeking.
What is driving the single status of Dowd and say, Hugh Grant is the same dynamic; an inability to make a definitive life choice and stick with it. People go into marriage knowing the risks and wanting a partner for the rest of their lives; with risks of divorce already very high. Women in particular give a lot up (sexual, economic, and emotional freedom) and often have a network of female friends to provide social bonds in substitute for marriage.
The choice is essentially economic; substituting friendship ala Sex and the City for marriage, with a lot of short-term relationships. Men in high income levels have done this for a long time; Jack Nicholson, Hugh Grant, Donald Trump come to mind. The ability to make this choice is more indicative of rising income and social equality of women than anything else. It’s not men discriminating against intelligent and powerful women but those women making the choice not to compromise their freedom and personal life.
Ironically Dowd misreads the movies she cites; Leoni’s character does not appreciate her nice-guy husband, preferring type-A macho guys and almost loses him to the maid who recognizes Sandler’s “niceness” in contrast to Latino machismo; Firth and Johansson share an appreciation for art across class lines and find art literally preferable to sex with Johansson’s character the artistic equal to Firth with her own artistic heritage; Firth’s character in Love Actually is another Sander-esque “nice guy” appreciated by his maid in Portugal. The lessons are pretty conservative and mainstream: don’t cheat on your spouse, share interest in what they do, appreciate “niceness” because it’s relatively rare. All that applies across both sexes. Ironically there are many movies with a high-powered male protagonist who learns to appreciate family life over all sorts of business stuff. Hardly the type-A masculine ideal.
After a while I couldn’t make myself read MoDo, even for grins. Then one weekend while watching C-SPAN’s Book TV, I finally caught a glimpse of this average-looking woman. After a few minutes of her snarky condescension and insufferable nasal twang, I turned off the boob tube.
I wouldn’t interpret the enthusiastic dislike many on the right and rightish have for Dowd as proof of her provocative ‘intellect’–she routinely attracts attention for two reasons: one being the same reason that the last lame zebra in the herd is always the first one the jackals pull down, the other being the same reason that everyone hates the grossly underqualified guy who got his job because he was the boss’s brother. Perhaps she’d be a decent writer on popular culture (though she still wouldn’t hold a candle to, among others, Cintra Wilson). But as a so-called political writer she’s a fun target because she’s predictable (witness Josh Chafetz’s ‘Immutable Laws of Dowd’), unthreatening, and only infuriating insofar as she’s the only woman sitting on one of the most choice pieces of opinion retail available–the NYT editorial section–and yet she has all the political insight of a gossipy hairdresser, leading one to the insulting conclusion that THAT really is the NYT’s idea of an ‘authentic’ female voice.
I feel sorry for the woman,a lifetime dancing backwards,in high heels, alone.
Her problem is that,at fifty,the choice is someone already married,divorced, a widower,a bachelor or someone much younger.All of them bring problems, except for widower…she is going to have to whack Katherine Zeta Jones.
From what little I’ve read about her, she’s a red-stater and sneers at her red-state brothers happy, successful marriages, life, and her family’s religion.
This came up awhile ago in bloggy discussion when Ann Althouse didn’t care for MoDo’s approach, nor, on the other hand, emphatically, for this alternate position:
I’m actually very sorry for the MoDo cohort who bought into their own entitlement to have it all — certainly more than other purportedly plodding ordinary less-interesting less-enlightened women — by virtue of, well, being special. Life is weird. Nothing is guaranteed. And in my observation people/men get to choose for enjoyment, comfort, and kindness, not, outside a few John Cheever heroines, challenging self-improvement projects. Even the grace of love is, at some levels, a rational transaction with exchange of benefits. I see very little sign in her comments that Ms. Dowd understands the likely criteria used by her potential market.
I think Maureen Dowd is a spoiled narcissist. No man is going to stand that for that combination very long, I’d say.
Not only does she come from a proud conservative family, she has an interestingly friendly relationship with Bush 41 and Barbara. Although I’m not sure how that’s going at this point
Sure has been a long, welcome while! But it’s easy to understand–his columns are so formulaic, after you’ve made fun of one or two, all the enjoyment goes out of it. Who needs boring repetition??
MoDo via Drudge
“…and its llke the witch trial scene in “Search For The Holy Grail”.”
Not in the least. Carol Cleveland was hot
I’ll drink to that, Richard M.
“But I think all of these shows and films are at least feminist in their own estimation–this is certainly true of ‘Sex and the City’, which was definitely if ham-handedly rah-rahing the idea that a woman can have sex ‘like a man’, which is to say, like the worst kind of man”
Well, one presumes that they act like the writers who created them – the majority of whom, I beleive, are gay. Not sure what that says about gays, but a gay friend of mine once posited that so-called gay promiscuity (NOT by any means universal)is just male behaviour without the tedious and restraining influence of females. This post is not designed to offend, and I’m certainly not convinved of this theory, but we were watching football when it was brought up, which should lend it a certain credibility.
She’s putting on that “poor little me” attitude. Guys don’t like that. Guys also don’t like getting put down for no reason at all, which seems to be second nature to Dowd. She also doesn’t seem willing to compromise in a “give and take” relationship. That’s why she’s alone and likely will be for the rest of her life. Maybe if she gets a dog her personality will soften enough for her to get a decent date.
==Men are going to have to get used to intelligent women or turn celibate.==
I for one have not seen that much correlation between education and intelligence.
==But being intelligent and powerful may not be the whole story for why she is alone.==
No kidding. She reminds me of a friend of mine who’s in her mid-40′s and has never married–basically because she’s one of those people who always has to be right about everything, and have the last word on every topic.
My saying about her is that “She’s the kind of woman who’d give a guy tips on how to masturbate.”
In the spirit of The Manolo, I’m giving her a makeover.
(with apologies for the shameless self-promotion)
Wow–our host, Althouse, the Anchoress, and Drudge all spawning thousands of comments about the MoDo–This is the most fun I have had since the hogs ate my little brother.
Oops–apologies to Fausta who started on the makeover–I am sure his site will have some wonderful photoshopping.
“MODO as ‘attractive, intelligent, powerful…’ That unassuming self appraisal suggests…”
ummm. “MODO” did not describe herself as such. those were roger’s words. did you read the article or just the roger’s negative response? don’t you think you ought to read the article before you start in with the “hear hears”?
MoDo is a sad story, & has previously written about lonely holidays, remembering lavish gifts she’s given men, who are now married to other women. Bitterness & sarcasm are double-edged swords; she’s forged a brittle, nasty persona of her own free will, but doesn’t seem to realize what it reveals about her private demons. Perhaps the men who’ve stopped returning her calls are simply looking for a decent & kind person
Reading anything that MoDo writes, or anything the NYT publishes is not worth my time or attention–I would have to characterize Roger’s appraisal as fake but accurate then.
It’s those big feet Mo,…that’s why.
I have my own opinion.
“Her problem is that,at fifty,the choice is someone already married,divorced, a widower,a bachelor or someone much younger.All of them bring problems. . .
Believe me, never-married guys in their 50s bring problmes too.
A little late to stumble across this thread but for someone who has made herself so hated I am quite surprised by the vulnerability MoDo shows in this piece. That’s a pretty bold combination IMO.
I was interested in the substance of her article though – mainly the social pendulum she is describing wherein the daughters of the baby boom feminists are now into marriage, family, home, and exuding sexuality (all of which we might infer will lead to higher reproductive rates in this coming generation of women). She wonders whether these women will, by the time they are in their 50′s, be lonely and isolated and popping valium and looking for Betty Friedan. That’s not an unreasonable prediction, given perpetual human dissatisfaction. But if that is how this next generation plays out – what of the subsequent generation of females – i.e. the ones who will be coming of age in 20-30 years time (the daughters of these new traditionalists, of whom there could be a great many, if the generation Dowd is describing procreates well). Will they swing back to feminisim after observing their mothers’ bitter disappointments with more traditional sex roles? And will they do so in a big way? It’s an intriguing idea actually. The granddaughters of the baby-boomer feminists as the uber-feminists, toting machine guns and fighting the global jihad. That’s the kind of women we’re going to need in 20-30 years. Maybe providence will inadvertently provide us with exactly what we need.
Caroline
“toting machine guns and fighting the global jihad. That’s the kind of women we’re going to need in 20-30 years”.
Damn, how depressing. OTOH, how potentially realistic. This will be a long war, with unforeseen meanderings. I hope your scenario is not necessary, but if it is, I hope you are right. The pendulum always swings, we occasionally alter its rhythm, but never its passage.
Ahem
It is the human condition to look outside of ourselves for answers to our own inner turmoil, the more unconscious the better. That, and her clear intend to bail, i.e., retire early from the New York Times, has caused her to publish a second book in two years that will clearly be nothing more than another regurgitation of old ideas. There is nothing new here, if this New York Times Magazine excerpt is any indication, except for her odd use of examples from bad recent movies – why would she consider a bad movie to be culturally meaningful? – and even worse TV. (The first book in this “please help me to retire” series is a compendium of her columns. And, by the way, my question is – why would anyone buy this? We who read her religiously – this includes me – don’t need to read any of them again, since we have already read them and they have a short shelf life, they being reactions to that week’s news items. Those who haven’t read her, don’t want to, I’ve noticed.)
Clearly it would be difficult to live with this kind of personality. At least Bill Maher doesn’t contain his glee at his naturalistically unattached (but not unsexed) state. Maureen, who I’ve often suspected might have a not-to-be-sneezed at greater love for the bottle than for the kind of self-containment and humility that is the gist of at least some of what is involved in a happy partnership, is clearly looking for a date as part and parcel of her own personal exit strategy.
She is pretty, and keeps herself up. She can be adoring and obsequious, as we’ve seen her on sunday morning news shows deferring her already semi-retired colleague, William Safire. There is a weird Catholic creepiness (I grew up one so I can say this) that she throws into many discussions seemingly unnecessarily. And she holds herself with a kind of stillness that I don’t think men find as inviting as a more naturalistic manner.
Her main issue though is that a man does not want to imagine having his sexual performance or God-forbid his member discussed or -aagghhh! – critiqued in the savage way she takes to the paperwaves twice per week. She doesn’t seem to understand that she is fairly unique in this regard, and not really in the same position or necessarily able to understand the position of many other women who are modulated and enhanced by the requirements of managing others, for example.
In my humble opinion Ms. Dowd’s problem is that, viewed, I admit, through her writings, she’s boring.
As posted at Maureen Dowd’s Social Myopia:
Maureen Dowd’s angst-full essay ‘What’s a Modern Girl to Do? ‘ echoes a myopic view of men and women found in Cincinnati Enquirer staff reporter Krista Ramsey’s ‘Who are these women?’.
Expanding on the hopes shared in ‘Looking forward to the day when…‘ , Porkoplis is optimistic and looks forward to the day when:
Essays and reporting like that of Mses. Dowd and Ramsey are just a curiosity of our past.Our ‘popular culture’ reinforces the notion that the whole, represented in a loving marriage between a man and woman, is greater the the sum of its individual parts. That same ‘popular culture’ seeks the ‘fulfillment’ both Dowd and Ramsey distress over in a commitment to family, rearing of the next generation and community.