We love the women fandom hates: Day 2
Betty Draper: Mommy Dearest
Of all the things that Betty gets picked on by fans the most, it's for her flaws as a parent. I've always thought that if there is one thing that society in general is most unforgiving of when it comes to women, it's being a bad mother. Now, I'm not going to go as far as to say that these criticisms are entirely inaccurate. Yes, Betty is a bad mother. But it frustrates me when fandom just goes with that without bothering to analyse or attempting to understand why she is the way she is. Which is a pity, because the show has done a damn good job of doing so, albeit sometimes using that part of her personality in order to villainise her and to make Don look good (smh, Season 4).
I think that a lot of Betty's parenting flaws stem, or stemmed, from her marriage to Don. First of all, as a housewife married to a man who was barely at home most of the time, taking care of the kids was entirely on her. It was up to her to discipline them, to entertain them, to make sure they were ready for school. She had to be there whether they were behaving well or behaving badly. And that is bloody hard work. Being around kids for that amount of time, all day long, is exhausting. For some bizarre reason, many people assume that children are beautiful bundles of light and joy that mothers are designed by nature to take care of. False. Children can drive you up the wall, and not all women are natural mothers. The fact that Betty was so often around the kids and Don was around them so little had a huge effect on the kids' perception of them as parents. Sally and Bobby eventually came to associate Betty as the 'strict, cold' parent who would punish them and discipline them (only because Don was never there to do it!) and Don as the 'fun, easy-going' parent - in fact, Don possessed all the characteristics of a non-custodial parent, even before he and Betty got a divorce. Statistically, the non-custodial parent tends to be more lenient and easy-going - since s/he's not around that often most of the discipline is not left up to him/her so usually the children will view him/her as the 'nicer' parent.
Case in point: take this scene from Three Sundays (Season 2, Episode 4) as an example (I can't embed the video). Don has just returned from a hard day at work to a stressed out Betty and the kids. Betty is kind and responsive when Don reveals that he's had a bad day, she passes him a glass of wine and asks whether he wants to talk about it, to which his reponse is an abrupt 'No.' At the same time, Betty is trying to control Sally and Bobby to no avail; she demands that Don does something and his response is? To angrily throw Bobby's toy across this room and break it, right in front of his face. Of course this is a TERRIBLE parenting tactic; it does nothing but intimidate and terrify the children instead of teaching them a lesson firmly. Betty and Don then storm upstairs to have an extremely revealing argument:
Betty: You have no responsibility for anything that goes on in this house.
Don: I pay the bills, put clothes on your back, the damn stables...
Betty: Don't you dare. I'm here with them all day, all alone, outnumbered...
Don: What about Carla, doesn't she count?
Betty: It's not her job to raise our children! I'm here, and then you come home and get to be the hero!
Don: You want me to bring home what I got at the office today? I'll put you through that window.
The argument ends on an ugly note, with both of them shoving each other physically and Betty storming icily out of the bedroom. What frustrates me is that after that argument that really SHOULD have been all about Betty we get a small scene between Don and Bobby and one of Don's Manpain Monologues. It's just - argh - YES, Don had a terrible childhood, Don had issues, and Don may have had a way with the kids that Betty doesn't for all the 5 minutes a day he saw them, but he STILL SUCKS. His behaviour at the dinner table was inexcusable. And then Don gets the heartwarming hug with Bobby. I hated how that scene made Betty out to be cold and mean when she had extremely valid points about Don's terrible parenting skills. It's not that I don't ever sympathise with Don - there are many times that I do - but I hate it when the show tries to make him out to be the better parent than Betty.
Let's also not forget that along with being a constantly stressed out mother, she also had to deal with her suspicions of Don being an unfaithful husband. Just think - she's stuck all day at home looking after his children while he's probably outside canoodling with random women, after which he would return home and lie about it to her face. That must have had an enormous toll on her, both mentally and emotionally. And because Betty is so emotionally repressed she had absolutely no idea how to handle these feelings, and barely anyone around to talk to who would understand her; which meant that these feelings would often, unfortunately, end up being taken out on Sally and Bobby. The children were part of Don, they were the people she was around most of the time, which meant that they would often bear the brunt of her temper or her bad moods.
At the end of the day - the tragedy of Betty is that she simply was not meant to be a mother. And that's OK - there's absolutely nothing wrong with a woman who doesn't want to have children. Unfortunately, because society dictated it and because of the way she was raised to be, marriage and children seemed to be a fate that she accepted readily and because it was expected of her. I think there is a lot of pent up anger inside of her - she's angry that she can't be this woman that everyone expects her to be, but she's also angry at herself for not living up to those expectations. Sally and Bobby are too young to realise all of this now and they'll probably continue to see her as Monster Mom for many years to come; but when they grow older they will be able to understand their mother better, Sally in particular.
And the reason I am able to say all this and why I think Betty is the most realistic and the most important female character on Mad Men is because she still exists to this very day. I still see the 'Betty' syndrome all around me - women who were mostly married during the late '60s or early '70s, who clearly hate being mothers, who hate being around their children, yet still soldier on day after day in a role that they felt was thrust upon them by the rest of the world. I still think that society views women who don't want children to be unnatural or unwomanly, and unfortunately because of this, Betty Draper has never actually disappeared.