Sex and the City: Love at the End of History
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- Опубликовано: 22 ноя 2021
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Let's overthink the sh*t out of this show!
Song used in intro/outro - "You've Got the Love" cover by Milka Christmas Choir
• You've Got the Love by...
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SOURCES:
Jane Arthurs “Sex and the City and Consumer Culture: Remediating Postfeminist Drama”, Feminist Media Studies, 3:1 (2003) pp.83-98.
Bonnie J. Dow. “Hegemony, Feminist Criticism, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show” Critical Studies in Mass Communication, 7 (1990), 261-274.
Jane Gerhard. “Sex and the City: Carrie Bradshaw's queer postfeminism” Feminist Media Studies, 5 (1) (2006) pp. 37-49.
Angela McRobbie. “Post‐feminism and popular culture” Feminist Media Studies, 4 (3) (2004) pp. 255-264.
Angela McRobbie, Lynn Spigel, Yvonne Tasker. Interrogating Postfeminism: Gender and the Politics of Popular Culture, Duke University Press (2007).
Emily Nussbaum. “Difficult Women: How “Sex and the City” lost its good name” New Yorker (2013).
Ariel Saramandi. "A Novel About Sleeping Through the ’90s, Designed to Wake You Up" Electric Lit (2018):
electricliterature.com/a-nove...
Belinda A. Stillion Southard. “Beyond the Backlash: Sex and the City and Three Feminist Struggles” Communication Quarterly, Vol. 56, No. 2, (2008) pp. 149-167.
David Zurawik, “The Trouble with 'Ally' Analysis: Fox's pseudo-feminist, 'neurotic female' is sending mixed messages on gender and workplace issues” Baltimore Sun (1998). 
Развлечения
Hello! My friend Hannah and I started a podcast :) it's called Rehash, and it's all about social media phenomenons that once took the world by storm, only to be quickly forgotten! We're releasing episodes weekly, which you can find here (and wherever you get your podcasts): anchor.fm/rehashpodcast
Did yo watch And Just Like That? Was wondering what your thoughts were on the spinoff.
“Capitalism strips us of our humanity, and then sells us books on how to be more human.” Wow. Love this video.
Capitalism stripping us from values is tiny compared to socialism, and even worse, compared to communism. Take it from someone who had seen the decay of her beloved country along with its values and all its meaning.
Wow. How can I say this in a civil way? I don't mean to offend...
Try living one week under the OPPRESSIVE, Totalitarian Chinese Communist regime if you wanna see what Really kills the soul. Being treated like a slave by a left-fascist regime.
I don't mean to insult or provoke anyone with this comment.
I used to hate capitalism too. It was a long road of study and disillusionment with Marxism that changed my perspective drastically.
@@elig6590
YES! THANK YOU.
My new comment essentially says the same thing...
Capitalism will make plastic of everything, given enough time
says the monetized youtube channel. Thicc with irony.
I think there is something to be said about female friendships and proximity. SATC made a lot of women believe their friends would always be there, and didn't anticipate the isolation caused by social media, the transience created by an unstable western economy and the loneliness of online dating. That's why it feels nostalgic to me. Big and Carrie talking on a landline phone, no texting, no photos to stalk it feels completely foreign now. I notice that most coming of age female drama shows have one protagonist who has one close friend and that's it. The individualism spoken about during the commentary went into overdrive in the 2010s.
Thank you for mentioning this!
@Erwin Lii Yes i think girls was realistic on this point, there were many seasons where the girls were not speaking to each other or in active conflict. When the main character becomes pregnant she moves away to the suburbs, which is realistic, whereas Miranda's life doesn't change much when she has Brady (not realistic). By the end of girls every one has pretty much gone their separate ways. Friendships are more peripheral and tenuous now.
This is something we need a video on
@@christieomojo Honestly, the female friendships in Girls was one of the things that made it impossible for me to watch the show. I don't find it a realistic portrayal at all. It is true that, when getting older, the quantity of female friendships diminishes and changes, but that is not necessarily the case for the quality. Girls loved focussing on the cliché that woman are actually incapable of being friends with each other, because we are either too self-involved or are competing for male attention. Apparently we are all secretly waiting to stab each other in the back. Of course none of the male characters have this problem (except when they're gay). God, that show was barely trying to hide its cynicism about women.
@@camillelemmens1745 they were awful to each other. I was relieved when they all went their separate ways.
The scene where they talk about being each other’s soulmates is literally one of my favorite scenes from any tv show.
Me too! It always gets me emotional. Despite its flaws, I really think SATC is one of the best examples of chosen family in all media.
it's actually the main reason i hate the very end so much. it shouldn't have been Mr Big it should've been the girls showing up in Paris to be with her.
Yeah
The Soul Mates episode is one of my all time favorites! Every birthday I would have my friends and I watch this.
@@nihilismistheonlyway4680 I totally agree.
I actually find our Sex and the City protagonists to be realistically flawed characters. They are driven,beautiful and intelligent. They at least hetero love each other. They are also vain,unwise,selfish and materialistic. They have external ethics barrowed from an ideal of 90's New York,but it's not really from them internally. It's largely an accident that they are such realistically neutral characters,but it's fascinating.
I agree. It kind of wouldn’t have worked if they were perfectly unproblematic? It’s a character study. It’s art, which shouldn’t be sterile. It’s not meant to be a moralistic guide on how to live.
I'm sure it would have been majorly different in any other city.
@@laurakibben4147 for sure, as a native new yorker who was in her 20s in the 90s living in manhattan I can attest that this is pretty specific to the show. the vibe doesnt carry over to chicago, l.a. or SF or tampa all of which Ive visted or lived in. every other city with maybe the exception of LA is pretty tiny compared to NYC. you can kind of lose yourself in nyc in a way and this anonymity promotes a kind of vanity and hyperindividualism and self absorption and self indulgence that's almost impossible to stop.
This is exactly what I think whenever I see videos calling the show toxic. These characters are flawed, troubled, biased, wrong, right, etc. Just like the rest of us. If someone made a show about ANY of us, we would all be “toxic” too, because not one of us is a perfect comic book hero, with zero flaws. We do and say fucked up shit the entirety of our lives. SATC reflected a time and a place, and the people in it with all their flaws.
This is why is dislike the discourse that paints Carrie as the devil and Samantha as the “real protagonist” and better friend. They all have their flaws. I love Carries selfishness, her cheating, her carelessness. I love that they don’t backtrack on it at the end of each episode, she is just so human. Still a funny interesting person and a good friend, just a character who the writers were actually unafraid to make human.
Miranda being excited to take a break from motherhood for a few days is not selfish. Usually men do it all the time, leaving all the work to the mothers and not being judged. I think the series showed perfectly the struggle to not leave your "personhood" for being a mother in the face of Miranda.
I agree but I feel like she was referring to the fact the he's treated like a burden from all the girls
@@claudiatonietto128that is actually also very realistic. I don’t want to come across as a bad person, I understand that children are the most important humans in their parents’ lives, but as friend without any kids I think it’s important to meet your friends without the kids. Even it’s once in a few months. And in case of satc with their lifestyle the kid was a burden.
@@natalyamartirosyan kind of proving her individualism point perfectly there...humans reproduce. it changes people. why would you expect your friends to prioritise you over their literal offspring??
The “maybe we could be each other’s soulmates” line from Charlotte will always bring me to tears. I think it’s truly how many of us feel about our friendships. Especially as we get older and have failed relationship, after failed relationship. You realize love and intimacy does not have to be physical to be profound and special.
Sex and the City serves as a very peculiar expression of time. Like it can be so very backwards, outdated and primitive while simultaneously existing in a time ahead of its own and has sense of "end of times" looming over it. Like time is circular as apposed linear and this show exists at the one point where the circle of time begins and ends. This is especially potent in how the women of the show seem to age without growing. Hope it makes sense.
DAYUM 😭👏👏👏this is good!
that's not very peculiar, circular time cycles have been a part of Eastern thought and storytelling for centuries
@@ikaros4203 The concept of circular time isn't peculiar, Sex and the City is. It feels like it's before AND after our time simultaneously.
so intriguingly explained..
Yes! I love this
I am so upset to learn that the original endgame for Carrie was for her to still be single. That truly would have been revolutionary for a show with a female lead, and a show with the kind of following SaTC had, for Carrie to go an entire series and not come out in a relationship (even if that relationship is bad/toxic [and as an aside, I have never been happy that Carrie ends up with Big]).
I feel differently. Carrie should have remained single because she scared of commitment. She wants to play house not have a real marriage. I hope Big fucks around on her in the new series - give Carrie the toxic dose she needs to realize she wasted so much time and energy on such a loser.
Agreed!
@@gurucarcar yup
Perhaps because in the real world, a woman cannot be married without children and she was never going to be cut out for that even if she hadn't have ended up with Big?
@@gurucarcar boy you're going to be shocked...
As someone who wrote a critical analysis essay on Fukuyama’s end of history and binged all of sex and the city this year, this video feels like it was made for me
is your essay available to read anywhere, or shareable at all? it sounds very interesting! :)
@@ros9922 it was a three page essay at her first year of community college
@@bensanderson7144 …..ok cool 👍
Omg it sounds like it kinda was!
in a yearrr? i watched all 6 seasons during a weekend omfg😭🖤🖤
"heterosexually liberated" is so apt omg hahahaha
Do you comment on every video you watch? Damn you're everywhere
@@midnightscreamer2481 You only notice her because of her following, she has a right to comment on whatever she wants. As does everyone else.
@@witchplease9695Does stating the obvious make you feel smart sherlock? You do realize you're defending freedom of speech while condemning me for using it at the same time right? I wasn't saying I didn't like her or what she says. I notice her everywhere I go. Calm down stan, your parasocial relationship is a little creepy. I recommend going outside, enjoy the sunshine. Vitamin D plays a role in brain development and function.
@@midnightscreamer2481 Jesus. Calm down dude.
@@RosieOleanderDallinger after you
It just occurred to me after dozens of times watching the pilot episode... Her quip about Breakfast at Tiffany's kind of totally ignores what Holly Golightly having her breakfast outside Tiffany's actually meant? Like, Holly was just scarfing a croissant early in the morning outside of the symbol of her financial aspirations. That pretty much exactly depicts the unromantic "breakfast at 7am" Carrie was contrasting it against.
than you misunderstand the point, she is talking about how people revere the movie, not whats actually in it or what the title ACTUALLY mean. Mostly no one knows that stuff, they have their arguably false memory or "narrative" about a thing, and usually not much more.
@@xBINARYGODx But...they DO aspire to the same goal. There is no real difference between having breakfast at Tiffany's and skipping meals to buy Blahniks.
I thought the same thing, but while the Breakfast at Tiffany's does represent a financial struggle, or, more generally, a look at your aspirations from the outside, it also represents personal freedom. Holly may be broke, but she can afford to go to bed at 5 a.m. and sleep till noon. Breakfast at 7 a.m. means, even if you're financially stable (and that was what Carrie&co represented, financially stable members of the workforce), in order to remain so, you are bound to an outside force. Your time and energy is not your own. Worse, a lot of people had neither money nor time.
In any case, I'd say Holly stands for dreamers and free spirits, while the single girls Sex and the City is meant to target often likely had neither the time nor the energy to be that.
I know I disagreed, but I really like your take!
@@NewYorker176 Holly is a sex worker though she goes to bed at 5am and sleeps until noon because she's out all night entertaining the men who pay for her time
@@queenoffabulous2156 Good point. However, while that is strongly implied in the movie, you never... actually see that. In fact, you see her working quite hard not to have sex with her... sponsors, like the time she escapes through the fire escape and at the beginning when she flees from a disgruntled guy who evidently didn't get what he was expecting. From what you see outright, it is almost as likely that she steels from these guys by promising sex and not following up as it is that she sleeps with all of them.
And assuming you are right - which is likely - the fact that it isn't shown outright holds up the illusion and keeps the fantasy alive.
In SatC, you have at the very least Miranda who is shown to be constantly working her ass off to burst the bubble of financial independence without obligations.
Carrie was the original Influencer! She post regularly. She was invited to the best partys. And she always looked good.
Sex and the City presenting bisexuality as a dishonest phase on the way to being gay or lesbian really did damage to my young bisexual psyche. It's a bummer to think of how easily they could have included an accurate depiction that would have lifted fans up instead of doing harm. The bi erasure is real.
What did you think of Samantha's bisexuality when she got with Maria or has had threesomes with women?
@@JaiProdz I personally wasn’t a fan. They portrayed it as a phase because Samantha was bored with straight sex, and then she ended it because being with a woman got too “boring” because they spent too much time talking about their feelings.
@@JaiProdz I mean it wasn’t really bisexuality, and her sexuality was pretty ambiguous. There was a line “try-sexual” IMO I think Samantha was pretty fluid and didn’t have a rigid sense of sexuality. I’ve watched the episode multiple times of her lesbian partner, and it was kind of just another partner. Her friends made jokes but she seemed okay with it (minus her using the strap 😂)
That clip was one of my early introductions to the show and shut me down to it. I came out as Bi in 2012, and I get so frustrated at seeing it continuously sidelined, relegated to subtext, or rejected entirely.
This was a common misconception of bisexuality in the 90s; eventually a bisexual person would just become gay. Not to say this was correct thinking, but this was not out of the ordinary by any means. With time things change and people understand better. So yes, the show did perform bi erasure, but it wasn't malicious and was based off of the ignorance of the time period.
the thing about sex and the city is that basically they try the whole series to not be like their mothers, but end up pretty much the same. in my opinion, they tried to subvert probably something they saw it in their own homes but like you said, didnt realize how lonely that could be. they "failed" to find new forms of relationships and communities, even within themselves (they never helped each other familywise, babysitting or cooking etc). they were still very conservative in terms of human relationships, they fell for the same pattern in the end: straight couple, nuclear family. i think samantha was the only one that tried to expand her horizon.
The abortion episode has been on my mind lately. Fiction mostly treats abortion as a single right or wrong answer in the ethical context of the narrative.
SANC does not, it shows that all choises are fine. They are choises. Life goes on. Whatever you think is right for you, there you are.
“Paranoid Reading”… what a term. Thank you so, so much for pinning this conundrum down and introducing me to it. Your content continues to be absolutely phenomenal.
aw thank you so much :')!!!
@@BroeyDeschanel I second that! Amazingly well thought out critiques and arguments. Thanks for the content!
Okay first, I have to say I cried while watching this during the section talking about SATC being about friendship. A big part of why it was so good is because it was very sentimental.
Also, it feels like the current day media has that same brand of being so out of touch with the average 20-40yr old’s actual experience with capitalism and consumerism.
Or it at least feels incredibly distant from a life like mine, a service industry worker or somebody who makes less than $50k a year.
Hard Agree. It seems to be taken for granted in current media that everyone is at least middle class enough to never talk about bills. I was so excited when the mom in One Day at a TIme reboot had car problems like finally! an actual situation that I find very real and stressfull and would love to feel the relief of laughing about it. That made the show even more relatable even though this family looks nothing like mine.
The mainstream media are mostly about promoting advertisers’ products (including “lifestyles”) to the subset of the public that can afford them. That’s why the media always showcase the more prosperous sector of each generation.
Every now and then it looks like the media are starting to “see” the new crop of struggling young (and not so young) adults. This group is acknowledged in a magazine article here and a show like “Rent” there. But this fad never lasts very long. We soon hear that the latest young-and-struggling crowd are starting to “make it” after all, to buy at least some luxury goods and services, and then to buy homes and raise kids. Then we no longer hear about those in that age group who still haven’t made it-who have been left behind.
What happened to the Chandlers and Rachels and Phoebes who still don’t have lucrative careers, or the Hannah Horvaths who never got permanent teaching jobs, or the Carrie Bradshaws who never got a book deal?
We’ll never know- because the corporate media will never give us that TV series.
"Paranoid reading" is a great way to articulate the phenomenon of people labelling things 'partially problematic and thus wholly terrible'. Love it
I've been mostly sleepwalking the last months in an effort to avoid pain and the world around me - I even literally slept most of the day today and it felt marvelous to simply not be. This video definitely helped me realize something, not sure exactly what yet, but it was extremely well done and thanks for this nuanced critique on a piece of media that I love myself but also have some issues with in retrospect.
I understand this
are you ok man
@@elizabethbennet4791 My partner of 10 years left me a few months before I was going to propose to him and then my mother died about a month ago. It's been a bad year. But there are some positive developments happening now it seems...thank you for asking.
@@chriscze6153 Im so sorry that happened to you. Trust me it lessens with time. LMK if you need to talk, I'm here
I hope you're doing better Chris 💓
Opening a SATC essay with Fukuyama…I’ll never not stan
Don't stan, support
As a cis gay man who was in his 20s in the 90s and living in a major and majorly cynical US city, my personal experience of SATC as I consumed it in its original run was to see the problematic stuff in real time but to still feel that overall the show expressed many things that my friends both queer and heterosexual were grappling with. I still cherish it while seeing its deep flaws. That second movie though...ugh.
i agree with the shoe situation though. keira blaming carrie for not having kids and putting herself up on a pedestal because she has children and 'reposnsibilities' is just ridiculous.
Yep. I might personally believe that paying that much for shoes is ridiculous, but if I were lose someone's shoes like that, I'd reimburse them, simply because I'd be pissed off to throw everything and anything that would hurt them right back in their face if they did something like that with something I liked and bought/created.
@@irondragonmaiden Even then, it's fine if you're not in a spot to be able to pay for the shoes...but it's something you could at least feel kind of guilty about. If you possess enough arrogance to default to an extremely patronizing and condescending insult towards your friend, in the name of absolving yourself, that's just you being shitty.
I watched SATC growing up, and will always be grateful for its core message:
You are *enough*. You don't have to be *perfect*. The most important relationship in your life is your (chosen) *family*.
Just two years ago we saw Cynthia Nixon's rendition of Rainville's 'Be a lady they said', which only confirms the timelessness of these lessons. They offer a comfort that helps be at peace with yourself, and then in turn have more love and energy to give to others.
It's a huge shame that the writers were blind to how universal this lesson is - the proper inclusion and representation of LGBTQ+ and BIPOC in SATC would have made it 'even more' New York, and just so,so powerful.
Have I watched a single episode of Sex and the City? Nope! I've never watched Love Island either, but I've watched
Broey Deschanel's video about that franchise multiple times because I adore the way Broey dissects media! Excited to buckle in for this!!!
YES the Love Island one roped me in, had never seen the show but love a good sociological dissection of mass media, esp reality shows since it's the rawest form. She has the best vid essays
Helloooo! I just wanted to clarify (as I do in the pinned comment of literally every video at this point lol), that I don't love the word "paranoid" to describe the critical phenomenon that Sedgwick is talking about. But alas, that is her descriptor for it! I just think "paranoid" has a relatively derogatory/dismissive connotation. Correction for the correction: Sônia Braga is BIPOC.
Anyways, would love to hear all your thoughts about reparative/paranoid reading and what you all think is the best practice for analyzing media these days! There's definitely no cut and dry solution I think. Do you think reparative readings are helpful - or do they gloss over criticism?
I think you did a great job on a reparative reading, I hadn't heard of that specific term before this video but that's how I like to analyze and interpret the media I consume and create, I think reparative readings can only be truly reparative if they (like you did) acknowledge the shortcomings of the piece of media and recognize the negative or problematic aspects while not discounting the positive ones, and just allowing the viewer or reader to decide what they think of the piece as a whole, just point out a lot of the more interesting details. love the work y'all are doin, keep up the good job y'all!
I think context is everything, it’s easy to “cancel” things because of their problems viewed with modern lenses. Yes of course it’s not right those issues occurred in the first place but it also shows the commonplace acceptance of such issues. I think seeing those commonplace issues and seeing how unacceptable they are at present allows for discussion of further growth. Change is frustratingly slow and widespread acceptance takes time and is influenced by politics. I think you are right in that nothing we consume media wise is apolitical, cultural commentary within the frame of the show is always going to be socio-political in nature. I think overall we have to be conscientious that of course what we find acceptable at present may not be in the future and strive not to critique not for what it’s lacking alone but what the overall themes and messages are. Most importantly I think it time we let those marginalized have their own voices and opportunities to express experiences and views in the media too. It clearly influences what society thinks is acceptable overall and can lead to change.
excellent video
“latinx” headass
I always thought Charlotte existed in this show so that the male partners of the women watching this show had something to care about. She was the only one that was likeable.
Wow the way you tied in 9/11 was powerful and made me emotional. I’m a late 90s baby but the youngest in my family with boomer parents. Us Muslims in America often talk about 9/11 as a turning point in which our racialized ion happened. When looking at history that is clearly inaccurate but I see a connection between the 90s ahistorical attitude and that perception. . .lots to reflect on with this video. I watched the entire SATC series during my senior year of college as a way to get excited about the “next phase” of my life. A bit funny because I’m not a rich white woman and can relate very little to this BUT it did give me the boost I needed not to feel awful about being a single Muslim gal leaving college. There’s so much to say about this!
Yeah
the weirdest thing about the Shoes episode is how the friend Kira actually shows up to the registry..
EVEN THO SHE KNEW CARRIE WASNT GETTING MARRIED YES LMAOOOOO
Lol spoil all of it for me cause i doubt i being a Black cishet man would watch it out of my own volition (no knocks to those that have) but i do desperately wanna know why it was so influential
Black cisgay over here it true there’s nothing “for me” obviously in SATC but that didn’t really stop me from watching (and mostly loving) it. Perhaps it is because I was still consuming tv media even when people like me were explicitly invisible in it during this era.
The overt materialistic, often racist, often homophobic, explicitly transphobic, xenophobic moments easily referenced and written about are definitely a thing but as Maia points out it’s also earnest, and relatable and right up to the end it complicates the women at the center of the story. Of course the dynamic of unyielding friendship in the face of utterly dehumanizing systems Carrie’s throughout the entire series.
That same dynamic has been explored repeatedly in shows before SATC (Living Single) to shows came after that kept that structure after it like Noah’s Arc or even Insecure and that makes me love SATC more. I figure it’s because it *feels good* and it’s relatable and I am disinclined to dismiss something wholesale because it looks like it isn’t for me.
I’m a 38 year old woman and have been programmed to cry whenever Mirandas moms funeral, Carries inconvenient love speech or the song “You’ve got the love” is referenced🥺
I’ll never know how my tackling of adolescence, adulthood and womanhood would have differed without SATC, but I’m glad it was there for me, no matter how problematic and cringe it would be if I were to revisit it now. Not a chance by the way, which makes me all the more thankful for thoughtful and nuanced video essays such as these☺️
You look good in a tutu skirt and lit up on a park bench Broey! And that Nomi painting is awesome🍔💎
For me Carrie ending up with Big does make sense as it, probably, can only do in fiction. I see Carrie as romantic, not the type that Charlotte is as I find her to be quite grounded in her desires for a life, but in the sense of the 19th century art movement. Everything is so grand and so deeply entwined with one's feelings, or better emotions that those become the main driving force behind one's actions. Carrie had the type of connection with Big that many do dream of so for her letting him go and make a healthy choice is impossible, because he is what she craves even at the determent of her mental health. And yes that isn't a good choice, but in fiction it makes sense. So it was simply the kind of happy ending people often hope for, to end up with the person we love and for those lovers to grow in personality
Thank you for putting into words so well what I have felt about the ending. Great comment.
I do see SATC as one of my problematic fave shows. The reason why I come back to it because at its core its about the importance of friendship and how these women created a family with each other.
commentary channels that make me tear up bc of how well they convey their thoughts and opinions in not only respectful ways but highly entertaining >>> that ending part was amazing, some of my fav work from you, your videos just are so thoughtful every single time. amazing work dude!
“The compulsion to sleep through life”….. wow.. amazing
I watched SATC a few years ago as a 'guilty pleasure' but re watched it this year guilt free. It may not be my favourite but it struck a chord with me and left a mark. Somehting in how I view my life and ambitions, how I'm living my 20s. It didn't change my life completely but it's always at the back of my mind.
Not related to postfeminism but...
I always felt like we misjudged Big. Yeah, he's not perfect, he cheated on his wife, he has troubles communicating but we are repeatedly forced to see him as a villain because he can't commit to Carrie. Which how is that a bad thing? Especially, considering that we are given an explanation for why Big can't commit - he is traumatized by his previously failed messy marriage.
Commitment issues are not a sign of moral failure. You are not a bad person if you can't commit.
It's like Carrie wants to see Big as someone he's not, and then gets pissed when she's met with real Big who can't return her love. It feels like Big was a villain because he wasn't able to love Carrie back the way she wanted him to. And when you say it like that it becomes apparent that maybe nobody here is a villain, and Carrie should have just moved on.
Honestly! I feel the same! I am always so confused that everybody blames him, but god damn, carrie, just let the man live!
Yup
@@louisekenn517 yeah. There are still valid iffy things about Big that could be portrayed as villainous (like manipulating and threatening Carrie to come clean to his wife about their affair) but my problem is that we are not encouraged to see him as a villain because of these things but because he can't commit to Carrie. Like "threaten me, manipulate me if you want but please love me or I'll hate you". Das weird.
Besides, no man commits to his "beloved" wife with a constant stream of porn in his pocket...
@@louisekenn517 do you know ANY woman that can and does?? Lol!!
Single since 94 and still laughing hilariously and quietly at all the poor guys dragging solemnly behind the nagging cow and bawling brats spending his pay in any big box store.
“Wtf is this” about the dancing baby, oh nooooo. I feel old lol. It was basically a prehistoric meme
As an older millennial woman, I definitely struggle with sleepwalking through life. I’m aware I’ve done it for much of my life because I’m filled with a sense of hopelessness and powerlessness. I envy the SATC characters in the way they were apolitical and ignorant to the realities of what was happening in the world.
It’s also why I, in a way, admired the protagonist of “My year of rest and relaxation.” The naive idea that you can be healed of your trauma and anxiety of the world, when really most of it stems from outside forces completely out of your control.
It says a lot that my form of coping right after 9/11 was to go to the mall.
i envy them too. i can’t imagine how it feels to not have to worry about money, to have a group of close friends i see frequently, go shopping/out to eat on a regular basis, or just have a day where i’m not consumed with dread/depression/anxiety about the problems in my life, society, the country, the world, climate change etc. i joke that i’m a doomer but it honestly feels like death is looming around every corner- nukes, mass shootings, covid or the next pandemic. at the same time we still wake up every day and have to go through the motions like everything is normal. i just wanna know what it’s like to have things easy even if just for a day.
i’m not even american but that last sentence hit so fucking hard
I watch re-runs of Sex and the City now as comfort watch as it reminds me of better times. It's a fairytale I can escape to from the deep horrors of my anxiety, disillusionment with today's feminism and LGBTQ activism (some of it is progress, some of it regressive like the show itself) and to also scrub out the stench of its abysmal reboot And Just Like That. It offers the glitz and glamour of fashion, going out and feeling sexy in your own body, and not have to rely on anyone. And also, the complexities and love of female friendships.
Good stuff. There's an episode in the Sopranos where Tony goes to the university that Meadow wants to go to and donates a large amount of money. This was probably a shocking scene at the time, or could be written off as mafia drama fiction. We find out later that it's true with the testing scandals. Before that, the media would have you believe that people went to Ivy League schools because they were smart, not because of corruption or family legacy. There's a certain arrogance with people who move to New York to improve their careers and then pretend they're Manhattan natives and that there's no better place. I imagine these are the people that end up writing shows like this. During the time it was popular to write characters as Ivy League educated, living in unaffordable places, and having a lifestyle relegated to a few. I imagine that many in the audience were less put off by it and perhaps saw this as an aspirational lifestyle, with the show providing some escapism. In other words, they saw less of the metacommentary and took it more at face value, at least initially. It's possible that the show was smarter than what we see, it's also possible that the writers thought they were being progressive but had massive blinders in certain areas. Keep in mind that post cold war, it was still a bit taboo to talk about Marxism and other political theories other than Keynesian economics.
amazing commentary!
Very insightful!
I loved the show in the early 2000's. Hasn't aged very well, but is still entertaining. I got to meet Cynthia Nixon on her run for governor in upstate NY who I had A huge crush on as A teen.
Whilst I love the focus on female friendship, it does paint a bit of an unrealistic view (for most ppl) of friendship in your 30s (interestingly perhaps more close to what u can have in your early 20s before ppl become more enveloped by their jobs or intimate relationships). Tho perhaps that is just my experience.
Yeah. I love my friends and love any minute I can get in their presence, but once we all got into our careers, nobody has time for each other anymore. Our kids and our jobs and all that are just so demanding on our time. It would be amazing if we could all meet for lunch several times a week like the women in SATC, but that was never something we could do sustainably.
It’s official: Broey Deschanel has the best song remixes I’ve ever encountered on RUclips. My friend in Manhattan was proposed to in Central Park with live musicians playing “You’ve Got the Love”
The end of history is such a funny theory. Like, yeah this is good it will last forever !! Its like if the french in 1770 were like "nothing else will happen"
I think it's wrong to compare the immediate post cold war situation to 1770 France . In the 1990s what fukuyama wrote made obvious sense to many people . Western liberal capitalist democracies were the most prosperous places to exist . Non western prosperous nations like Japan and South Korea had also embraced this model while the only competitor to this , Soviet socialism had collapsed in a humiliating way . Other developing countries like India , china and Vietnam all three of which have been socialist states with planned economies ( india was not socialist but most of the economy was state controlled) started to embrace capitalism and experienced exponential economic growth that pulled millions of people out of poverty . This was the context in which fukuyama was talking about . Obviously he turned out to be wrong as China while accepted capitalism , did not accept democracy and this system of authoritarian state capitalism without democracy worked out pretty well for it . Then there was the great recession which weakened the economic prosperity of developed countries and now we have climate change .
Hey, queen! Girl, you have done it again, constantly raising the bar for all of us and doing it flawlessly.
No seriously, your video essays are amazing. It‘s like reading a college paper but with imagery and easier language. If you ever publish a collection of essays I would be happy to purchase one 😇
I planned on only watching the first five minutes of this but ended up watching the whole thing. Between the research, the sequencing, and the presentation, you're incredible at what you do.
I never thought I see these 2 topics in the same video in a million years 😭
Idk, 1998-1999 releases from the west usually have this as a backbone in analysis videos
thank you for such a thoughtful, careful and complex reading of this show. there was a lot this show did for women when it came to talking about female desire. we can take those elements and consider the mistakes too and what we can learn from them. i also like how they show the messiness that happens in your romantic relationships as just life circumstances get in the way. Charlotte and Harry trying to adopt. Samantha having cancer. And most notably, Miranda uprooting her life in Manhattan and ultimately becoming a caregiver of her husband's mother. Magda tells her, "What you did, that's love." is one of my favorite from the show. Because it is. Having a life with someone isn't really romantic declarations on bridges in Paris. Life is messy and painful. Sometimes love doesn't survive these huge life struggles. But without love underneath, the relationship wouldn't last at all. And the friendship between the women, god I have so much to say about that too.
The only reason I ever got into Sex and The City was because I was looking for something to binge watch after my first serious relationship ended to distract from my ~sorrows~ 😂 At the time I was still attending community college, living on the border of the poverty level and very, very queer. it had to be the least relatable show I could have gotten into but TBH that was kind of why I enjoyed it? For me it was almost like watching something sci-fi or fantasy with how alien these well-off white cis women were to my own lived experience, and seeing it in the early 2010s with no prior context made it feel like more of a period piece. I found i ended up connecting with different aspects here and there despite myself. So much of it is so incredibly dated, even harmful, I can't imagine how much harder that breakup would have been for me if I hadn't had it around as the tv equivalent of comfort food though.
For all of its flaws I do think it was notable in terms of how much it attempted to normalize sex, both having it and frank discussions of it, especially in a nonmarital, non religious context. I also appreciated the end relationships of every major character save for Carrie, it really felt like everybody besides her experienced some genuine growth. Although frankly her and Big kind of deserved each other, lmao
I agree 💯 (I’m straight though) but being black and South African I really don’t relate to them in anyway. But that’s kinda what I like about it, guilty pleasure and a form of escapism. The same reason I love the modern family, they just comfort shows.
It's practically a soap opera. I watched it because I had time (pandemic) and was finally old enough to where I wouldn't have to switch the channel as someone walked in the room. I knew what it was, and was looking for something adult and light to watch. Seemed appropriate. I honestly had no idea they were only around half hr episodes because the glimpses I had always seemed so full... It seems that, outside of being a well-off hetero white cis woman, it's automatically a guilty pleasure because you're well aware of how unrelatable it is. It works so well as a fantasy because the ladies are practically caricatures that you build bittersweet love for - also Carrie's rent controlled apartment and blackhole of high-end fashion despite being one of the most financially irresponsible characters we may ever see on tv... They're all a mess in ways, but there are also pieces of their lives that we can all fantasize about (yes, even Charlotte's - in between the constant eyerolls). Many aspects of the show are also still uncommon to see. Pushing 30 myself, I'll always appreciate that we meet these characters in the age range that we do - the most lively and free of them all (Samantha) even significantly older! I'm really looking forward to the reboot, especially since they are more aware of where they failed the first time around. Very true too, Carrie and Big do deserve each other - I'm content knowing that they're happy playing hot potato with the BS.
Wow I really relate to this.
Now THIS is a video essay! After rewatching SATC in my mid 20's I've been yearning for a real critique and analysis around each character and the overall show. Thank you thank you thank you! I absolutely loved the conclusion where you commented on our relationship with old media and reparative reading. It is extremely important to critique all the media that we consume from a social and political lens but it is also just as important to apply context and acknowledge what the media achieved so we can learn from it and move forward.
this was so well done! feel like i've learned so much. talking about the show itself: it kind of makes me glad to see it hasn't 'aged well' - it's a sign of progress and it makes me happy to feel myself cringing at some of the parts because it means we've evolved and we're better. being able to recognise the problematic parts allows me to enjoy the actual beauty of the show - my most meaningful friendships with two of my closest friends is based so heavily on what we saw and learned from SATC. even though we're women in our early 20s, we've caught ourselves in almost identical situations the SATC characters experience and it's helped us get through life together and from a strong, beautiful bond. "You've Got the Love" is our anthem and I have to thank this show, because I can go through life knowing I've got two soulmates locked down :)
I wonder what you'd make of Supergirl (2015-21) because it's absolutely on that Mary Tyler Moore-Ally McBeal-SATC spectrum while also being a SF action show
"Carrie? More like Karen" is an excellent quip.
I highly recommend jimmy fowlie’s sec and the city Karen Carrie parodies. His Sarah Jessica Parker is uncanny
I must say that I never agreed with comments that Carrie character was so wrong and unlikeble. That she should be better. For me it was the opposite. I loved Carrie the most when she was in wrong, when she was full of shame, when she made awful mistakes, pity things. Because that was making her a human, you know? Real woman. Because very often in movies women are there to be perfect. Loving support, innocent, pure, moral ground for male protagonists, saints. And there she is: Carrie. Who sometimes is an awful friend or girlfirend and still she is forgiven for it most of the time. We have impossible high moral standard for women and I feel tired thinking about it. That i'm a bad person because i'm not people pleasing enough, I dont like sacrifice for others every-freakin-day. We needed this shows where women were selfish, selfcentered, funny and making huge mistakes because sometimes we are exactly that. And because of that I love SATC.
Yes!!!
Sameee
I don't know but I loved Samantha, I wish to some day be as free as her. She booked a doctor's appointment for a nun (who she just met and didn't have anything in common) even though she didn't have, has never been judgy towards her friends, and even babysitted Brady as an act of love for Miranda.
Yes, Sam had her flaws like how she dealt with trans people and her unability to really commit. BUT she do committed to someone, her friends
SATC looks like a show about shoes and taxi rides, but it's really a show about friendship, as opposed to Girls, which looks like a show about friendship but it is actually a show about selfish and individualistic self-entitled young women who dream success.
Disagree. SATC merely TEASED us with the notion that female friends could “be each other’s soulmates”-before dishing out the standard marriage-as-happy-ending for three of the four leads (and even what at the time looked like LTR for Samantha). No radical vision of permanent “chosen family” here!
@@terry9238 it's not like they parted ways as soon as they got married. You can have BOTH friendship AND a marriage. Although I admit that the way they handled the show at the end kind of betrayed its initial spirit.
I worked in a bookstore, and not even my bosses sold me on “My Year of Rest and Relaxation” the way you did in this video!
This is a fascinating look at a show I am only now beginning to understand and appreciate. I grew up in an intellectual household, and SATC was something both of my parents dismissed (and I dismissed by example) as vapid and, as you say, "un-feminist" or post-feminist.
But now I am a relatively independent woman with a stable-if-uninspiring job, looking for love and friendship. I don't want children, like most of the main cast, and I'm already jaded to the dating scene despite having relatively little experience: it's overwhelming and terrifying. I'm decidedly an idealist, but I understand losing one's faith in love. I'm white, my family is part of the fading middle class, but I myself am only one paycheck away from destitution (as many people are nowadays). I also love shoes and fashion and spending frivolously (to the chagrin of my bank account) in a desperate attempt to fill the void with tchotchkes and books about how to Be Better. There's something comforting about these women who are like me in many ways. Maybe, if they succeeded, I can too.
Everything that humans create reflects humanity in some way and because of that alone it is worth examining. Its worth looking at lots of media even stuff deemed fluffy and unimportant or bad bc it reflects the culture as much as the "high-brow art" reflects culture. Humanity is problematic and imperfect but also amazing and beautiful simultaneously and a thorough examination of media that goes beyond the shallow will bear that out every time. Thanks so much for the video now i'm off to watch SITC for the fourth time! 😂😂
I think you're correct in saying both ends of the 'serious to fluffy' perspective equally reflect the current state of a culture, and can be usefully read in contrast/comparison with each other? 🙂
TBH I would also argue that A) Majority of people's attitudes are influenced FAR more by popular entertainment than by high-brow media, and B) Some media actually seems to migrate from one end of that spectrum to the other over time, in terms of whether it's considered 'high' or 'low' culture? Think e.g. Shakespeare (originally fairly derivative crowdpleasers), Dante (basically self-insert fanfic of the Greco-Roman classics) or Virgil (writing an unauthorized sequel to the Homeric epics)....?
This video just seems like peak RUclips. A long deep dive into something no one asked for but are better to have it. And a skill share sponsorship.
I love a good video essay on things people view as too 'girly' but sis, no one does an amazing video essay like you! ❤️🐞🍒🍒
why is being girly or very girly a bad thing
@@sainttheresetaylor2054 I'm not saying it's a bad thing 😂 I'm saying that society often mocks girls for liking shows that revolve around girls in their 20s and their dating lives but these shows and films often end up having so much depth that gets written off for being melodramatic or hyper feminine
your script writing is just next level
i’ve returned to this video so many times, and it gives me something new every time. thank you for your work!!
Yes! We needed more sex and the city video essays
I think any focus on the problematic elements of SATC forgets to consider the context of late-'90s broadcast television, and what the purpose of this show was at that time. Such a positive presentation of female sexuality was truly groundbreaking, and was in itself pushing the boundaries of what could be broadcast. For that to be possible, it needed to be aimed at a clear and large audience. From that perspective, if the creators had attempted to make a more broadly progressive show, they would have only succeeded in making a show that was too subversive to be broadcast in prime-time slots, and so would have achieved minimal if any impact on a broader cultural level. They had to pick their battle.
I was rewatching sex and the city recently and that episode where Samantha practically fetishes that one black man and his sister was just trying to be protective made me CRINGGGGEEE
Like it gave off emotional incest, it gave off fetish, it gave off "how dare a black woman tell me no"
Ughh
Yeah, like real life. That's why it's good for shows to depict it.
@@thesecondRUclips exactly, white women can be completely inappropriate and I think they need to see it lol
AMAZING!!!! This is one of the best video essays I have ever seen and I've seen many. The part where you spoke about the individualism, influence of late capitalism and lack of human bonds/sterile cold unmaternal attitudes of the women in the show encapsulated and perfectly articulated a deep and indescribable feeling I've had for SOO long. Wow. Masterfully written, presented, everything! I want to check out that book now too. All the sources you bring in are so fascinating! It's just amazing how you created this. I can't even comprehend it. Bravo it's just beyond superb and masterful!!!!
Never watched Sex and the City and always sort of had mild contempt for it but this gave me an appreciation for it. I'd also been sort of contemplating the paranoid/reparative reading thing w/r/t the often unsatisfyingly vigilant or stultifying or thought-terminating nature of online discourse etc and having this concept raised here was successful for me in making both the subject of vid and my unrelated thoughts more explicit.
This was great, I especially loved the inclusion of Sedgwick. I see reparative reading as an important way forward for media criticism in the current hypocritical and self-consuming climate. Obviously recognizing issues in media is good, but over-reliance on that type of criticism kills the enjoyment of art and its complexities, and only allows for bland and inoffensive art (which often isn't actually unproblematic at all, rather just too shallow to critique). I like reparative reading's focus on the pleasure of the text; I don't think it glosses over problems in art, but rather acknowledges them as part of the experience.
Another effect of "Ally McBeal", intentional or not, was the super-skinny, size zero phase that overtook the country in the late 90's/ early aughts. It's hard to fight for social change when you've starved yourself to the point where you can barely walk.
It seems wild now that anyone took Fukuyama seriously at the time, but I suppose that's because most of us in our 20s and 30s didn't really see or don't remember the "good times" of the 90s
It was felt quite obvious to people in the 90s what fukuyama wrote . Liberal capitalist western democracies were the most prosperous places humanity had seen . Non western prosperous countries like Japan and South Korea had also embraced this model while the only competitor to this , Soviet socialism had collapsed in a humiliating way . Other developing countries like china ,Vietnam and india all three of which had previously been socialist countries with planned economies ( india was not socialist but still most economy was state controlled) were starting to embrace capitalism and experienced huge economic growth because of this .
Much problematic, especially when viewed with a modern lens. But nonetheless groundbreaking at the time, and did push a lot of conversations and change our dialogues at the time (and moving forward). A lot. And as you say, this is why we are still talking about it (in video essays, in podcasts) today. Really enjoying 'And So I Got To Thinking', a podcast which unpacks each episode and see how it is now relevant (or Not) today. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
"Dear funky spunk." Fave all-time line. Loved that Carrie smoked and oft fought for her right to. Superficiality aside and having lived in NYC in the mid-'90s, I saw the show as a multi-season video extension of Joan Didion's 'Goodbye to All That,' yes later "punctuated" by 9/11. Friendship, yes, and whatever happened to Skipper? Great take/post per always.
Yeh...Skipper...what happened?
1:22 I totally stopped paying attention to the voice over and was solely focused on you. WOW BESTIE.
This is the best thing I've come across in the internet for a very long time, thank you! I stumbled across this video whilst procrastinating from uni readings in global political economy and funnily enough this video helped me to comprehend real-life consequences of neoliberal politics better than any of the articles provided. Keep up the good work!
I have never understood post-feminism until this moment. I am inebriated as shit, and I think that might have contributed. Great video, Bro.
I have such an unbelievable love/hate relationship with this show, I can't even put it into words.
you have risen to be one of my favourite video essayist. this one was wonderful! well done!
I blame Michael Patrick King for the downslide of the show and films. He has such a cheesy, shallow, consumerist sensibility.
When it was good, the show owed its roots to the film Miami Rhapsody with SJP (totally the precursor), Darren Starr realizing he could turn it into a female Dream On for HBO, and all the fantastic women writers on SATC who created based on their real world sensibilities and experiences with bite and flair. One of them should have been made the show runner.
I appreciate your conclusion about the characters adopting attachment and warmth more as the series progressed, but the show also became cartoonish in its emphasis on fashion and money (as did the movies: spend, spend, spend!), crowding out realistic and meaningful material.
The show was ahead of it's time when it came out. There was interracial romances in the show. Samantha, Miranda, and Mr. Big both had African American boyfriends and girlfriends. Samantha had a girlfriend of Latin descent. Remember it was still somewhat taboo in the late 1990s and early 00s to have these kind of relationships on screen. The cast did complain about the lack of diversity in the late 90s. I was put off by how waspy everything was. As someone who has lived in New York, it is a multicultural paradise. That is what makes NYC awesome. In defense of the show, I think these women wanted to evolve into stronger feminists, but society at the time would not allow it, by shaming them. I did think it was odd that they were being shamed for being 30 something and single. That is very common in New York as well as other big cities. I think the show was not as progressive as it should have been because it have to cater to middle America and the bible belt.
i think i've watched this show beginning to end about 10 times, so i know what you mean in that it's captivating and i keep coming back to it and i'm not sure why. i usually just skip bits or episodes that are so politically tone deaf it hurts, and my watching experience is filled with a lot of eye rolling and their approaches to problem solving, but idk man i still get invested every time.
This video is amazing. The amount of work that most have went into this is really admirable. Keep up the good work!
I love this essay so much I continuously find myself coming back to it. It’s such an interesting look at feminism and human desire
I seriously love every single video you put out. It's a deep, well-researched, and thoughtful analysis every single time, and I come away having learned something new or thinking about a piece of media in a new way. I really feel like Sex and the City is the kind of show I would love to watch and apply the type of framework that you encourage in this video.
For those of us who live on Twitter, it's really easy to become increasingly irritated by the overexposure of 280 character "takes" that, at best, are a neutral expression of someone's opinion that (through recommendations, likes, etc) gets unfortunately shoved down thousands of people's throats without their permission. That in turn makes all of us more miserable and arguing over topics in a deeply aggressive manner that we literally wouldn't have cared about any other day, lol. So I just wanted to say that I love these 45 minute bangers that really focus on a core argument and unfold in a really cool way. It is long overdue but I've finally subscribed to your Patreon, and I can't wait to see what you work on next!
Also, re: your pinned comment. I too have the same gut reaction to Sedgwick's term of "paranoid". The term itself gets thrown around a lot these days (sometimes too much), but I feel like I've rarely seen discussion about how the term itself is constructed. That being said, I'm sure you've read her more than me, so I can only describe how I feel with little evidence to back it up. Mostly I feel sad that the attitude is increasingly being used to shut down conversations started by well-intentioned people that are trying to think about how these shows (including Succession, The White Lotus, The Sopranos, etc) are interesting and necessary for look into certain psyches, but simultaneously asking us to still care about (and throw the most accolades and critical acclaim toward) the psychology of an overrepresented/oppressive group. Not everyone, rightly so, finds value in that kind of art being praised year after year.
Lessss goooo new Broey deschanel video
I found this channel completely by accident and it is giving endless insight. Loved this. Thank you ❤
in the best way possible, your analysis in this video helped me realise why i'm so desperately lonely and seeking, as carrie bemoaned, "real love: ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can't-live-without-each-other love," despite seemingly 'having it all', so thank you for this
Never having had interest in Sex and the City, and I'm not even sure if I've ever seen an entire episode of the show, I nonetheless found this video incredibly informative and entertaining.
As a polsci student that is interested in media analysis, this vid essay is everything. Then again, most of your videos are:) keep doing what you do
Just dropping in to say that you are amazing!! These essays continue to enrich my life !
Totally wonderful video. Thank you for breaking this down so eloquently💛
SATC has its flaws, but it was groundbreaking for the time. We can't really judge with our modern lenses, it's been more than 20 years
Coming from a strict Christian background and being a closeted bisexual woman, Carrie's comments about being bisexual were really hurtful and damaging. I could never like her character after those statements and especially after she broke Aiden's heart by having an affair with Big! I appreciate the the call to not completely cancel a show just because it has not aged well. It absolutely speaks volumes about the society we were living in as it aired! We need to continually learn from our mistakes as humans. "Cancelling" and ignoring shows such as Sex and the City will only hinder our progress. This was such a great analysis of the show and the arguments were presented so well. Gave me a lot to think about!
I was listening to this video while washing the dishes and got a mid-roll ad for a murder-themed puzzle subscription thing that was like "after a long day of feeling nothing at work, I need more than social media to calm down, you know? in these monotonous times, I need something...dangerous...to relax" and I definitely thought it was like, a parodic sketch from the show,
this is the best analysis i have ever watched on SATC. thank you for a truly wonderful 44 minutes
Oh boy I watched a bunch of this show with my sister and have tried to block it out. This is bringing it all back but I'm still here for it haha
I watched Sex and the City movie today, and I was very very confused on what I was watching. I'll skip over my overly complicated emotions, but I found myself always happy and somewhat emotional when the parts that reflected human connections happened, like Miranda and her husband meeting at the bridge, the joy of the woman who couldnt get pregnant being able to have a kid, etc etc, a part of me was both happy that in all the cynicism I was experieincing and biases I carry, I could still find myself happy for the women when they were together and you could see how happy they were from the fact that they have each other at least no matter what. A part of me was deeply disturbed, but another was really happy that in the craziest of media the things that make people the happiest or more meaningful are human connections
one of the best pop culture video essays i've ever watched. Thank you.
wow. what a very well researched and clever video with such beautiful ending. Thanks you for that- made me evening!
Here I am once again devouring a Broey video on something I only have second-hand knowledge about