I feel like, as millennials survey the ruins of 2010s culture, we hunt for something of value to salvage and settle on Girls, a show from a time just before social media ate everything, when it seemed like the present, and future, might still be somewhat interesting.
Today, fictional characters are often dismissed as "unlikable" due to their misdeeds, but we root for the characters in Girls even though they do wrong. Maybe that's partly because their failures have consequences. The female empowerment stuff that came later lacks any kind of karmic balance. It's purely positive & Pollyannish.
The Girls characters were unlikable but in a very relatable way. Dunham wasn't just piling on the cringe and awfulness in a gratuitous way. And what's the female empowerment stuff you're referencing?
The kind of female empowerment stuff I'm thinking of is Broad City, Shrill, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, stuff like that. I can't watch these shows for long so it's hard to really critique them, but the vibe seems to be, "Women are wonderful, women can do whatever they want, women are always right, even when they're wrong." That attitude seems very much embedded in millennial feminism. Every depiction of womanhood has to be "empowering." By contrast, Girls continually disempowers its characters: they do wrong, fail, suffer consequences. I think the characters are relatable because of their fallibility and suffering.
British TV doesn't have these problems as much. Fleabag and I May Destroy You are both outstanding shows created by women. There seems to be something uniquely childish about American feminism (or maybe Americans generally).
This is finely observed. The most interesting part of the Lena Dunham backlash has always been how much of it came from people close enough to recognize the room, the language, and the ambitions.
Criticism is easy. Being accurately seen is the part that leaves a bruise.
If you think Master of None has a "wishful diversity" that sounds like more of a you problem than a problem that the show had. People in diverse areas do have diverse friend groups.
There's natural diversity, and there's the kind of diversity that Master of None had that was painfully calculated with many episodes ending with a clumsy little lesson moment.
Perhaps you could have made it clear that your critique was actually about corny, calculated life lesson moments rather than the diversity of MoN's friend group. I can see that about the show for sure. But I found nothing about the actual makeup of the friend group in question to be "wishful" - no doubt informed by my own experience with diverse friend groups in SF, OC, San Diego. Mine is not a unique experience by any means.
Two things can be true at once: there are arbitrarily diverse social circles to be had in major metro areas; and certain scenes are extremely self-segregating (even within such locales), so portrayals of them as diverse may feel contrived.
If OP wishes to be a part of certain scenes that, due to self-selection, are not that diverse in reality, the diverse TV version is gonna feel rather idealized. Of course, the rest of us minorities can just nope out of such scenes and have our normie diverse friend groups.
They perhaps feel contrived to those people who haven't experienced what is actually a normal, regular thing in some places. A person from a small town in Texas may find it hard to believe that there are cities where two men can walk together hand in hand, but that doesn't mean such places don't exist or that they are idealized. An incel may find a story about a normal looking guy hooking up with a girl to be contrived and unrealistic and "wishful." Both of these people would be literally incorrect. Just as Chris was when he labeled MoN's diversity to be "wishful". If it exists in reality, it is not a wish... it is reality.
The funny thing here is that Chris actually appears to be a part of a diverse set himself - at least per his social media.
But I will assume that Chris was not being purposely insincere just to be provocative, just to inexplicably slam MoN for its diversity, just as a way to look at Girls' lack of diversity as somehow laudable. I will take him at his word (at least the words in his reply to me): his intention with his incorrect phrasing was to slam MoN's life lessons, not its perfectly normal diversity.
I've already gone on way too long, but I will add that I think Girls was an absolutely fantastic show. A strong enough show that it was totally unnecessary to insult Master of None's diversity in order to re-litigate what was once an absurd attack on Girls re its lack of diversity. No need to shit on one thing in order to uplift another thing. I hate that sort of petty bs.
I think a number of things are worth separating out in an honest discussion:
what are the demographics and culture of a specific group/scene;
how well are they represented in some given entertainment or work of art — and how much does it matter for them to be portrayed accurately;
how representative and important is that group in real life, among those who are not in that scene or aspiring to be in it?
I am an Asian American woman. There are social scenes, such as that depicted as Dunham’s friend group in Girls, that I don’t feel comfortable in. In fact, just the other day, a young white man requested my attendance at an event involving this crowd, and took it extremely poorly when I tried to explain (in private, therefore to no embarrassment to him, never mind that we had discussed race at length previously) that the crowd was too “white” — by which I meant culturally above all — for my comfort.
I am fine not being in such scenes! However, OP finds Girls honest in its portrayal of selective inclusion of Asians — more so people like me than people like him. And I can’t convince him that there is a whole vibrant world outside of that scene. And if one is so personally invested in these scenes, it will influence one’s perception of not just the verisimilitude but also the value of entertainment or works of art that portray them.
You are making some very interesting points, in particular in your last paragraph. Those last two sentences are striking.
Regarding the point "And I can't convince him..." I do wonder if Chris would find value in this world outside, if he would even find this normie world bearable. That said, it is hard for me to believe that such 'inside worlds' are truly all-white. But your own anecdote leads me to think that maybe they are? Which I find strange and shocking. And perhaps a more recent development - last decade & a half, or so?
My own experiences/what makes the entire idea of such ethnically demarcated worlds surprising to me:
- I'm a mixed-race American male (Asian/White) who, as I've mentioned, has lived throughout California (SF, OC, SD). Throughout these locations, I've never had a friend group or been a part of wider social milieu that was not a diverse one. The social scenes of my friend groups have themselves been diverse: nerd/honors-normies (high school/OC); frat-normies, alternate music scene, queer scene (all three in college/SD); anarcho-communitarian spaces that centered on music scenes, art scenes, activist scenes (my post-college 20s & 30s in SF), progressive social services providers (my current colleagues & staff in SF), and the now semi-normie middle class/mixed education folks who used to be in the anarcho-communitarian spaces but are now home & business owners with families lol (my current Bay Area social circle). Literally each and every one of these spaces were/are multicultural, multi-ethnic spaces (and I don't even note my childhood in very diverse military spaces). The slight majority were/are white, but I give that no thought to that as this country is majority-white. The fact of the matter is that there were plenty of queers and POC mixed in with the straight whites. I think all of this may explain my antipathy towards Chris's dismissive statement? He paints a "reality" that I don't think is realistic and that I haven't seen across numerous diverse social scenes and across well over 40 years of life.
- I'm Gen X. Perhaps I have generational blinkers on. Have things so degraded in society that generations subsequent to mine now actively seek segregation, even in mixed-culture, urban settings where diversity is basically pro forma? This would be both wild and depressing to me.
But back to Chris and his piece. I went into a bit of a dive with his writings. Two things stood out to me: (1) he's an excellent writer! I enjoyed all 6 of the pieces I read; and (2) Master of None has something of a symbolic resonance for him, a negative one. It appears to be a slight obsession of his. Not counting this piece, he's written about or references the show in at least two Medium pieces and at least four Substack pieces.
Most illuminating was his self-described "takedown" of the show in an early Medium piece. What I took from that article was that he intensely disliked the show because it was not misery porn that described the existential pain of "being Asian in America" but instead sought to portray a social milieu of usually-happy, rather well-off liberals who got along and learned things from each other. I thought his piece was fascinating, enjoyable, and well-written but also almost laughably pretentious. A portion of his ridicule seemed to be aimed towards the very idea of mixed-race relationships, which of course took me personally aback as the product of just such a relationship. There was a near-Marxist leftism that also informed the piece. Which makes his embrace of Girls rather understandable: Dunham is not portraying in a balanced way the ins & outs of a relatively gracious and affirming social milieu (unlike the one featured in her latest work Too Much); she is instead satirizing a milieu full of hypocrisy and unearned privilege. A person analyzing a show from a class-first leftist lens would of course be disgusted by Master of None and would relish the ruthless satire of Girls. As would a social conservative. Horseshoe!
Uncomfortably, his over the top attack on Master of None (created by two Asians) actually reminded me a lot of the over the top attacks on Girls that Chris discusses in his article above. Perhaps he is blind to this uncomfortable parallel: his attack article weirdly parallels the attack articles put out by Dunham's bullies - women in Dunham's field who feel her fame was unearned. Chris replicates this dynamic in his Medium attack piece on Master of None.
As you reference, Asians are most definitely present in Girls: Asian men are portrayed positively, as figures of desire to the Shoshanna character; Asian women are portrayed negatively, as rivals or the instigators of problems to the Hannah and Marnie characters. I think this gendered representation is an interesting one to consider. Chris does an excellent job in an earlier piece theorizing on why Dunham decided to portray Asian men & women so differently. But I'm not sure if he's aware of what this says about his own ease with Girls.
Lena Dunham is like a barnacle in your underwear. Won't go away, keeps wanting more and disgusting to behold, especially when feeding its unsavoury hungers.
I feel like, as millennials survey the ruins of 2010s culture, we hunt for something of value to salvage and settle on Girls, a show from a time just before social media ate everything, when it seemed like the present, and future, might still be somewhat interesting.
Today, fictional characters are often dismissed as "unlikable" due to their misdeeds, but we root for the characters in Girls even though they do wrong. Maybe that's partly because their failures have consequences. The female empowerment stuff that came later lacks any kind of karmic balance. It's purely positive & Pollyannish.
The Girls characters were unlikable but in a very relatable way. Dunham wasn't just piling on the cringe and awfulness in a gratuitous way. And what's the female empowerment stuff you're referencing?
The kind of female empowerment stuff I'm thinking of is Broad City, Shrill, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, stuff like that. I can't watch these shows for long so it's hard to really critique them, but the vibe seems to be, "Women are wonderful, women can do whatever they want, women are always right, even when they're wrong." That attitude seems very much embedded in millennial feminism. Every depiction of womanhood has to be "empowering." By contrast, Girls continually disempowers its characters: they do wrong, fail, suffer consequences. I think the characters are relatable because of their fallibility and suffering.
British TV doesn't have these problems as much. Fleabag and I May Destroy You are both outstanding shows created by women. There seems to be something uniquely childish about American feminism (or maybe Americans generally).
This is finely observed. The most interesting part of the Lena Dunham backlash has always been how much of it came from people close enough to recognize the room, the language, and the ambitions.
Criticism is easy. Being accurately seen is the part that leaves a bruise.
Yes, the predictable backlash from the predictable groups was boring. It was the Wannabe-Lena-on-Actual-Lena attacks that were most interesting.
If you think Master of None has a "wishful diversity" that sounds like more of a you problem than a problem that the show had. People in diverse areas do have diverse friend groups.
There's natural diversity, and there's the kind of diversity that Master of None had that was painfully calculated with many episodes ending with a clumsy little lesson moment.
Perhaps you could have made it clear that your critique was actually about corny, calculated life lesson moments rather than the diversity of MoN's friend group. I can see that about the show for sure. But I found nothing about the actual makeup of the friend group in question to be "wishful" - no doubt informed by my own experience with diverse friend groups in SF, OC, San Diego. Mine is not a unique experience by any means.
Two things can be true at once: there are arbitrarily diverse social circles to be had in major metro areas; and certain scenes are extremely self-segregating (even within such locales), so portrayals of them as diverse may feel contrived.
If OP wishes to be a part of certain scenes that, due to self-selection, are not that diverse in reality, the diverse TV version is gonna feel rather idealized. Of course, the rest of us minorities can just nope out of such scenes and have our normie diverse friend groups.
They perhaps feel contrived to those people who haven't experienced what is actually a normal, regular thing in some places. A person from a small town in Texas may find it hard to believe that there are cities where two men can walk together hand in hand, but that doesn't mean such places don't exist or that they are idealized. An incel may find a story about a normal looking guy hooking up with a girl to be contrived and unrealistic and "wishful." Both of these people would be literally incorrect. Just as Chris was when he labeled MoN's diversity to be "wishful". If it exists in reality, it is not a wish... it is reality.
The funny thing here is that Chris actually appears to be a part of a diverse set himself - at least per his social media.
But I will assume that Chris was not being purposely insincere just to be provocative, just to inexplicably slam MoN for its diversity, just as a way to look at Girls' lack of diversity as somehow laudable. I will take him at his word (at least the words in his reply to me): his intention with his incorrect phrasing was to slam MoN's life lessons, not its perfectly normal diversity.
I've already gone on way too long, but I will add that I think Girls was an absolutely fantastic show. A strong enough show that it was totally unnecessary to insult Master of None's diversity in order to re-litigate what was once an absurd attack on Girls re its lack of diversity. No need to shit on one thing in order to uplift another thing. I hate that sort of petty bs.
I think a number of things are worth separating out in an honest discussion:
what are the demographics and culture of a specific group/scene;
how well are they represented in some given entertainment or work of art — and how much does it matter for them to be portrayed accurately;
how representative and important is that group in real life, among those who are not in that scene or aspiring to be in it?
I am an Asian American woman. There are social scenes, such as that depicted as Dunham’s friend group in Girls, that I don’t feel comfortable in. In fact, just the other day, a young white man requested my attendance at an event involving this crowd, and took it extremely poorly when I tried to explain (in private, therefore to no embarrassment to him, never mind that we had discussed race at length previously) that the crowd was too “white” — by which I meant culturally above all — for my comfort.
I am fine not being in such scenes! However, OP finds Girls honest in its portrayal of selective inclusion of Asians — more so people like me than people like him. And I can’t convince him that there is a whole vibrant world outside of that scene. And if one is so personally invested in these scenes, it will influence one’s perception of not just the verisimilitude but also the value of entertainment or works of art that portray them.
You are making some very interesting points, in particular in your last paragraph. Those last two sentences are striking.
Regarding the point "And I can't convince him..." I do wonder if Chris would find value in this world outside, if he would even find this normie world bearable. That said, it is hard for me to believe that such 'inside worlds' are truly all-white. But your own anecdote leads me to think that maybe they are? Which I find strange and shocking. And perhaps a more recent development - last decade & a half, or so?
My own experiences/what makes the entire idea of such ethnically demarcated worlds surprising to me:
- I'm a mixed-race American male (Asian/White) who, as I've mentioned, has lived throughout California (SF, OC, SD). Throughout these locations, I've never had a friend group or been a part of wider social milieu that was not a diverse one. The social scenes of my friend groups have themselves been diverse: nerd/honors-normies (high school/OC); frat-normies, alternate music scene, queer scene (all three in college/SD); anarcho-communitarian spaces that centered on music scenes, art scenes, activist scenes (my post-college 20s & 30s in SF), progressive social services providers (my current colleagues & staff in SF), and the now semi-normie middle class/mixed education folks who used to be in the anarcho-communitarian spaces but are now home & business owners with families lol (my current Bay Area social circle). Literally each and every one of these spaces were/are multicultural, multi-ethnic spaces (and I don't even note my childhood in very diverse military spaces). The slight majority were/are white, but I give that no thought to that as this country is majority-white. The fact of the matter is that there were plenty of queers and POC mixed in with the straight whites. I think all of this may explain my antipathy towards Chris's dismissive statement? He paints a "reality" that I don't think is realistic and that I haven't seen across numerous diverse social scenes and across well over 40 years of life.
- I'm Gen X. Perhaps I have generational blinkers on. Have things so degraded in society that generations subsequent to mine now actively seek segregation, even in mixed-culture, urban settings where diversity is basically pro forma? This would be both wild and depressing to me.
But back to Chris and his piece. I went into a bit of a dive with his writings. Two things stood out to me: (1) he's an excellent writer! I enjoyed all 6 of the pieces I read; and (2) Master of None has something of a symbolic resonance for him, a negative one. It appears to be a slight obsession of his. Not counting this piece, he's written about or references the show in at least two Medium pieces and at least four Substack pieces.
Most illuminating was his self-described "takedown" of the show in an early Medium piece. What I took from that article was that he intensely disliked the show because it was not misery porn that described the existential pain of "being Asian in America" but instead sought to portray a social milieu of usually-happy, rather well-off liberals who got along and learned things from each other. I thought his piece was fascinating, enjoyable, and well-written but also almost laughably pretentious. A portion of his ridicule seemed to be aimed towards the very idea of mixed-race relationships, which of course took me personally aback as the product of just such a relationship. There was a near-Marxist leftism that also informed the piece. Which makes his embrace of Girls rather understandable: Dunham is not portraying in a balanced way the ins & outs of a relatively gracious and affirming social milieu (unlike the one featured in her latest work Too Much); she is instead satirizing a milieu full of hypocrisy and unearned privilege. A person analyzing a show from a class-first leftist lens would of course be disgusted by Master of None and would relish the ruthless satire of Girls. As would a social conservative. Horseshoe!
Uncomfortably, his over the top attack on Master of None (created by two Asians) actually reminded me a lot of the over the top attacks on Girls that Chris discusses in his article above. Perhaps he is blind to this uncomfortable parallel: his attack article weirdly parallels the attack articles put out by Dunham's bullies - women in Dunham's field who feel her fame was unearned. Chris replicates this dynamic in his Medium attack piece on Master of None.
As you reference, Asians are most definitely present in Girls: Asian men are portrayed positively, as figures of desire to the Shoshanna character; Asian women are portrayed negatively, as rivals or the instigators of problems to the Hannah and Marnie characters. I think this gendered representation is an interesting one to consider. Chris does an excellent job in an earlier piece theorizing on why Dunham decided to portray Asian men & women so differently. But I'm not sure if he's aware of what this says about his own ease with Girls.
Excellent piece!
Thank you, Kimberly!
Lena Dunham is like a barnacle in your underwear. Won't go away, keeps wanting more and disgusting to behold, especially when feeding its unsavoury hungers.
Who is Lena Dunham?
My piece explains!