Monday, January 14, 2008

December article in Rare Magazine

New episodes of Grey's Anatomy are back. I hope the writers strike ends soon. Here is my December article in Rare Magazine.

Now that we are well into the fourth season of Grey’s Anatomy, I’m sure of this; The journey of Meredith, Izzy, McDreamy and McSteamy has all of us acting McStupid.

This tv show is messing up America. We used to be strong, assertive and in control our feelings, especially in the workplace. The popularity of the medical drama has taken the one person we trusted, our doctor, and showed us that they are an emotional train wreck. That, in turn, has given us all the green light start whining, crying and spilling our guts whenever we feel fit, especially at work. This has left us unproductive, emotionally empty, and constantly searching for our own McDreamy, McSlut or McIntern hooching buddy or a shoulder to cry on.

I spent recent months watching seasons one through the current episode of season four just so I could catch up on the Grey’s phenomenon. I had to see what all they hype was about and find out why women where calling each other at 9:01pm Thursday nights crying. I have to admit, I felt empty at work on Friday mornings. There I was, happy as can be at work, but feeling out of place as all my co-workers where fighting back tears, recalling the young woman and man who showed up at Seattle Grace with the same pole jammed through their abdomens. I secretly wanted to be sad over the impaled pair, just as everyone else was. Twins needed to be separated last night and we don’t know if they survived? I wanted to feel the same anxiety until the next Thursday, just as everyone else.

Not only has this show opened up the emotional floodgates, it’s got us idolizing the main characters for so many of the wrong reasons. We used to idolize tv characters because they were strong, assertive, good looking and had it all together. Now we tend to think the following:

I wish I could blink involuntarily, sleep with two of my roommates, be completely indecisive and cut my own hair. Thank you George.

I wish I grew up in a trailer park, would rather bake muffins than go to the bank and cash an 8 million dollar check, have an inappropriate relationship with a client and then kill them. Thank you Izzie.

I wish I could sleep with an intern, whine about the my wife cheating even thought I ignored her for years, never properly shave, and have watery eyes every time a camera zooms in on me. Thank you McDreamy

I wish I had a mother that was disappointed in me, a father that abandoned me, sleep with my boss and wear size 0 jeans. Thank you Meredith.

These are the wrong people to find as role models and yet they are the one’s we have chosen. Long gone are the tv characters who always seemed to make the right choices, have the perfect careers and save the damsel in distress in the final five minutes.

This list goes on an on with these flawed characters. I’m not saying we are not flawed personally, I’m just saying we keep it personal, on some level, out of respect for those in the office cube next to us. Somehow when we watch Grey’s, we want to trade places with them, we want to be a part of this madness. This is what’s making us, the viewer, take our normally stable, on track lives and throw them into a tailspin. We aspire to lead a life that would be far more interesting on primetime than “I had a great day at work, went to my kids soccer game, cooked a nice casserole, read fifty pages of a Dean Koontz novel and went to bed.” That’s messed up. We should kill for the second option. When will we learn not to get McStuck on McStupid.

Here’s another strange thing about the Grey’s phenomenon. I would imagine that on average, we each spend at least an hour dissecting and analyzing the show. “Derrick should have said ______ to Meredith.” “George should have told the truth to Izzie.” “Meredith should get some freaking counseling!” Yet, do we spend on hour a week truthfully thinking about what we should do with our own lives. Hell no. We’re just bouncing through life trying to keep up with our email, our pets, kids and occassionaly we ask our spouse something other than “what were you thinking for dinner?” Could you imagine if we put the time and effort into our own relationships that we do into Christina and Burke or McSteamy and Addison? We’d be the masters of our own relationships and get two thumbs up from Dr. Phil. We’re being McLazy, McIdiots.

The other huge problem with the success of Grey’s is that I no longer trust my doctors. When I see them I can no longer see them with the trust and loyalty I used to. I can only think, “I bet he’s sleeping with that nurse right there in that broom closet right there.” Or, “I wonder if she had to repeat her internship and how many test she failed before she is able to do this surgery right here, right now.” Or the worst one of all, in the middle of my surgery, I don’t want him thinking “I wonder if I picked up an STD from little miss McWacky Scrubs last night after too many McShots in the McWarehouse district.

Let’s all make a deal. Doctors go back to acting like doctors, we’ll go back to acting like responsible citizens and keep our emotions on the inside, where they belong. We’ll all be able to move forward, be more productive with our workday, our lives and stop our McCryin. Until we figure out how to take back our lives and emotions, I’m right there with you, acting like a McIdiot. I’m completely and utterly “Stuck on McStupid”.

No comments: