Letter to Editor of The Age

As I read Madeline Bunting’s article ‘Sex, the city and the seduction of feminism’ (5/3) I stopped for a moment and thought about whether I and most of my young, assertive female friends were in fact betraying our feminist upbringing in regularly tuning in to ‘Sex and the City’, and then in true Seinfeld fashion, spending our time around the water cooler the next day recalling our favourite moments and how amazing it was that the writers had once again captured the essence of today’s young (and not so young) modern woman. And then I thought, Get Real.

True it is that the show does not deal with the complexities of modern life – the impact of globalisation, homelessness, poverty and unemployment,. And true, if the script writers were given a brief to write a show about the average modern woman, their lead character would probably be struggling to feed, clothe and house their children (on their own), let alone worry about such luxuries as health and education. They would more likely than not be constrained to a set in a third world country, rather than the glamorous backdrop of Manhattan, New York. And the women would probably not be discussing sex, the maxed out credit card or the latest cool place to be seen. It would be about the more mundane topic of survival – where to find food and how to get enough to minimise the prospect of starvation for yourself or your children.

To be fair to Madeline Bunting however, she does not want to watch a show that is that real to life. Rather, she would like a little evidence of a hard day at the office, some stress, some exhaustion, a little (or perhaps a lot) less glamour and, most importantly, less discussion about men and sex. I hate to be the one to break it to Madeline Bunting, but I, and thousands of other women in first world countries, don’t need to turn on the television to discover what that sort of day is like!

It appears Madeline Bunting’s thesis is that the show ultimately fails feminism as the lives of the lead characters still revolve around men. What nonsense. Whilst there is an extraordinary amount of discussion about men and sex in the show, this is only part of the show’s appeal. What ‘Sex and the City’ captures for me are the reality of strong female friendships, where no topic is off bounds.

I think Madeline Bunting should be a little kinder to her feminist sisters who watch ‘Sex and the City’ precisely because we don’t want to see too much of our hectic days reflected in it.

Liberty Sanger

Vice-President

YWCA Victoria

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