Parks and Recreation

Pop culture made me a feminist. As a suburban girl in the early 90s, I picked up my beliefs about equality from some books at the library and a copy of Cyndi Lauper’s “She’s So Unusal.” After no one at my elementary school opted to join my "Gender Equality Club," I looked back to pop culture to find others of my kind—and I found the most feminists were on network TV.

We've come to my last entry for Women's Work, my guest blog exploring TV portrayals of women in the workforce. Thanks so much for reading, for commenting on, and for sharing these stories...

TV shows House of Cards and Parks and Recreation both point important real-world dynamics. While young men have a wealth of male mentors to choose from—as well as so-called old boy networks—young women have few gender-specific examples of what success looks like.

On these shows, we see two examples of young women looking up to a singular older, female role model: House of Card's cub reporter Zoe (Kate Mara) admires rich nonprofit chief Claire Underwood (Robin Wright) and Parks and Rec's city hall staffer April (Aubrey Plaza) has Councilwoman Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) to thank for much advice and career help.

Today is Galentine’s Day! This fictional-turned-actual holiday from NBC’s Parks & Recreation is a day for ladyfriends to celebrate one another’s awesomeness.  All week, Bitch has posted two daily Galentine’s cards featuring Parks and Rec characters that I drew for you to share with your friends—here's the final batch! 

This Wednesday is Galentine’s Day, the fictional-turned-actual holiday from NBC’s Parks & Recreation, wherein ladyfriends grab brunch and celebrate one another’s awesomeness.  To help get you in the mood, from today through Wednesday Bitch will post two daily Galentine’s cards featuring Parks and Rec characters that I drew for you to share with your friends! 

It's rare to see TV show characters who actually have a job. As recent study showed that only half of prime-time speaking characters possess an "identifiable job." When shows do depict women working, we're rarely portrayed in nontraditional occupations. Television would have us believe that when women have careers, we're in stereotypical "women's work" like being  administrative assistants or glamorous fashion designers. In TV careers, men do the heavy lifting.

Last week's episode of Parks and Recreation, "Women in Garbage", is fairly unique then, in showing women at work in a male-dominated career: takin' out the city's trash. In their own hilarious way, Parks & Rec focused on the fraught fight that needs to happen in order to undo a city's institutional sexism. In the episode, City Commissioner Leslie (Amy Poehler) discovers that very few women occupy jobs in Pawnee's public sector. She attempts to create a gender equality commission, but finds she's presiding over an all-male group—in April's (Aubrey Plaza) words, a "sausagefest."

Onscreen, women struggle as unpaid interns but are saved by, in April's case, a surprise job opportunity in season two of Parks and Recreation. But in real life, about one in six 18-24 year-olds are unemployed and those who land coveted internships often go unpaid.

After a long, agonizing, Pawnee-less summer, Parks and Rec comes back tonight! Will Leslie and Ben make a long-distance relationship work and renew the romantic hopes dashed by Amy Poehler and Will Arnett's *sniff* real-life divorce? Will Tom Haverford and Ann Perkins call it quits so we can go back to watching Big T hit on women at the Snakehole Lounge? Will Ron Swanson continue to eat all the bacon and eggs you have? (Yes.)


"That building looks like a boob."

To tide you over until the season five premiere on September 20 (so close yet so far!), here's a delightful Parks and Recreation blooper reel:

All Parks and Rec fans know that February 13 is Galentine's Day in the fictional town of Pawnee. However, like other fictional-but-fun holidays before it (Festivus, Chrismukkah, Cheeseburger Picnic), Galentine's Day is worth celebrating in real life—if only for the breakfast.

It's like Lilith Fair without the angst. Plus frittatas.