The Diplomat on Netflix. The Challenge of Crafting a Feminist Heroine

 

The Diplomat on Netflix.
The Challenge of Crafting a Feminist Heroine

The Diplomat is an eight-part, 2023 Netflix drama. It stars Keri Russell as Kate Wyler, an American diplomat in London who is trying to save the world from nuclear war. Russell had previously starred as a Russian spy in The Americans. The Diplomat was created by Debora Cahn, who wrote for and produced The West Wing, Homeland, and Grey's Anatomy. National Public Radio and the New York Times called The Diplomat "intelligent" and "thoughtful." An online reviewer called it "the best grown-up show Netflix had released in years." A podcast called it "civics-tainement," that is entertainment that teaches civics. Netflix calls the show "cerebral."

Cahn and several cast members cite journalist Paul Richter's 2019 book The Ambassadors: America's Diplomats on the Front Lines as inspiration. "American ambassadors," Amazon says of this book, "are the unconventional warriors in the Muslim world – running local government, directing drone strikes, nation-building, and risking their lives on the front lines." Another inspiration for The Diplomat was the 2019 documentary, The Human Factor, described as "The epic behind-the-scenes story of the United States' 30-year effort to secure peace in the Middle East."

These accolades inspired me to watch The Diplomat. I immediately realized that The Diplomat is not "cerebral." It is popular entertainment. Overcoming disappointed expectations, I came to enjoy the show, in spite of the problems I had with it. Its Hollywood romanticizing of diplomats did not mesh with my overseas experience. More importantly, the main character, Kate Wyler, did not work for me. Crafting a feminist heroine for a Netflix show in 2023 is a challenge.

The Case Against the Sexual Revolution by Louise Perry Book Review

The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century
Journalist Louise Perry Sets Us All Straight

The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century is a 216-page, August, 2022 book published by Polity Press. Author Louise Perry is a beautiful British journalist, activist against sexual violence, wife and mother. Case has received very positive reviews from professional reviewers as well as Amazon readers. Phyllis Chesler, for example, wrote "Perry has written the most radical feminist challenge to a failed liberal feminism." Helen Joyce wrote, "Brilliantly conceived and written, this highly original book is an urgent call for a sexual counter-revolution." And Rachel Cook wrote, "It may turn out to be one of the most important feminist books of its time." As of this writing, Case has almost seven hundred Amazon reviews, with an average rating of 4.5 out of 5 possible stars. I had some problems with this book, but there is an audience for whom Case is just about perfect. More on that, below.

Jordan Neely and Daniel Penny

 

Kitty Genovese 

Jordan Neely Was Not a Victim of White Supremacy or Lack of Services
The Leftists Celebrating Neely Wield a Weapon that Will Hurt More Like Him

 

I was debating gun control. Someone insisted that his gun was his best protection. I told him that his best protection is something he can't even see, something he's probably never thought about. His best protection is something ephemeral, something multisyllabic; something you can't explain in a soundbite. "Your best protection," I insisted, "is narrative."

 

My family lived in the same house for almost seventy years. I was in and out of that house for decades. Not only did I never use a key, I don't even know if a key existed. We slept with doors and windows open. Neighbors walked in and out without knocking. We lived in New Jersey, America's most densely populated state. Our town was mostly white but there were blacks, Ramapo Mountain People, Chinese, Indians, Filipinos, Arabs, and Hispanics as well.

 

It wasn't paradise. My hometown exposed me to the slings and arrows that flesh is heir to. In just three short blocks, I know of four women who had serious mental health or cognitive issues. This was back in the bad old days when doctors would irresponsibly over-prescribe drugs like Thorazine and Miltown. There was substance abuse, domestic abuse, suicides attempted and completed, and the very rare ax murder. Our town was industrial and cancer was ubiquitous. One family seemed targeted by God: cancer, crippling injury, chronic illness. And we were poor.

 

What made the town so safe? My best guess. We shared narrative. We were all working class, and religiously observant, largely church-going Catholics. We were children or grandchildren of immigrants. We were patriotic Americans who realized how lucky we were to be here, and not there, where our cousins lived under Communism or otherwise in poverty. The kids played together. The adults socialized together. We thought of ourselves as characters in each other's narrative.

I'm Poor

 
Another Reason I am No Longer a Leftist
I'm Poor

In 2014, I published an essay listing ten reasons I am no longer a leftist. Something happened last Monday that hurt my feelings a lot and reminded me of another reason: I'm poor. This is counterintuitive. The Left depicts itself as the champion of the poor; the Left depicts right-wingers as hating the poor. Backstage, behind all the speechifying about "compassion," a very specific left-wing attitude to the poor is abhorrent to me. I encountered that attitude last Monday. I felt disgust, rage, and sorrow.

The Victims' Revolution: The Rise of Identity Studies and the Birth of Woke Ideology by Bruce Bawer. Review.

 

The Victims' Revolution: The Rise of Identity Studies and the Birth of Woke Ideology by Bruce Bawer.

Buy It. Read It. Share It. Act on It.

I was new in town. I had no money. I was determined to get a PhD. I had been accepted to an Ivy League school. I had to turn it down. They offered no funding, and the school was in an expensive city. I came to this university, in the middle of farm country, with lower rents. I begged for an assistantship, a job that would cover my tuition. I was hired by an elegantly dressed professor, slim and attractive as a fashion model. Her CV was a cavalcade of accolades and presidencies.