Kenny Coyote
Telly Talk Star
I was watching the second season episode "Election" and it's a classic episode. It foreshadows a lot of what will happen in the show.
The scene that's the most indicative of a serious rift in their marriage takes place just over eleven minutes into the episode:
Bobby say to Pam: I think it's time we talked about just what we're doing here.
Pam: I have to do it Bobby. Cliff's my brother and I have to help him.
Bobby: I knew it was gonna be difficult when you were just stuffing envelopes, honey, but this, I don't know.
Pam: There's none else to do it - he doesn't have the kind of organization behind him that the Ewing candidate does.
Bobby: That's the problem honey - there is a Ewing candidate and you are a Ewing! Now have you figured out how you're gonna handle it?
Pam: Yes, I'm gonna help my brother.
Bobby: Pamela, do you understand what this election means to my family?
Pam: Oh I understand exactly what it means to your family - it's a way to get back at my brother!
Bobby: Now you're being simplistic Pamela and you know it. Besides, your brother hasn't exactly had a hands-off policy when it comes to us either, has he?
Pam: Well what do you expect him to do? If he doesn't do something, the Ewing family is gonna control everyone and everything!
Bobby: Stop it Pamela; you're starting to sound like that knee-jerk radical brother of yours!
Pam: If being a knee-jerk radical means being against exploitation, corruption and greed, I'm proud to be one!
Bobby: Exploitation and corruption of who? Of what? Look, my daddy built an empire here because he was smarter than the next guy, and he worked harder, and he was luckier, but anybody with the same qualifications can do the same thing.
Pam: That's easy to say when you're born rich! It's the others Cliff is worried about!
Bobby: Oh, Cliff talks a great game, but when it comes right down to it, he can play just as dirty as the rest of them.
Pam: Well, we see things differently, don't we?
Bobby: What I see Pamela, is that this is doing to us.
Pam: Well, we've chosen our sides.
Bobby: No, not this time. This time I think we were born into them.
*****************
This conversation makes me question Pam's motivation for marrying Bobby. Was marrying him truly a response to the virtues of his character and if so, why would she so vehemently oppose what Bobby's doing and help Cliff to win so that he can have more power to try to hurt Bobby and the rest of his family? Pam's words here tell me she sees Cliff as far more virtuous, and therefore deserving of her cooperation than she thinks Bobby is.
Did Pam marry Bobby on a whim, to do the most rebellious thing she could do? Bobby and Pam are the called the Romeo and Juliet of Dallas but I don't recall Juliet helping her family to ruin Romeo's family. I don't recall Juliet having contempt for Romeo's values and doing everything she could to help a man who says of Romeo: "He's not a man. He's a Montague." Is Pam just oblivious to how much Cliff hates the Ewings, including Bobby? If not, how can she justify helping Cliff, knowing how much he hates Bobby and everything Bobby stands for?
Pam never does answer the questions: "Exploitation and corruption of who? Of what"? Is that because she sees no evidence of it being so, but Cliff said so and that makes it gospel? Pam seems to be blind to any underhanded, corrupt or exploitative thing her brother ever does. She seems to see Cliff as the ideal man, a reflection of her deepest values and a symbol of all that is good. Her actions tell me she sees Cliff as a better man than her own husband. Why would you love someone who you think is a defender of exploitation and corruption, a defender of what you despise? Why would you marry someone who not only doesn't reflect your own highest values but adamantly opposes them?
In "For The New Intellectual" Ayn Rand wrote about love and sex:
"Love is blind, they say; sex is impervious to reason and mocks the power of all philosophers. But, in fact, a man’s sexual choice is the result and the sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy of life. Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you his valuation of himself. No matter what corruption he’s taught about the virtue of selflessness, sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which he cannot perform for any motive but his own enjoyment—just try to think of performing it in a spirit of selfless charity!—an act which is not possible in self-abasement, only in self-exaltation, only in the confidence of being desired and being worthy of desire. It is an act that forces him to stand naked in spirit, as well as in body, and to accept his real ego as his standard of value. He will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself, the woman whose surrender permits him to experience—or to fake—a sense of self-esteem . . . . Love is our response to our highest values—and can be nothing else."
It looks to me like Pam's love for Bobby was not a response to her highest values. Maybe Pam wanted it to to be something else. It couldn't be something else and therefore it could not last.
The scene that's the most indicative of a serious rift in their marriage takes place just over eleven minutes into the episode:
Bobby say to Pam: I think it's time we talked about just what we're doing here.
Pam: I have to do it Bobby. Cliff's my brother and I have to help him.
Bobby: I knew it was gonna be difficult when you were just stuffing envelopes, honey, but this, I don't know.
Pam: There's none else to do it - he doesn't have the kind of organization behind him that the Ewing candidate does.
Bobby: That's the problem honey - there is a Ewing candidate and you are a Ewing! Now have you figured out how you're gonna handle it?
Pam: Yes, I'm gonna help my brother.
Bobby: Pamela, do you understand what this election means to my family?
Pam: Oh I understand exactly what it means to your family - it's a way to get back at my brother!
Bobby: Now you're being simplistic Pamela and you know it. Besides, your brother hasn't exactly had a hands-off policy when it comes to us either, has he?
Pam: Well what do you expect him to do? If he doesn't do something, the Ewing family is gonna control everyone and everything!
Bobby: Stop it Pamela; you're starting to sound like that knee-jerk radical brother of yours!
Pam: If being a knee-jerk radical means being against exploitation, corruption and greed, I'm proud to be one!
Bobby: Exploitation and corruption of who? Of what? Look, my daddy built an empire here because he was smarter than the next guy, and he worked harder, and he was luckier, but anybody with the same qualifications can do the same thing.
Pam: That's easy to say when you're born rich! It's the others Cliff is worried about!
Bobby: Oh, Cliff talks a great game, but when it comes right down to it, he can play just as dirty as the rest of them.
Pam: Well, we see things differently, don't we?
Bobby: What I see Pamela, is that this is doing to us.
Pam: Well, we've chosen our sides.
Bobby: No, not this time. This time I think we were born into them.
*****************
This conversation makes me question Pam's motivation for marrying Bobby. Was marrying him truly a response to the virtues of his character and if so, why would she so vehemently oppose what Bobby's doing and help Cliff to win so that he can have more power to try to hurt Bobby and the rest of his family? Pam's words here tell me she sees Cliff as far more virtuous, and therefore deserving of her cooperation than she thinks Bobby is.
Did Pam marry Bobby on a whim, to do the most rebellious thing she could do? Bobby and Pam are the called the Romeo and Juliet of Dallas but I don't recall Juliet helping her family to ruin Romeo's family. I don't recall Juliet having contempt for Romeo's values and doing everything she could to help a man who says of Romeo: "He's not a man. He's a Montague." Is Pam just oblivious to how much Cliff hates the Ewings, including Bobby? If not, how can she justify helping Cliff, knowing how much he hates Bobby and everything Bobby stands for?
Pam never does answer the questions: "Exploitation and corruption of who? Of what"? Is that because she sees no evidence of it being so, but Cliff said so and that makes it gospel? Pam seems to be blind to any underhanded, corrupt or exploitative thing her brother ever does. She seems to see Cliff as the ideal man, a reflection of her deepest values and a symbol of all that is good. Her actions tell me she sees Cliff as a better man than her own husband. Why would you love someone who you think is a defender of exploitation and corruption, a defender of what you despise? Why would you marry someone who not only doesn't reflect your own highest values but adamantly opposes them?
In "For The New Intellectual" Ayn Rand wrote about love and sex:
"Love is blind, they say; sex is impervious to reason and mocks the power of all philosophers. But, in fact, a man’s sexual choice is the result and the sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy of life. Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you his valuation of himself. No matter what corruption he’s taught about the virtue of selflessness, sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which he cannot perform for any motive but his own enjoyment—just try to think of performing it in a spirit of selfless charity!—an act which is not possible in self-abasement, only in self-exaltation, only in the confidence of being desired and being worthy of desire. It is an act that forces him to stand naked in spirit, as well as in body, and to accept his real ego as his standard of value. He will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself, the woman whose surrender permits him to experience—or to fake—a sense of self-esteem . . . . Love is our response to our highest values—and can be nothing else."
It looks to me like Pam's love for Bobby was not a response to her highest values. Maybe Pam wanted it to to be something else. It couldn't be something else and therefore it could not last.
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