I Need to Better Separate My Politics from My Escapist TV

So there I was, watching Private Practice. You know, this show is not very good, and I don't know why I keep watching it. (I'm lying, I totally do - it's because of my ongoing obsession with Paul Adelstein.) And two things kept going through my head:

First, damn, Owen really is working a lot, Adam wasn't lying. He seems to be everywhere.

Second, what's up with a society and an entertainment industry that continue to tell women that they are not real women if they don't reproduce "naturally"? Watching Addison root around for Owen's one remaining swimmer so it could be implanted in Wife of Owen's egg, I just got more and more annoyed, rather than feeling the warm fuzzies this successful fertilization was supposed to inspire.

Maybe it's because I have been personally affected by this issue of late (no, the husband and I are not in the throes of trying to reproduce, rather I have seen people I know and love going through similar trials). It breaks my heart to see all these women/couples going through hell and high water to conceive - both for them, and for the unwanted children who aren't getting adopted because they wouldn't be "theirs." And maybe I'm less sensitive because, no, I have not gone through the trauma of trying and failing to conceive, and maybe if I did, I'd feel differently.

The other thing that irks, though, is that while all the feminist writers and bloggers are up in arms (correctly, I think) about all the films that don't present abortion as a reasonable, viable option (most recently Knocked Up and Waitress), no one seems to be addressing the fact that this idea of pregnancy as the end-all and be-all road to motherhood is permeating our culture as well. In hearing about the tens of thousands of dollars women are spending on invasive fertility-enhancing procedures, I can't help but wonder if those women are, at a basic level, really meant to be carrying children to term. I'm reminded of Patton Oswalt's line in reference to sexagenarian mothers: "Science is all about coulda, not shoulda."

And watching Private Practice, it was very clear that we were meant to celebrate Owen's and Wife of Owen's conclusion that they could not abide even the thought of adoption or artificial insemination. Not that they considered either option and decided it wasn't for them, but that, at their very cores, they just couldn't fathom having a baby that wasn't "theirs." And it pissed me off.

And also? Private Practice is not a very good show. Paul Adelstein, however, rocks.