How Grey’s Anatomy encourages feminism in the workplace
Opinion
In the 17 season long, hit ABC television drama series, Grey’s Anatomy, Meredith Grey and other doctors are shown their emotional and mental progression starting out as interns. The show encourages a lot of social inclusion and progress, but most of all it focuses on the importance of feminism in the workplace. Grey’s Anatomy shows that women can be successful, sheds light on women being sexualized in the workplace, and reassures women that it’s okay to choose a career over children.
Grey’s Anatomy encourages women to excel in a highly competitive, male dominated workplace. Grey’s Anatomy shows the progression of how Meredith’s mother overcame women being oppressed as doctors. Ellis Grey came to the hospital in the early 80’s. This would be during the second wave of feminism where women focused on their right to employment rather than domestic duties. In season 6 episode 15 Ellis is in the hospital trying to revive a patient, a male doctor says, “this is no job for a nurse” and tries to take over. Ellis shoves him off and replies, “you know damn well I’m not a nurse” and brings the patient back to life. Doctor Debra Wirtzfeld wrote a scholarly article on the history of women in surgery. She talks about Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, who was the first female physician in the United States. She was rejected from over 20 medical schools before finally being admitted to Geneva Medical College where she was awarded the gold medal from Geneva Medical College. Even with this accomplishment no one would give her a residency position and she never became a surgeon.
Later, in season 11 episode four, Meredith watches a recorded video of her mom talking about the first time she won a Harper Avery Award (a prestigious medical award). She got the award for creating a groundbreaking surgical procedure. She called it the “Grey Method” which her male coworkers called “audacious”. She jokingly states that she dedicated it to all the men who had been “so supportive”. She then corrects herself and says she dedicated it to “all the women surgeons who would come after me.” Even though Meredith and her female colleagues’ accomplishments are important as well, historically speaking her mother being so successful at her age at that time is important. In addition, it shows how future generations of women are given the ability to excel because of the sacrifices of past generations of women.
Meredith’s mother overcame a hostile work environment and was a single mother yet still gave her daughter and many other women a future in medicine. The targeted audience is women aged 15–50 and more specifically 20–35. According to wetpaint.com 76% of viewers are female. This encourages women of different ages to go to school, be a successful single mother, and to be extraordinary and pay no attention to what men might think or say.
The show also depicts how men will sexualize their female co-workers. In season one episode four intern George O’Malley gets upset that his roommate and fellow intern Izzie Stevens walks around the house in her underwear but he doesn’t sexualize or ogle her. Stevens knows O’Malley has a kind heart and good intentions, so she doesn’t mind. Stevens put herself through medical school by modeling and knew that being sexualized in the workplace could be an issue in her career because of this. Later Alex Karev a male intern discovers a magazine with sexual pictures of his fellow intern Izzie Stevens. Karev then plasters them all over the intern’s locker room for everyone to see. Stevens breaks down and strips to just her bra and panties and yells, “What are these? Oh my god breasts! How does anyone practice medicine hauling these things around? Gather around and check out the booty that put Izzie Stevens through med school.”
The blatant sexual harassment is hard to watch. The reality is no matter how successful a woman is in a profession, such as a surgeon, they are often stripped to being seen as sexual objects and not as a respected professional. On pages 139–147, co-authors, Ethan Thompson and Jason Mittell wrote in their book How to Watch Television on how feminism is apparent in Grey’s Anatomy. Specifically, they state, “While many representations of women in postfeminist culture depict femininity and sexual attractiveness as women’s foremost sources of liberation, in Grey’s Anatomy, empowerment comes when the women doctors are seen as medical professionals ahead of sexualized beings.”
Throughout Grey’s Anatomy, the show fights the stereotype that women are obligated to choose a family over their career. This is a issue prominent throughout most of the show. Christina Yang who graduated first in her class at Stanford University School of Medicine with an M.D., and earned her Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of California, Berkeley made it clear through the show that she wanted a career over a family.
She is criticized in her first engagement for choosing her career over children by her fiancé’s mother and her own mother. Christina’s hesitation to choose a married lifestyle is ultimately what ends the engagement and she is left humiliated at the altar.
Later, Yang marries Owen Hunt, an ex-military surgeon. Owen desperately wants a family and married Christina knowing she didn’t. Yang gets pregnant and eventually she gets an abortion with Owen standing by her side. Knowing she never wanted a family he still shames and guilts her for it. In season eight episode 12 Yang and Hunt get in an argument and he yells, “You killed our baby!” and everyone in the next room hears it. This type of guilt that society, in particularly men, put on women who choose career over children is completely unfair.
Society expects women to not only give up their career but their bodies and their lives for children because it’s their “duty” as women. Men don’t have to give up their bodies and often continue to work expecting the women to take care of the children at home. Yang’s firm stance on choosing career over children for years encourages women to stand up for themselves and to not let society shame them into a particular lifestyle.
An article by Lauren Wilkins titled Is Grey’s Anatomy on the Wave? A Feminist Textual Analysis of Meredith Grey and Cristina Yang mentions how Christina’s decision to choose her career over having children is both second and third wave feminism. It is second wave feminism because, “second wave feminists believed that women had to choose either career or traditional feminine roles.” Then Wilkins discusses how it can also be considered third wave feminism because, “Meredith is asserting Cristina’s individual right to choose and supporting her against Owen, a man who, in a way, tries to dictate Cristina’s actions.” Grey’s Anatomy encourages women to be independent and to pursue their careers for themselves, not for anyone else. It breaks the stereotype that only men can ever have a real career because women are obligated to give up their careers in order to have children.
Grey’s Anatomy provides entertainment to women across the world that encourages them in many aspects. With its ties to both second and third wave feminism it shows the struggles women went through earlier in American history that helped pave the way for women today to continue to fight for their rights. Rights such as to have a respected career, to be respected in the workplace, and to be allowed to choose work over the domestic position of a housewife and to not feel ashamed of that decision.
