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Ross and Ted Were the Nice Guys? Seriously?
In the criticism of shows like Friends and HIMYM, we’re missing how awful and compelling the characters really are.
I was looking through a younger friend’s Instagram stories a little while ago, and saw a piece of criticism of the character of Ted in the sitcom How I Met Your Mother.
My friend is very progressive, always publishing her opinions on racism, homophobia, fatphobia and slut-shaming, among other things. I love looking through her social media because I feel like I learn new things from her all the time. Her points of view often direct me to information that I, as an elder millennial (thanks Iliza Shlesinger for this term), may not have paid attention to on my own.
This time, she posted an opinion on all the sexism in HIMYM. If you’ve ever seen the show, the misogyny is pretty blatant, especially in the sex-crazed character of Barney. But, my friend argued, Ted is the character we really should be paying attention to.
Ted was painted as a good guy, and therefore his character is much more dangerous. We let these characters mold our perceptions of the world, and take them as the model of the man we should be looking to date. Ted’s the main character of the show, after all, and the one whose love story we…
