Be a Marilyn

I am a difficult woman - or so the weaklings tell me. Growing up, I was always taught that education comes first, then marriage and if I’m lucky, a career. Most important of all - of course marry for love - but marry a man with means.

“Women are either a Jackie or a Marilyn.”

Jackie was poised and elegant.If she were to get an academy award, then it would be for Best Supporting Wife. She ignored JFK’s many flings and put up with his family, who treated her as a no good outsider. She kept to the shadows and only focused on dressing well and making a good public appearance. She was dutiful, submissive and obedient.

“Women should strive to be like Jackie.”

That is what women are told even now. Just look at the movies. How many “ride-or-die” characters are expected to be women? How many movies praise a woman who “stands by her man” even though he likely abuses drugs, verbally assaults her and gives her a few hits. It’s just a few! They’re meant to be a couple - she just needs to fix him!

Life gives women enough projects and we don’t need another. But now, look at how few movies and shows depict a supporting man. A man who supports a woman is called a “simp” and other derogatory terms because even in 2020, a woman is still less.

She earns less. She’s worth less. She’s praised less.

Norma Jean Baker was nothing special. She married her first husband to get out of the foster care system. In true Hollywood fairytale fashion, she was “discovered.” She already had the body so she simply dyed her hair, assumed a new name and created her now famous “bimbo” personality. She was born in a time when women had to use what they had to get ahead. In this case, it was Marilyn’s sexuality.

Go ahead. Judge her. Many of you do while you ignore the benefits we have in 2020 that she had no access to. You think they had #metoo in 1955? Women were expected to sleep with producers and directors for money. Marilyn just bet on all the right horses and catapulted her name to international stardom.

YET.

Marilyn was no one’s supporting actress. She married the most famous baseball player in the world and yet the press emblazoned her name on the papers first. DiMaggio might as well have been Mr. Monroe.

She was the Best Actress of her own life. She eclipsed anyone who stood next to her and now, almost 60 years later we still refer to her as a sex symbol. Her movies still sell well and her face appears in paintings, tattoos and on other various merchandise. She has long been in the ground but we still remember her.

So be a Marilyn and let everyone else be a Jackie.