A second Manhattan scam shows why the problem goes even deeper. A new drama that opened late last month, In the Next Room, is easily the worst play I've ever seen on Broadway. Two strikes: It's neither thoughtful nor funny. Third strike: It's based on a lie. The play, set in the 1880s, assumes that in the Victorian era men routinely oppressed women and that neither sex knew anything about sex. It takes outlier cases as the norm and a fringe theory about female hysteria as standard medicine.
I happen to know something about sexual conduct and medicine in that era because I did a lot of Library of Congress research while writing a book that centered on abortion in the late 19th century. Sadly, ignorant drama critics accepted the left-feminist views parroted by the play's author, Sarah Ruhl. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times, for example, waxed on about "documented history [that shows] how much control men had over women's lives, bodies and thoughts." Sure.
Other reviews were similar, with only the Newsday reviewer concluding on a quizzical note: "I still wish I understood the appeal." OK, here's the appeal: We're smart. Those old time folks were stupid. Ignored in the process: 19th-century women led major social service organizations, often ruled men from behind the scenes, and—gasp—generally liked sex.
Furthering the appeal: Many reviews noted that Ruhl is "one of the country's brightest young playwrights" and the winner of a MacArthur Genius Grant. Hmm. . . . Which prominent leader is also said to be brilliant? Ye who doubt: He's a Nobel Prize winner! Those 19th-century hicks, and their epigones like George W. Bush, were all stupid.
Many of Obama's supporters in 2008 voted their pocketbooks, but he went over the top with folks propagandized in college who voted their misshapen knowledge of history. They voted to slay the past. They voted to step into a brilliant future. Now, left with a bedraggled present, how many of them have buyer's remorse? We'll find out next November.