In alternative Kimmy Schmidt universe, the bunker is full of weak nursing students
One of the final episodes of the sitcom Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, which Netflix released in January 2019, presents an alternative world in which the Reverend never abducted Kimmy and held her underground for 15 years. But instead of Kimmy, he took twenty meek, gullible nursing students—i.e., handmaids.
January 25, 2019 – Today Netflix released the final episodes of the sitcom Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and one of them expresses the still-common Hollywood contempt for nursing. Season 4 episode 9 (“Sliding Van Doors”) shows what might have happened if junior high schooler Kimmy had never gotten in the van of the evil Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne and never been held for 15 years in an underground bunker. That one change, it turns out, would have dramatically affected the lives of every major show character, as in the film Sliding Doors. In particular, it would have meant that the Reverend did not stop at five random abductees, as he did when the assertive, quite-a-handful Kimmy was one of them. Instead, in this alternative Kimmy-verse, the Reverend continues abducting students from the local “nursing college” who are so gullible and passive that they present tempting targets even after the danger has become obvious. Although we see brief glimpses of these nursing students, they seem too timid to speak. When the nursing students have gone missing, local law enforcement doesn’t bother searching for them until somebody tells them it might be important because “the doctors need wives.” At one point, in the bunker, one of the few non-nurse abductees begs for anyone to stand up to the Reverend; the 20 nursing student-handmaids continue silently sewing. A couple are dressed in white uniforms with caps that would place them more in the 1950s than the 2010s. At another point, college-age Kimmy distinguishes herself from the abducted students by saying, “I’m smart.” Kimmy also asks her boyfriend: “Why don’t they kill him or escape?” Later, Kimmy becomes a local TV reporter and gets her big network break to cover the finally freed women. She exults, “Thank God for stupid nurses.” The show is not actually endorsing the harshness of alterna-Kimmy’s views; it ultimately punishes the character. But the show never gives us any reason to question the idea that nurses are, in fact, terminally meek and dimwitted. There is no counter-example. It’s true that few professions are off limits on a show like this. But the recurring idea that nurses are dim and submissive reinforces enduring handmaiden stereotypes that continue to plague the profession, as it struggles for the resources it needs for education and clinical practice. Using nursing as a convenient shorthand for “weak females” is itself weak. Show creators Tina Fey and Robert Carlock are responsible for this episode.
Join us in sending a letter to Tina Fey and the other makers of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt!
Below is the letter we are sending. Please feel free to modify it or write your own.
I am writing to object to the misportrayal of nursing in the “Sliding Van Doors” episode of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (season 4 episode 9). The episode’s suggestion that nursing students are dim, weak yester-women reinforces damaging stereotypes of the profession at a time when nurses need public support to save lives.
As you recall, the episode shows what might have happened if junior high schooler Kimmy had never gotten in the van of Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne and never been held for 15 years in an underground bunker. That one change would have meant that the Reverend did not stop at five random abductees, but continued abducting students from the local “nursing college” who are so gullible and passive that they present tempting targets even after the danger has become obvious. These nursing students seem too timid to speak. At one point, in the bunker, one of the few non-nurse abductees begs for anyone to stand up to the Reverend. The 20 nursing student-handmaids continue silently sewing. A couple are dressed in white uniforms with caps that would place them more in the 1950s than the 2010s. At another point, college-age Kimmy distinguishes herself from the abducted students by saying, “I’m smart.” The vanished nursing students are portrayed as so useless to society that local law enforcement only goes to search for them because “the doctors need wives.” Later, Kimmy becomes a local TV reporter and gets her big network break to cover the finally freed women. She exults, “Thank God for stupid nurses.”
I understand that the show is not actually endorsing the harshness of alterna-Kimmy’s views; it ultimately punishes the character. But the episode also never gives us any reason to question the idea that nurses are, in fact, weak, dimwitted and without value. There is no counter-example presented of nurses as strong, smart, lifesaving professionals.
The recurring idea that nurses are dim and submissive reinforces enduring handmaiden stereotypes that continue to plague the profession, as it struggles for the resources it needs for education and clinical practice. When nurses are understaffed, as too many are today, patients suffer and die.
Please make amends to the nursing profession by apologizing, avoiding such stereotypes in the future, and creating media that conveys a more realistic vision of nurses, one that shows them to be skilled, lifesaving caregivers, and determined patient advocates.
Thank you.
Join us in sending a letter to Tina Fey and the other makers of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt!
