The Pam Problem

 The Pam Beesly Problem

 Or The One Time I Can Persuade Myself I'm Better Than a Fictional Character

      This video is so glorious. There are few things I love more than a romantic supercut. 

So, I recently read a book by Julie Klausner called "I Don't Care About You Band: What I Learned from Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Felons, Faux Sensitive Hipsters, and Other Guys I've Dated." It is... fine, I guess. Very New York-y, in the less likeable sense of the word. It's a memoir/collection of humorous essays, and unfortunately that means you either end up liking the book and the person, or you despise both.  But all of this is inconsequential. The book reaches transcendence when Julie Klausner breaks down the problem with Pam from The Office and the Guys Who Adore Her, and it is illuminating. Truly, it makes the book. Because for years, these guys have plagued me. I assume most girls have experienced this. My older sister has, and she has been married for as long as The Office has been on the air, so the Pam Issue existed even before Pam herself was created. Now it just has a name. 

There's a certain kind of guy that is irresistible to you during a certain time in your life-- this time is called College, and you are just generally stupid. He's shy and smart and slyly funny, and he plays the acoustic guitar really badly. He's cute but not too cute-- the kind of guy you pick because he seems so sensitive, and you don't anticipate a lot of competition for his attention because he's just the better side of ordinary. This guy I fell for about 10 times, in slightly altering versions, from high school to about 2 weeks ago. And inevitably, this guy tells me about how Pam Beesly is his Perfect Woman. 

For one's information, this is nearly the worst thing you can tell a person who wants to make out with you that is not actually Pam Beesly. Pam the Receptionist is half of the once-thwarted now nauseating romance of The Office-- the girl our hero Jim pined for, and therefore deserved. However, Pam is so perfectly ordinary that you feel like she doesn't really deserve much. Prior to breaking up with him for Jim, Pam is long (and rather unhappily) engaged to a grown-up high school football playing thug from the warehouse and her fiance just lords over her, medieval serfdom style. She is so passive it's hard to imagine she speaks above a whisper. She is shrouded in mousiness. For her positive attributes, Pam is said to be clever, and she comes up with good pranks to pull on Dwight. She has a good sense of humor and she is sweet and kind, to even the irritating fools of the show. All this is well and good. And I understand why Jim or anyone who worked with Pam in their office would have a crush on her-- it's a crush of convenience, and it happens all the time-- it's how you get through the workday/schoolday. But why does this fervor exist?

That mousy passivity is infuriating to female-hood. Pam talks about these ambitions-- she wants to leave Scranton and the office to work on her art, she manages to go to school for graphic design, she leaves her Dundler-Mifflin receptionist job to be a salesman for Michael Scott-- and she fails them all. Not even fails-- she chickens out or quits when it gets hard. And perhaps this is all accurate. Maybe if she had succeeded in any of these things, I would have a whole other bag of complaints. But currently my problem with Pam is that she's weak-- she doesn't own her looks, she hides from them, she hides from her talent, her intelligence, all because she's afraid. No girl wants to be Pam, however much they want Jim Halpert.*

Julie Klausner's argument, essentially, is that the Guys Who Love Pam are a waste of time (this is correct) because they are just as afraid of women as your d-bag frattastic bros, they just hide it under the veil of "sensitivity." Because they don't want an empowered woman. They want someone who they alone can discover is beautiful, smart, funny but the girl doesn't know it so she doesn't have any of that annoying "confidence." I believe Julie Klausner, and what's more, I want to believe her. It explains why this type of guy fails almost everyone I know, because thankfully I know no one as docile as Pam. However, what I think Julie Klausner ignores is that the whole argument is pretty hypocritical. The Guys that Want Pam are truly no better than Pam-- the whole reason YOU want them is because it will be easy and you feel like you have the upper-hand. Is it just as sexist to like these kind of guys? Is my crush on Jim Halpert just the whole situation gender-flipped? Jim is cute, sure, but he's not mind-blowingly cute. He's clearly better than his situation, but never manages to get out of it. These guys aren't really a "Get." And shamefully this all is a lead-up to a post for tomorrow about one of my favorite things to talk about: Celebrity Attainability (it's the best and most absurd thing).

Until then-- guys, think of this as a PSA-- if a girl is "hanging out watching the office"-- she does not want to hear about how the girl of your dreams is someone who can't seem to manage eyeliner. All it makes the girl wonder is "my god, does he think of me like this? i hate myself"

This is... accurate, Pam.

*I stopped watching The Office over 2 years ago, with the exception of Steve Carell's last couple episodes. For all I know all of this is moot and Pam is a badass, in which case-- I'm sorry Pam.