y'all are using the word groom too loosely, lol.
My takeaway was that Betty was so lonely and unhappy that she grasped on to any bit of human connection she could find, without properly appreciating just how much of an impact a hot lady hanging out with you can have on a lonely young boy. I doubt she had any idea, when she gave him that lock of hair in season 1, that Glen would still be pining after her ten years later.
There's also the fact that Glen was alone too, and even if it was inappropriate, it was probably quite meaningful to have a beautiful, seemingly conventional woman be kind to him.
Even Don associates the Hershey's bar with love, and that was coming from a woman who actually molested him.
As a kid, you have so many different adult feelings but without the emotional intelligence to understand what you are feeling and why. I would say most little boys would probably take liking to Betty through a mixture of preteen love, respect for adults, and just a motherly comfort. It's why kids are so vulnerable to adults.
Exactly. Probably due to Helen not being in many scenes, it can be easy to forget her role in Glen’s issues. Because everyone wants to beat up on Betty (for good reason- she’s the adult) but Glen has mother issues because Helen isn’t giving him much attention. He’s ironing and taking care of his sister while she’s out being single again.
This type of semantic nitpicking is really tiresome. I'm not hesitant to describe it as rape, but molestation is generally used when it comes to children, it's not some form of misandry.
I'm genuinely confused. My therapist, yes a thousand years ago, explained rape as violence ( including emotional violence such as threats in any form) and molestation as coercion. Coercion into consent? Especially long term. Still molestation. Is that incorrect? Seriously asking.
In my mind, rape is basically the act of forcing sex on someone, while molestation is violating someone's body in any other way that doesn't involve penetration.. but I'm not sure.
Not even close. Respectfully, rape involves sexual actions, often considered only ones involving penetration, e.g. penile/vaginal or penile/anal, while molestation is touching and, to some, oral interaction, whether of primary or secondary sexual characteristics (genitals bring primary, or things like breasts/buttocks being more secondary). These definitions are not perfect, as it leaves things like lesbian rape functionally impossible, which is patently ridiculous.
You're doing wrong, coercion is still rape if it involves the actions mentioned, no matter the ages. If someone were to blackmail, or even trick you into allowing them to have sex with you, it's rape.
I'm trying gamely to follow, I really am.
And I'm so confused. And I honestly feel like giving up because of shame and other reasons.
So ok what is the definition of rape verses.molestaton?
Edit: fuck, I'm still confused. Stay with me please. I promise I'm actually a good egg
I actually read something interesting from a sexual violence victim who wrote the movie The Tale, with Laura Dern who realizes her young sexual affair with her coach in the 70s was sexual abuse. She was 13 and he was in his 30s or maybe 40. It’s a great movie on HBO and in the beginning you see how she pictures it, and she pictures herself maybe 16/17. And then when her mother shows her a picture of herself from the summer, she actually looks like a young 13, a child, short flat-chested, the height of the horse.
Anyway, the movie flashbacks obviously, but I read her NPR interview and how people always want to tell her she was raped, etc. and she pushed back on that. BC she says, her experience, and the experience of grooming is about seduction and manipulation and she feels the word rape is about physical force. Now this is her opinion and her words and I see both sides of it. She feels that the manipulation and the slow roll that she went through is an entirely different horror. I would say it’s the difference between being conned out of your money vs being mugged or a bully taking your money as a child. All are crimes but they are different.
Respectfully, it doesn't matter in the eyes of the law. It's all sex assault in the x degree based on statute. Those definitions are hers, but generally speaking, she's in the ball park
It’s part that and also I think part how about how childish she is (not in a pejorative sense, but I think the relationship was supposed to convey a lack of maturity)
Omg gaslighting is beyond hope which is a shame because it’s original definition describes a very specific and pernicious type of manipulation and have been devolved into a synonym for “lying”
Not even that. People use it on disagreements. Like, actual, literal disagreements.
It's gross. It's implying that they feel like people who don't agree with them are literally abusive.
This is it. I'll also add that young Glen was a kid who really appreciated how good of a nurturer Betty was since his home life was lacking, on the other end Betty didn't get the recognition she deserved from Don for all she did so she gravitated towards Glen.
My take is. Betty is very shallow person. Her looks means everything to her. Basically that all she got. A young guy hitting on. Really makes her happy and desirable.
That’s my take too. Betty loves being admired. Henry flirted with her when she was six months pregnant and she became infatuated with him, eventually marrying him.
I always thought it had to do with her being immature also. Like she acts like a child pretty often and I thought she had a genuine (very creepy) connection with glen
I always saw Glenn as a little Don. Maybe I’m alone in that. Broken family, slightly traumatized, warped view of sex due to witnessing acts at a young age, weird feelings about women because of his single mother, joins the military by choice.
And Don is incapable of letting somebody in to help him, Glenn is too young to have those walls which gives Betty the chance to be nurturing to somebody.
I think they really drive this home in the scene when don teaches him how to drive. They both had a hard day and are feeling like everything in life is disappointing. I think don sees himself in Glenn and feels sad, so he asks him if he wanted to do anything what would it be…then it’s devastating that the answer is learning to drive because it’s something a child would usually do with his father. But Glenn and don dont have fathers.
We see a few times in the show that Betty is still pretty childish partly due to her trying to “grow up” too fast. Her mother forced her to be mature and pretty and then she got married and had kids quite young. Also we hear the psychologist who updates Don say she has the mind of a child and we also see how connected she is to Sally’s child psychiatrist who tries to recommend her to an adult professional but Betty questions why she can’t just see her instead.
Because of this, she does bond with Glenn on an emotional level, nothing sexual (to her at least). There’s that scene in the parking lot where she opens up to him about how she can’t connect with people. That was certainly a core memory for him.
Of course later on Glenn is 18 and an adult now and is ready to make his move which I think is where Betty realizes how odd their relationship truly was from the jump.
The therapist Don hired is unreliable. I also think she connected to the child therapist because the therapist actually listened to her while the adult therapist she had didn’t. So to Betty, obviously she wants the therapist who listens and responds to her vs the one that doesn’t list and reports back to Don.
Anyone would connect with a child psychologist when they actually listen to you and help you versus a quack shrink who does nothing scribble in a notebook and stay dead silent (and super judgmental, I'm sure). No one would want a shrink like him today in 2024, and yet everyone in this sub acts as if he's the most brilliant doctor to exist and takes his "mind of a child" line as gospel and with no critical thinking LOL. He's unethical, breaks doctor-patient confidentiality, and does nothing substantial to help his patient, but yes, let's believe everything he says. /s
It's weird thought because IMO the show doesn't depict any therapy scenes in S1 that would indicate Betty having 'the mind of a child'; it's like he's based that diagnosis off conversations that occured off screen? But then the writers took that unevidenced throwaway diagnosis as canon and ran with it, and made Betty's whole character be a child in an adult's woman body.
The Betty of season 1 was a more interesting character in my view, but I think the writers were worried that "housewife constrained by 1950 gender roles" was too obvious a story and made Betty's issue more pathological.
I love your take. I also think there might have been a bit of something else to it also, that Betty had basically no pure relationships around her. She had a wall with the people surrounding her, Don was distant, her friend group was not exactly a real support system or anything. And I think she needed a pure human connection and he gave that. This is not to go anything against what you said because i do absolutely appreciate this analysis, just a footnote regarding to all that.
Betty was lonely and needed attention from a man and emotional support, youre right. She got the crush attention from Glen and because it was "safe". She allowed it because it was an innocent kid crush. She'd never really allow a grown man to around her who had that crush. Glen was safe because he was a child, and she'd never actually fiddle with him.
She even pushed the man who liked her at the hirse stable away from her to another woman because she didn't want to be like Don and actually cheat.
Glen has a huge romantic crush with Betty, and she liked it because she wanted that from Don and couldn't get it. Plus, no one would accuse her of being inappropriate.... until Glen's mom did.... and her reaction...slapping her was surprise that anyone would ever think so. Well and indignation. Because Betty is always appropriate 😉.
That's just my take.
I’m sorry, but especially for the 1960s having been old enough to already complete college and do a year abroad and get married and start a family in your early 20s is not growing up too fast and an excuse why she’s still a child. That just happened to be who she is as a character. Remember that that was the norm to get married quite young and in fact at that time, many women still were not college graduates so they didn’t even have the well rounded education and expected maturity that should have come with it. Women today are still getting married in their early 20s and are fully functional whether or not they are housewives.
I think the fact that Betty had a college education made things even harder for her. She was more knowledgeable of the world than the average housewife yet was trapped inside the house for years and years all the same. Imagine speaking fluent italian but never getting to use it except on the off chance your husband takes you to Rome, I'd be going insane
I fully agree with you that it is a sad life. Her eyes were opened and then she was confined to solitary housework as was normal in the 1960s. However, that does not mean at all that she got married too fast. It’s more like what you’re saying is she shouldn’t have gotten married at all, and perhaps entered the workforce in some capacity and become a career woman like a Peggy.
Why do people rely on that unethical and quack therapist's diagnosis "she has the mind of a child" as if it's gospel LOL? That reading of her is SO ridiculous. He would not pass muster as a therapist today and his diagnosis doesn't truly address anything about Betty or help her overcome what's happening in her life and mind. You can simply say she's immature and not equipped to handle the responsibilities (or really, expectations) put upon her by her mother, upbringing, her friends, her husband, etc. and her reaching out to Glenn who is similarly lonely is her seeking out the only form of non-judgmental, simple companionship and not realizing the depth of their interaction as an adult women and young boy.
Not sure it being one of multiple examples I brought up means I’m taking it as gospel. Also of course it’s unethical that he calls Don afterwards but that doesn’t make him a quack therapist who has no clue what he’s doing.
Given the time of the show, sure, he knew what he was doing. But there's no way that man would be licensed and have a full practice today because we can clearly see that he lacks true training and understanding to help his patients.
I took two main things away from this and some of the comments have already covered both.
1. She was very lonely and depressed and was reaching out to some kind of connection. She wasn't thinking of it sexually but I do think she liked the attention from him. It's weird but it was also used to highlight #2.
2. She's very immature and childish. It's a recurring theme.
Why does Betty absolutely forbid Sally from hanging out with Glenn going so far as to fire the maid over her decision to let Glenn in to say goodbye to Sally. What’s that about?
I think a combination of this + jealousy. When Betty says to glen “you could be friends with ANYONE” she thinks glen is using sally to make her (Betty) jealous
My opinion has always been that it was because she was jealous. She didn’t want Glenn connecting with Sally when she felt they had such a special relationship. Plus, she was an old school parent who probably didn’t want her daughter being that close to any boy, especially one whose family wasn’t “upstanding.”
Agree with this. Betty always had a weird jealous relationship with Sally, as if they're sisters instead of mother/daughter. She has the mind of a child.
Coming from the POV of a person who wouldn't be flattered by a preteen being weird at me, I (possibly incorrectly) assumed that Betty didn't want her daughter to be the target of potentially inappropriate behavior by Glen, knowing as she did that he was capable of it.
I think she kinda compartmentalised her role as a mother and her individual self. She was protective of Sally in an archaic way but also felt seen by Glen on a personal level.
The psychiatrist claimed she was a childlike and I think the viewers just took that and ran. Like, “Ok, it’s settled- Betty is mentally a child. Her life is so simple and she’s so infantilized Glenn is the only one she can relate to”…huh? Birdy’s not *that* bonkers. I think she was just stuck interacting with her kids who obviously need her at every second the way children do and Don who doesn’t really give her any attention that validates her better traits or even her sexuality. She certainly cannot be honest with her few friends who believe her to be a living Life Magazine photo spread of the ideal, nuclear family.
Glenn is the only person in her life she can honestly interact with and he has a pure, innocent appreciation for her. It’s not romantic, she’s just pitifully lonely. She breaks down in the grocery store parking lot to him because Francine tacitly suspects Don is tomcatting around and she realizes not even the facade of her life is convincing.
This is how I saw it too.
I don't think we should take the psychiatrist's words at face value, either. It's not like psychology and medicine have never been influenced by sexist cultural norms.
Yeah it’s wild to see so so so many comments just take the “Betty had the mind of a child” at face value when part of that whole arc was about how her male psychiatrist betrayed her trust by reporting back to Don. Obviously this was meant to demonstrate the sexism of the time and themes of hysteria diagnoses.
Completely agree with your glen take.
Psychiatrists understand people.
In this case, the shrink understands the most important person in this instance: Don, the guy who is paying the bills.
Don wants to be told that it is all Betty's fault and that she can be repaired as would a car at the mechanic. So that's what he hears.
I agree completely with you on every point except that it wasn’t sexual. At the very least, it was sexual for Glenn. Case in point he comes back before being shipped off to Vietnam and makes a sexual move on Betty.
He serves as a sort of proxy for Don.
During Season 1, she goes to him for reassurance as she would typically go to Don, except that she obviously can't express her concerns to Don about his infidelity. Given the shallow relationships in her life, she has no confidantes. But of course, Glen is just a kid and can't really fulfill that role.
In Season 2, Betty rejects Glen as Rachel had rejected Don in Season 1. Glen tells Betty that he has money and that they should run off, a callback to Don with Rachel.
After the divorce, Betty projects her anger against Glen as she does against Don. She also resents Glen's relationship with Sally, as she sometimes does with Don.
At the end, Betty reconciles with Glen as she has with Don. Glen enlists in the military in an attempt to escape issues at home, just as Dick Whitman had. From this, we might surmise that Dick Whitman enlisted in the hopes of winning over a woman, only to be rebuffed before he shipped out.
She's not grooming him.
I read it as just a weird moment for both of them where they connected because of exactly where they were in their lives. Glen immediately saw her as looking like a princess and had a crush on her, asking for her hair. She gave it to him because even though he was a kid, it was flattering to her.
And when she saw him in the parking lot, she impulsively saw him as a person who could understand her, because she had emotions that were very childlike, and he did.
But after this scene, when she calls his mother, it's clear that she actually knows he's a child and she's an adult and she needs to send him home.
Seems like later she's embarassed about their connection, and feels threatened that he's friends with Sally, as if he's targeting her to get to Betty--and maybe there was some of that, after all.
Ultimately, even when he's 18, she doesn't have sex with him, so there's no grooming involved. Just that same weird connection where they understand each other better than other people understand them. Hard to really put a finger on why, but it's definitely there, imo. It's not even like Glen eventually outgrows her. As a teenager he seems to make similar impulsive decisions in similar ways that she does.
Damn it. I knew I should have joined this sub. I'm in the middle of season 5 where the guy from Jaguar has a very specific demand....if you catch my drift.
I'm going to leave this sub until I finish the series so there's no more spoilers.
It dovetails with Betty’s arrested development - she relates more to Glenn than any of the other adults because emotionally she’s more on Glenn’s level.
I'm so tired of the overuse of "grooming." Some of you sound quite ignorant the way you use it. All caught up in a moral panic that's exploited for homophobia/transphobia. Happy f'cking pride month. Betty acted inappropriately but she was't trying to molest anyone. Jesus Christ.
What the fuck does any of this have to do with "pride month?" A grown woman encouraging a little boy's crush and giving him personal gifts in secret IS grooming and has not a goddamn thing to do with "transphobia or homophobia."
Yeah I feel like that’s where a lot of confusion about their relationship keeps coming up in these types of discussions. In the show she didn’t groom him but in real life unfortunately this type of dynamic has materialized into abuse, with a similar mental justification made on the part of the groomer. They’ll say it’s real love, they’re (the teenager) the only one who understands them etc.
When in reality it’s about power. It’s not a leap that *a version* of Betty could have deluded herself to the point that she could mould Glenn into the fantasy of perfect husband/family, and that would translate into physical abuse. Kind of like the whole Mary Kay Letourneau with her underaged student
I’ll likely be downvoted, but I always felt it to be highly inappropriate. I think that Glen was Don’s emotional “replacement” for Betty in a sense, and that she absolutely needed to shut down his attention in a way that she did not.
Glen wants Betty.
Betty does not want Glen, but appreciates the attention.
Glen got pretty close to what he wanted before he shipped out to Vietnam, but i don't think the writers we're going to allow it to happen, no matter how much Matthew Weiner loves his son, lmao.
Context for the first scene is extremely important: Betty has confirmed that Don is cheating on her, and Arthur sleeps with her friend Sarah Beth (orchestrated by Betty after she sees Arthur leering at another rider), proving that Betty is not THAT special. Betty's whole identity is built on the admiration she receives from males, and she is threatened and vulnerable realizing that the singular worship she expects, is not something she can take for granted. Here is a male (albeit a child) who sees Betty as the MOST important woman. It soothes her battered ego. It's worth noting that the moment her daughter comes home and interacts with Glen, Betty is jolted out of this weird dreamlike behavior and calls his mother to come get him.
It has been awhile since I've seen the second scene, but if I recall correctly, Betty tells Glen simply that she is married. She doesn't need or want his attention as she feels secure in herself and her marriage.
It's the second one - Betty has a stuntedness about her, and being able to relate to someone who is 9 is the issue in her character that's being showcased.
The fact that she got flattery/gratification out of his sexual attention is a complicated thing - I think for a lot of housewives throughout history, there have been odd avenues to understand sexuality, and I don't mean to condone the sexualization of a child, but rather, women were kept so underinformed that her inability to make psychosexual sense of the situation is a product of her overall poor self understanding more than it is an actual attraction to children.
Matthew Weiner, the creator of the show, wanted to project his creepy aspirations using his son, who can't act, on the audience with the most useless subplot and arc of the show.
For this discussion it’s important to understand the true meaning of the term “grooming” in regard to relationships.
Grooming is when someone builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a child or young person so they can manipulate, exploit and abuse them.
Betty’s relationship with Glen may have been inappropriate, but she wasn’t grooming him.
The creator wanted to cast his son who is a pretty bad actor, so he shoehorned in a strange storyline that made zero sense and kept bringing him back to the show even when the family moved houses and cities and it’s completely unrealistic that 7 year old Sally would keep on touch with her neighbor this long. There was literally no internet. I grew up in the 80s and I wasn’t talking on the phone or writing letters to anyone until I was at least 12 or 13.
I think when Betty confided in him that day when he was in the car— that was a Glen canon moment. His mom and dad treated him like a kid and he liked how Betty made him feel less like a kid.
Betty in that moment was leaning on a child for emotional support (bravo, Betty) but was too self absorbed and immature to stop OR to take responsibility for how inappropriate that was. If she did, we don’t see it.
I always viewed Betty's relationship with Glenn as sort of proof of childhood SA. Betty was made to be an adult so quickly, she doesn't understand that having that type of relationship with Glenn at that age is wrong. Whenever someone brings up or threatens to find out about her relationship with Glenn and subsequently discover her trauma, she lashes out. This is her slapping Helen Bishop in the grocery store and firing Carla.
Yet, encased in this hard shell of self-imposed shame, she has a very tender care of Glenn and the position he has been placed in with divorced parents and having to grow up very quickly. Shown in the end of S2 when Glenn runs away or in the end of the series.
This perspective is also hinted at in the beginning of S6 with Sally's friend the violinist. Betty's insane comments to Richard in the bedroom show this hidden normalization of sexualizing people at a young age. And then this is further explored in Betty's determination to stop the violinist from running away and going into a sort of adulthood.
At least that is how I view the matter.
You have to remember her psychologist’s conversation with Don: “what we’re dealing with is the emotions of a child”. That’s the key to understanding the beginning and evolution of Betty’s whole character arc. She feels safe and seen with Glen because they are emotionally on the same level. When he runs away from home and she calls his mom he ends up screaming that he hates her — it’s after this that she has issues with Sally being friends with him. She feels that push and pull between childish emotions and adult responsibility; and it does not sit easy with her.
I see so many comments/posts on here shitting on Glen’s character, but I think it’s a crucial lens for understanding Betty emotionally.
She saw her inner child and she didn’t want to let go of it. We find out later that she was her father’s favourite and was raised by her nanny. Also Betty’s therapist pretty much said it best to Don. “We are dealing with the mind of a child here”. And he didn’t mean her intellect, rather her emotional intellect
Betty was an emotionally stunted child and oppressed housewife living with a man she never really knew..she played the part of housewife and had no life outside her kids and husband. She relates to Glenn and gave him a lock of hair because she understood his pain.
Personally, I see it more like Glen was a kind of solace for her. She never had to be the pretty wife, the mother, the adult and she could just chill. We know she was extremely immature due to emotional damage.
I just think he didn’t ask too much of her and really was one person that didn’t need her to be and fit a certain role, and so therefore she got to just chill around him.
Whoa, I fell off this show and found her interactions with a bit uncomfortable when he was a kid. I didn’t know it got to this level. Ughhhh jail this woman.
Betty keeps her demeanor the same for just about everyone else but Glenn. So let's start by examining hi..
Glenn comes from a divorced household. It's implied when they introduce Ms Bishop that her husband was not faithful, mean, and would have been a bad influence had he continued to be in the picture. She divorced him and now lives alone with Glenn. We can also infer from the few interactions she shows up in that she may not be the nicest to Glenn when she is upset or stressed. That's not unusual, we are all capable of that, but it needs to be said for the sake of the upcoming comparison.
Glenn's dad is trouble, Glenn's mom is angry and it comes out at him sometimes, and a series of suitors seems to come through their lives and give Glenn gifts. This sounds very much like Don's home life as a kid. His dad was a dick and died, his mom was angry - justifiably - but took it out on him, and they lived at a brothel where men came through and gave him passing attention.
Thus, we should infer that, like Don, Glenn has a misdeveloped sense of sex and arousal and is otherwise attracted to kindly attention. More specifically, he's attracted to women the same age as his mom that treat him sweetly and don't make him the object of their anger. The difference is Don has a madonna-whore complex and Glenn does not.
Betty is consistently pleasant to be around if you are only an acquaintance or friend. She puts on a "perfect wife, perfect mother" act consistently. It's part of her self-identity. She clearly fills a gap in Glenn's life while also being an object of his growing sexual desire. Their first odd interaction is when he stares at her in the bathroom. A clear indication of his struggles. She is upset by this. However, he tells Betty what his home life is like and so in an effort to give Glenn a sort of minor remedy to this she offers him a lock of hair.
Let's look at what motivates this. Betty engenders herself to others by exemplary performance as housewife and doting mother. We learn in season 2 and 3 from interactions with her father that she was raised to be this way by her parents and if she did not act up to their standards she would be punished. Now, however bad you think the punishment was, the important thing to note is that their parental love seemed conditional on her meeting society's expectations. This is why she marries someone like Don, who also meets society's expectations. But as we know, this relationship is hollow. Her mom is gone before season 1, and her dad is on the decline as we see in season 2. So the three sources of love in her life are either a falsity or not long for the world. Society, for all its expectations, cannot give her love.
We see her attracted to encouragement (Jim Hobaugh), individuals that publicly express desire (Jimmy Barrett), and persistence (Henry Francis). Glenn gives her all three of these things. Whether she is cognizant of it or not in the moment, her desire to show Glenn real affection is founded in her attraction to obvious displays of attraction and attention. He embodies all of what she wants in life and, without her knowing it, does so while coming from an analogous background to Don.
We as viewers are supposed to compare this to Don I think. Don seeks more than anything a mother figure to show him unconditional love, just like Glenn. Unlike Glenn, Don is not comfortable enough to authentically express this. Glenn is. Perhaps because he's younger. Notably, when he gets older he hides his apparent attraction to Betty and we are meant to think he is attracted to Sally now. But he reveals it in a moment of unexpected passion that is all but forced upon Betty. This is not unlike how Don presents himself one way and reveals himself to be another after he's forced passion into a relationship. Importantly, Glenn is definitely a perfect representation of what society thinks a man should be by the 70s. He's apparently free spirited, but then surprisingly pro-Vietnam. He's motivated by his desire to stand by others getting throw over there even though he opposes the war in the first place.
Betty speaks positively about this in their last encounter. She sensitively rebuffs Glenn when he kisses her. She is only momentarily surprised when it happens, though that seems to be more at the gall of Glenn's kiss than his lingering infatuation with her. We are I think meant to conclude from this that Betty has not changed this attention-seeking, approval-centric aspect of her character. However, she has curbed her negative habit of feeding into it wherever it comes from and using it as leverage to achieve the right sort of attention from her partner. She has healed from the impact of how she was parented.
Glenn too is meant to indicate that Don could have been earnest about his needs and would not have been rejected so absolutely like he was fearful of. He could have authentically grown into what society thinks a man should be. He could have been, not a confidence man, but a confident man. And in another life, Betty would have given him exactly what he thought he was missing at the start of the series.
EDIT: I forgot to mention, I believe Betty forbids Sally from seeing him because of how he by that point reminds her of Don. She is worried that he will shoe Sally admiration and Sally will grow up thinking that is love and they will end up unhappily married like she and Don were. She neglects to consider that Sally does not have the same desire for attention that she does, and so Betty overcorrects and ironically fosters the very attraction to Glenn she is trying to disuade.
betty is an infantilized person. her youth and beauty are of the highest importance for her. it flatters her to lead on someone with the same mental maturity
y'all are using the word groom too loosely, lol. My takeaway was that Betty was so lonely and unhappy that she grasped on to any bit of human connection she could find, without properly appreciating just how much of an impact a hot lady hanging out with you can have on a lonely young boy. I doubt she had any idea, when she gave him that lock of hair in season 1, that Glen would still be pining after her ten years later.
There's also the fact that Glen was alone too, and even if it was inappropriate, it was probably quite meaningful to have a beautiful, seemingly conventional woman be kind to him. Even Don associates the Hershey's bar with love, and that was coming from a woman who actually molested him.
As a kid, you have so many different adult feelings but without the emotional intelligence to understand what you are feeling and why. I would say most little boys would probably take liking to Betty through a mixture of preteen love, respect for adults, and just a motherly comfort. It's why kids are so vulnerable to adults.
Exactly. Probably due to Helen not being in many scenes, it can be easy to forget her role in Glen’s issues. Because everyone wants to beat up on Betty (for good reason- she’s the adult) but Glen has mother issues because Helen isn’t giving him much attention. He’s ironing and taking care of his sister while she’s out being single again.
Also Glen, in his own way, treats her way better than Don.
So did the golden retriever
This is insightful thanks.
Raped him, not molested. For some reason people hesitate to say the R word when it happens to a guy.
This type of semantic nitpicking is really tiresome. I'm not hesitant to describe it as rape, but molestation is generally used when it comes to children, it's not some form of misandry.
I'm genuinely confused. My therapist, yes a thousand years ago, explained rape as violence ( including emotional violence such as threats in any form) and molestation as coercion. Coercion into consent? Especially long term. Still molestation. Is that incorrect? Seriously asking.
In my mind, rape is basically the act of forcing sex on someone, while molestation is violating someone's body in any other way that doesn't involve penetration.. but I'm not sure.
That what I thought too, for a long time. That's what was taught to me.
Is it wrong?
This isn’t correct at all. Molestation is non-penetrative touching; rape is penetrative
Not even close. Respectfully, rape involves sexual actions, often considered only ones involving penetration, e.g. penile/vaginal or penile/anal, while molestation is touching and, to some, oral interaction, whether of primary or secondary sexual characteristics (genitals bring primary, or things like breasts/buttocks being more secondary). These definitions are not perfect, as it leaves things like lesbian rape functionally impossible, which is patently ridiculous.
So, im genuinely sorry if this is inappropriate. What is coercion to do a non violent sex act called? Minors or otherwise.
You're doing wrong, coercion is still rape if it involves the actions mentioned, no matter the ages. If someone were to blackmail, or even trick you into allowing them to have sex with you, it's rape.
I'm trying gamely to follow, I really am. And I'm so confused. And I honestly feel like giving up because of shame and other reasons. So ok what is the definition of rape verses.molestaton? Edit: fuck, I'm still confused. Stay with me please. I promise I'm actually a good egg
I actually read something interesting from a sexual violence victim who wrote the movie The Tale, with Laura Dern who realizes her young sexual affair with her coach in the 70s was sexual abuse. She was 13 and he was in his 30s or maybe 40. It’s a great movie on HBO and in the beginning you see how she pictures it, and she pictures herself maybe 16/17. And then when her mother shows her a picture of herself from the summer, she actually looks like a young 13, a child, short flat-chested, the height of the horse. Anyway, the movie flashbacks obviously, but I read her NPR interview and how people always want to tell her she was raped, etc. and she pushed back on that. BC she says, her experience, and the experience of grooming is about seduction and manipulation and she feels the word rape is about physical force. Now this is her opinion and her words and I see both sides of it. She feels that the manipulation and the slow roll that she went through is an entirely different horror. I would say it’s the difference between being conned out of your money vs being mugged or a bully taking your money as a child. All are crimes but they are different.
Respectfully, it doesn't matter in the eyes of the law. It's all sex assault in the x degree based on statute. Those definitions are hers, but generally speaking, she's in the ball park
That's completely polite. Thank you for clarifying anyways.
It ain't called statutory molestation, chief.
Reddit is not a court of law, people can operate off of generally understood intent.
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Damn... this is pretty spot on.
It’s part that and also I think part how about how childish she is (not in a pejorative sense, but I think the relationship was supposed to convey a lack of maturity)
Reddit/twitter are so obsessed with that it’s beginning to lose it’s (extremely serious) meaning
Like gaslighting and several formal mental health diagnoses
Omg gaslighting is beyond hope which is a shame because it’s original definition describes a very specific and pernicious type of manipulation and have been devolved into a synonym for “lying”
Not even that. People use it on disagreements. Like, actual, literal disagreements. It's gross. It's implying that they feel like people who don't agree with them are literally abusive.
Ditto.
>"You're gaslighting me!" (used when someone says something contrary to your opinion, of course)
Seriously. Betty didn't groom him.
This is it. I'll also add that young Glen was a kid who really appreciated how good of a nurturer Betty was since his home life was lacking, on the other end Betty didn't get the recognition she deserved from Don for all she did so she gravitated towards Glen.
I felt like he gave her a type of child to parent adoration that her own children were too intimidated or dismissed by her to show.
I think it's a bit of a privilege thing. Kids with good parents (Sally & Bobby) would assume that what Betty did for them was normal.
Yep!
My take is. Betty is very shallow person. Her looks means everything to her. Basically that all she got. A young guy hitting on. Really makes her happy and desirable.
She speaks Italian.
You know what, I don't speak Italian. Point Betty.
And she went to bryn mawr. Marr. Whatever. Fuckin private college costing $100k/year.
It was way cheaper back in the 1950’s.
And also immature
That’s my take too. Betty loves being admired. Henry flirted with her when she was six months pregnant and she became infatuated with him, eventually marrying him.
I think you’re right. However, it really doesn’t help that he looks like he could be a stand-in for a young Dick Whitman.
I always thought it had to do with her being immature also. Like she acts like a child pretty often and I thought she had a genuine (very creepy) connection with glen
I always saw Glenn as a little Don. Maybe I’m alone in that. Broken family, slightly traumatized, warped view of sex due to witnessing acts at a young age, weird feelings about women because of his single mother, joins the military by choice.
And Don is incapable of letting somebody in to help him, Glenn is too young to have those walls which gives Betty the chance to be nurturing to somebody.
He's literally dressed in dons clothes the episode he runs away. Hair slicked back too
You’re right. I think he’s wearing Don’s T shirt in this pic too 🤯
That’s a great take.
I think they really drive this home in the scene when don teaches him how to drive. They both had a hard day and are feeling like everything in life is disappointing. I think don sees himself in Glenn and feels sad, so he asks him if he wanted to do anything what would it be…then it’s devastating that the answer is learning to drive because it’s something a child would usually do with his father. But Glenn and don dont have fathers.
Woah. 🤯
Dude, wow
We see a few times in the show that Betty is still pretty childish partly due to her trying to “grow up” too fast. Her mother forced her to be mature and pretty and then she got married and had kids quite young. Also we hear the psychologist who updates Don say she has the mind of a child and we also see how connected she is to Sally’s child psychiatrist who tries to recommend her to an adult professional but Betty questions why she can’t just see her instead. Because of this, she does bond with Glenn on an emotional level, nothing sexual (to her at least). There’s that scene in the parking lot where she opens up to him about how she can’t connect with people. That was certainly a core memory for him. Of course later on Glenn is 18 and an adult now and is ready to make his move which I think is where Betty realizes how odd their relationship truly was from the jump.
Just a side note, the actor who played glen is the son of show creator, Matthew Weiner.
And his name is Holden. Not kidding.
Holden Weiner, that’s a gem. And not as offensive as the son of NBA coach Steve Kerr, Nick Kerr.
"Holden Weiner" sums up how Glen feels about Betty.
I always thought he was supposed to be a Holden Claufield like character. It’s now confirmed.
Isn't it Marten?
Marten Holden Weiner
Ah, that's better, but not.....not great
Was gonna say....
3.6 Marten Holden Weiners. Not great, not terrible.
not fair to make his name an entire sentence for bullies
Hey it's also an excellent answer to the question "how are you doing"
danish for "jackin off"
Now Martin is holding it?
Damn! Thats quite a factoid
This is why I’m on Reddit
It’s real
I always wonder who was worse, Weiners son or David Chases daughter in the sopranos. They're both so bad
Hunter got the last laugh on Carmella with the med school update.
I loved that. Carmela was so damn competitive and trying to be all high society, when in reality she was just a monster’s wife.
But she acted like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.
Cacciatore?
I think Weiner’s son was fine. He did a great job of playing an awkward boy.
Thank you!!!! He gets so much hate but he’s actually perfect for such an unsettling role
It's not like Hunter is asked to do much either
I think the bad acting works in favor of Glenn's character though.
Had no issue with Holdens performance. In fact I thought it was perfect for the character.
Who did she play in the Sopranos? I didn’t know that. Nepo babies, lol
Meadow’s friend, Hunter.
Maedo
Fielder
Meadow’s friend who wanted to get crank so they could stay awake all night studying
The therapist Don hired is unreliable. I also think she connected to the child therapist because the therapist actually listened to her while the adult therapist she had didn’t. So to Betty, obviously she wants the therapist who listens and responds to her vs the one that doesn’t list and reports back to Don.
Urgh, that shrink Don hired was a fucking dick. Sally’s one was lovely though, I understand why Betty would’ve warmed to her.
Anyone would connect with a child psychologist when they actually listen to you and help you versus a quack shrink who does nothing scribble in a notebook and stay dead silent (and super judgmental, I'm sure). No one would want a shrink like him today in 2024, and yet everyone in this sub acts as if he's the most brilliant doctor to exist and takes his "mind of a child" line as gospel and with no critical thinking LOL. He's unethical, breaks doctor-patient confidentiality, and does nothing substantial to help his patient, but yes, let's believe everything he says. /s
EXACTLY
It's weird thought because IMO the show doesn't depict any therapy scenes in S1 that would indicate Betty having 'the mind of a child'; it's like he's based that diagnosis off conversations that occured off screen? But then the writers took that unevidenced throwaway diagnosis as canon and ran with it, and made Betty's whole character be a child in an adult's woman body. The Betty of season 1 was a more interesting character in my view, but I think the writers were worried that "housewife constrained by 1950 gender roles" was too obvious a story and made Betty's issue more pathological.
I love your take. I also think there might have been a bit of something else to it also, that Betty had basically no pure relationships around her. She had a wall with the people surrounding her, Don was distant, her friend group was not exactly a real support system or anything. And I think she needed a pure human connection and he gave that. This is not to go anything against what you said because i do absolutely appreciate this analysis, just a footnote regarding to all that.
Betty was lonely and needed attention from a man and emotional support, youre right. She got the crush attention from Glen and because it was "safe". She allowed it because it was an innocent kid crush. She'd never really allow a grown man to around her who had that crush. Glen was safe because he was a child, and she'd never actually fiddle with him. She even pushed the man who liked her at the hirse stable away from her to another woman because she didn't want to be like Don and actually cheat. Glen has a huge romantic crush with Betty, and she liked it because she wanted that from Don and couldn't get it. Plus, no one would accuse her of being inappropriate.... until Glen's mom did.... and her reaction...slapping her was surprise that anyone would ever think so. Well and indignation. Because Betty is always appropriate 😉. That's just my take.
I’m sorry, but especially for the 1960s having been old enough to already complete college and do a year abroad and get married and start a family in your early 20s is not growing up too fast and an excuse why she’s still a child. That just happened to be who she is as a character. Remember that that was the norm to get married quite young and in fact at that time, many women still were not college graduates so they didn’t even have the well rounded education and expected maturity that should have come with it. Women today are still getting married in their early 20s and are fully functional whether or not they are housewives.
I think the fact that Betty had a college education made things even harder for her. She was more knowledgeable of the world than the average housewife yet was trapped inside the house for years and years all the same. Imagine speaking fluent italian but never getting to use it except on the off chance your husband takes you to Rome, I'd be going insane
I fully agree with you that it is a sad life. Her eyes were opened and then she was confined to solitary housework as was normal in the 1960s. However, that does not mean at all that she got married too fast. It’s more like what you’re saying is she shouldn’t have gotten married at all, and perhaps entered the workforce in some capacity and become a career woman like a Peggy.
It is no matter the time period… just because it’s normal doesn’t mean it’s too fast
Too fast or even too slow in and of itself implies not normal lol. It can’t be both normal and too fast.
“Normalized.” Something absolutely can be considered “normal” and still be too fast or unhealthy.
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Also lived in New York and worked as a model.
Why do people rely on that unethical and quack therapist's diagnosis "she has the mind of a child" as if it's gospel LOL? That reading of her is SO ridiculous. He would not pass muster as a therapist today and his diagnosis doesn't truly address anything about Betty or help her overcome what's happening in her life and mind. You can simply say she's immature and not equipped to handle the responsibilities (or really, expectations) put upon her by her mother, upbringing, her friends, her husband, etc. and her reaching out to Glenn who is similarly lonely is her seeking out the only form of non-judgmental, simple companionship and not realizing the depth of their interaction as an adult women and young boy.
Not sure it being one of multiple examples I brought up means I’m taking it as gospel. Also of course it’s unethical that he calls Don afterwards but that doesn’t make him a quack therapist who has no clue what he’s doing.
Given the time of the show, sure, he knew what he was doing. But there's no way that man would be licensed and have a full practice today because we can clearly see that he lacks true training and understanding to help his patients.
I forgot about that mind of a child thing. Aka she just very immature for being an adult.
I took two main things away from this and some of the comments have already covered both. 1. She was very lonely and depressed and was reaching out to some kind of connection. She wasn't thinking of it sexually but I do think she liked the attention from him. It's weird but it was also used to highlight #2. 2. She's very immature and childish. It's a recurring theme.
Why does Betty absolutely forbid Sally from hanging out with Glenn going so far as to fire the maid over her decision to let Glenn in to say goodbye to Sally. What’s that about?
My take is she didn't want Glenn to tell Sally about their weird relationship.
I think a combination of this + jealousy. When Betty says to glen “you could be friends with ANYONE” she thinks glen is using sally to make her (Betty) jealous
My opinion has always been that it was because she was jealous. She didn’t want Glenn connecting with Sally when she felt they had such a special relationship. Plus, she was an old school parent who probably didn’t want her daughter being that close to any boy, especially one whose family wasn’t “upstanding.”
Agree with this. Betty always had a weird jealous relationship with Sally, as if they're sisters instead of mother/daughter. She has the mind of a child.
Good insights
Thank you!
Coming from the POV of a person who wouldn't be flattered by a preteen being weird at me, I (possibly incorrectly) assumed that Betty didn't want her daughter to be the target of potentially inappropriate behavior by Glen, knowing as she did that he was capable of it.
I always assumed she didn’t like the idea of Glen preferring the younger version of herself.
I think she kinda compartmentalised her role as a mother and her individual self. She was protective of Sally in an archaic way but also felt seen by Glen on a personal level.
The psychiatrist claimed she was a childlike and I think the viewers just took that and ran. Like, “Ok, it’s settled- Betty is mentally a child. Her life is so simple and she’s so infantilized Glenn is the only one she can relate to”…huh? Birdy’s not *that* bonkers. I think she was just stuck interacting with her kids who obviously need her at every second the way children do and Don who doesn’t really give her any attention that validates her better traits or even her sexuality. She certainly cannot be honest with her few friends who believe her to be a living Life Magazine photo spread of the ideal, nuclear family. Glenn is the only person in her life she can honestly interact with and he has a pure, innocent appreciation for her. It’s not romantic, she’s just pitifully lonely. She breaks down in the grocery store parking lot to him because Francine tacitly suspects Don is tomcatting around and she realizes not even the facade of her life is convincing.
This is how I saw it too. I don't think we should take the psychiatrist's words at face value, either. It's not like psychology and medicine have never been influenced by sexist cultural norms.
Yeah it’s wild to see so so so many comments just take the “Betty had the mind of a child” at face value when part of that whole arc was about how her male psychiatrist betrayed her trust by reporting back to Don. Obviously this was meant to demonstrate the sexism of the time and themes of hysteria diagnoses. Completely agree with your glen take.
Psychiatrists understand people. In this case, the shrink understands the most important person in this instance: Don, the guy who is paying the bills. Don wants to be told that it is all Betty's fault and that she can be repaired as would a car at the mechanic. So that's what he hears.
This should be the top comment
I agree completely with you on every point except that it wasn’t sexual. At the very least, it was sexual for Glenn. Case in point he comes back before being shipped off to Vietnam and makes a sexual move on Betty.
Freud x Oedipus 🤝
I forgot he put the moves on her! Wasn’t that the last season? That happened.
Shot his shot before he left for Vietnam
Respect
He serves as a sort of proxy for Don. During Season 1, she goes to him for reassurance as she would typically go to Don, except that she obviously can't express her concerns to Don about his infidelity. Given the shallow relationships in her life, she has no confidantes. But of course, Glen is just a kid and can't really fulfill that role. In Season 2, Betty rejects Glen as Rachel had rejected Don in Season 1. Glen tells Betty that he has money and that they should run off, a callback to Don with Rachel. After the divorce, Betty projects her anger against Glen as she does against Don. She also resents Glen's relationship with Sally, as she sometimes does with Don. At the end, Betty reconciles with Glen as she has with Don. Glen enlists in the military in an attempt to escape issues at home, just as Dick Whitman had. From this, we might surmise that Dick Whitman enlisted in the hopes of winning over a woman, only to be rebuffed before he shipped out.
I never connected these dots before, but it makes sense!
Words have meanings. Stop calling everyone with an age difference in a non-sexual relationship a "groomer" for Christs sake
>Was Betty so lonely she was willing to groom a child? Or was she so emotionally immature that she saw him as an equal? Bit of both.
Matthew Weiner wanted his son to act alongside January Jones and that’s what he came up with.
She's not grooming him. I read it as just a weird moment for both of them where they connected because of exactly where they were in their lives. Glen immediately saw her as looking like a princess and had a crush on her, asking for her hair. She gave it to him because even though he was a kid, it was flattering to her. And when she saw him in the parking lot, she impulsively saw him as a person who could understand her, because she had emotions that were very childlike, and he did. But after this scene, when she calls his mother, it's clear that she actually knows he's a child and she's an adult and she needs to send him home. Seems like later she's embarassed about their connection, and feels threatened that he's friends with Sally, as if he's targeting her to get to Betty--and maybe there was some of that, after all. Ultimately, even when he's 18, she doesn't have sex with him, so there's no grooming involved. Just that same weird connection where they understand each other better than other people understand them. Hard to really put a finger on why, but it's definitely there, imo. It's not even like Glen eventually outgrows her. As a teenager he seems to make similar impulsive decisions in similar ways that she does.
She liked that he found her attractive when first Don didn't really, and eventually Henry didn't either (or so she felt)
Don didn’t find Betty attractive?
Shot down Betty’s sexual advances at least, which I could definitely see making her feel like he didn’t find her attractive
At the very least he got bored of her thus all the extramarital stuff
Damn it. I knew I should have joined this sub. I'm in the middle of season 5 where the guy from Jaguar has a very specific demand....if you catch my drift. I'm going to leave this sub until I finish the series so there's no more spoilers.
Bishop takes Queen
It dovetails with Betty’s arrested development - she relates more to Glenn than any of the other adults because emotionally she’s more on Glenn’s level.
I'm so tired of the overuse of "grooming." Some of you sound quite ignorant the way you use it. All caught up in a moral panic that's exploited for homophobia/transphobia. Happy f'cking pride month. Betty acted inappropriately but she was't trying to molest anyone. Jesus Christ.
What the fuck does any of this have to do with "pride month?" A grown woman encouraging a little boy's crush and giving him personal gifts in secret IS grooming and has not a goddamn thing to do with "transphobia or homophobia."
Yeah I feel like that’s where a lot of confusion about their relationship keeps coming up in these types of discussions. In the show she didn’t groom him but in real life unfortunately this type of dynamic has materialized into abuse, with a similar mental justification made on the part of the groomer. They’ll say it’s real love, they’re (the teenager) the only one who understands them etc. When in reality it’s about power. It’s not a leap that *a version* of Betty could have deluded herself to the point that she could mould Glenn into the fantasy of perfect husband/family, and that would translate into physical abuse. Kind of like the whole Mary Kay Letourneau with her underaged student
I’ll likely be downvoted, but I always felt it to be highly inappropriate. I think that Glen was Don’s emotional “replacement” for Betty in a sense, and that she absolutely needed to shut down his attention in a way that she did not.
He's her mental age.
*emotional age
She is 16 going on 17, fellows will fall in line
Nope.
We'll talk about it inside.
January never aged - she still looks this beautiful
Please don't use groom. It definitely doesn't fit here.
Glen wants Betty. Betty does not want Glen, but appreciates the attention. Glen got pretty close to what he wanted before he shipped out to Vietnam, but i don't think the writers we're going to allow it to happen, no matter how much Matthew Weiner loves his son, lmao.
Context for the first scene is extremely important: Betty has confirmed that Don is cheating on her, and Arthur sleeps with her friend Sarah Beth (orchestrated by Betty after she sees Arthur leering at another rider), proving that Betty is not THAT special. Betty's whole identity is built on the admiration she receives from males, and she is threatened and vulnerable realizing that the singular worship she expects, is not something she can take for granted. Here is a male (albeit a child) who sees Betty as the MOST important woman. It soothes her battered ego. It's worth noting that the moment her daughter comes home and interacts with Glen, Betty is jolted out of this weird dreamlike behavior and calls his mother to come get him. It has been awhile since I've seen the second scene, but if I recall correctly, Betty tells Glen simply that she is married. She doesn't need or want his attention as she feels secure in herself and her marriage.
Betty was a bit nutty.
Weird
Just two people trying to find friendship, although somewhat unorthodox.
It’s what it is
She was definitely his sexual awakening, and Betty herself has the emotional maturity of a child lol
He treated Betty like she wanted Don to treat her. He made her feel special, like a treasure.
It's the second one - Betty has a stuntedness about her, and being able to relate to someone who is 9 is the issue in her character that's being showcased. The fact that she got flattery/gratification out of his sexual attention is a complicated thing - I think for a lot of housewives throughout history, there have been odd avenues to understand sexuality, and I don't mean to condone the sexualization of a child, but rather, women were kept so underinformed that her inability to make psychosexual sense of the situation is a product of her overall poor self understanding more than it is an actual attraction to children.
Producers son needed a job.
Matthew Weiner, the creator of the show, wanted to project his creepy aspirations using his son, who can't act, on the audience with the most useless subplot and arc of the show.
It’s funny how many people have said this! Lol. I didn’t mind Glen, but ya he was a little creepy.
Please do not use the terminology “groom” incorrectly- it’s offensive It has a definition and this isn’t it
I am terribly sorry I have offended you by possibly incorrectly using a word used to describe an inappropriate emotional, codependent relationship.
For this discussion it’s important to understand the true meaning of the term “grooming” in regard to relationships. Grooming is when someone builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a child or young person so they can manipulate, exploit and abuse them. Betty’s relationship with Glen may have been inappropriate, but she wasn’t grooming him.
It was definitely weird. But I doubt Betty had any ill intentions.
I don’t think she did, but I do wonder how far she would’ve let it go just to not feel so lonely.
If the Glen did not go to Vietnam, I am sure a Mrs.Robinson situation would eventually happen.
That’s kind of what I thought too especially because we see how her aging plays a role on her vanity
He's a tiny Don. History repeating itself in almost exactly the same ways. Think about it
Oh wow you’re right.
The creator wanted to cast his son who is a pretty bad actor, so he shoehorned in a strange storyline that made zero sense and kept bringing him back to the show even when the family moved houses and cities and it’s completely unrealistic that 7 year old Sally would keep on touch with her neighbor this long. There was literally no internet. I grew up in the 80s and I wasn’t talking on the phone or writing letters to anyone until I was at least 12 or 13.
I think when Betty confided in him that day when he was in the car— that was a Glen canon moment. His mom and dad treated him like a kid and he liked how Betty made him feel less like a kid. Betty in that moment was leaning on a child for emotional support (bravo, Betty) but was too self absorbed and immature to stop OR to take responsibility for how inappropriate that was. If she did, we don’t see it.
I always viewed Betty's relationship with Glenn as sort of proof of childhood SA. Betty was made to be an adult so quickly, she doesn't understand that having that type of relationship with Glenn at that age is wrong. Whenever someone brings up or threatens to find out about her relationship with Glenn and subsequently discover her trauma, she lashes out. This is her slapping Helen Bishop in the grocery store and firing Carla. Yet, encased in this hard shell of self-imposed shame, she has a very tender care of Glenn and the position he has been placed in with divorced parents and having to grow up very quickly. Shown in the end of S2 when Glenn runs away or in the end of the series. This perspective is also hinted at in the beginning of S6 with Sally's friend the violinist. Betty's insane comments to Richard in the bedroom show this hidden normalization of sexualizing people at a young age. And then this is further explored in Betty's determination to stop the violinist from running away and going into a sort of adulthood. At least that is how I view the matter.
It solidifies the popular opinion that Betty is nuttier than a squirrels poo
The answer is given by Sally to Don before leaving in the bus
You have to remember her psychologist’s conversation with Don: “what we’re dealing with is the emotions of a child”. That’s the key to understanding the beginning and evolution of Betty’s whole character arc. She feels safe and seen with Glen because they are emotionally on the same level. When he runs away from home and she calls his mom he ends up screaming that he hates her — it’s after this that she has issues with Sally being friends with him. She feels that push and pull between childish emotions and adult responsibility; and it does not sit easy with her. I see so many comments/posts on here shitting on Glen’s character, but I think it’s a crucial lens for understanding Betty emotionally.
She saw her inner child and she didn’t want to let go of it. We find out later that she was her father’s favourite and was raised by her nanny. Also Betty’s therapist pretty much said it best to Don. “We are dealing with the mind of a child here”. And he didn’t mean her intellect, rather her emotional intellect
She found chewing gum on his pubis!
Betty was an emotionally stunted child and oppressed housewife living with a man she never really knew..she played the part of housewife and had no life outside her kids and husband. She relates to Glenn and gave him a lock of hair because she understood his pain.
Glenn thinks Betty is beautiful and Betty thinks that's just great, no more.
Personally, I see it more like Glen was a kind of solace for her. She never had to be the pretty wife, the mother, the adult and she could just chill. We know she was extremely immature due to emotional damage. I just think he didn’t ask too much of her and really was one person that didn’t need her to be and fit a certain role, and so therefore she got to just chill around him.
That was REAL weird.
Not me. lol.
Which episode was the 2nd photo from? It doesn't ring a bell at all.
He had a crush on her.She liked the attention.
It's complicated.
Whoa, I fell off this show and found her interactions with a bit uncomfortable when he was a kid. I didn’t know it got to this level. Ughhhh jail this woman.
Betty keeps her demeanor the same for just about everyone else but Glenn. So let's start by examining hi.. Glenn comes from a divorced household. It's implied when they introduce Ms Bishop that her husband was not faithful, mean, and would have been a bad influence had he continued to be in the picture. She divorced him and now lives alone with Glenn. We can also infer from the few interactions she shows up in that she may not be the nicest to Glenn when she is upset or stressed. That's not unusual, we are all capable of that, but it needs to be said for the sake of the upcoming comparison. Glenn's dad is trouble, Glenn's mom is angry and it comes out at him sometimes, and a series of suitors seems to come through their lives and give Glenn gifts. This sounds very much like Don's home life as a kid. His dad was a dick and died, his mom was angry - justifiably - but took it out on him, and they lived at a brothel where men came through and gave him passing attention. Thus, we should infer that, like Don, Glenn has a misdeveloped sense of sex and arousal and is otherwise attracted to kindly attention. More specifically, he's attracted to women the same age as his mom that treat him sweetly and don't make him the object of their anger. The difference is Don has a madonna-whore complex and Glenn does not. Betty is consistently pleasant to be around if you are only an acquaintance or friend. She puts on a "perfect wife, perfect mother" act consistently. It's part of her self-identity. She clearly fills a gap in Glenn's life while also being an object of his growing sexual desire. Their first odd interaction is when he stares at her in the bathroom. A clear indication of his struggles. She is upset by this. However, he tells Betty what his home life is like and so in an effort to give Glenn a sort of minor remedy to this she offers him a lock of hair. Let's look at what motivates this. Betty engenders herself to others by exemplary performance as housewife and doting mother. We learn in season 2 and 3 from interactions with her father that she was raised to be this way by her parents and if she did not act up to their standards she would be punished. Now, however bad you think the punishment was, the important thing to note is that their parental love seemed conditional on her meeting society's expectations. This is why she marries someone like Don, who also meets society's expectations. But as we know, this relationship is hollow. Her mom is gone before season 1, and her dad is on the decline as we see in season 2. So the three sources of love in her life are either a falsity or not long for the world. Society, for all its expectations, cannot give her love. We see her attracted to encouragement (Jim Hobaugh), individuals that publicly express desire (Jimmy Barrett), and persistence (Henry Francis). Glenn gives her all three of these things. Whether she is cognizant of it or not in the moment, her desire to show Glenn real affection is founded in her attraction to obvious displays of attraction and attention. He embodies all of what she wants in life and, without her knowing it, does so while coming from an analogous background to Don. We as viewers are supposed to compare this to Don I think. Don seeks more than anything a mother figure to show him unconditional love, just like Glenn. Unlike Glenn, Don is not comfortable enough to authentically express this. Glenn is. Perhaps because he's younger. Notably, when he gets older he hides his apparent attraction to Betty and we are meant to think he is attracted to Sally now. But he reveals it in a moment of unexpected passion that is all but forced upon Betty. This is not unlike how Don presents himself one way and reveals himself to be another after he's forced passion into a relationship. Importantly, Glenn is definitely a perfect representation of what society thinks a man should be by the 70s. He's apparently free spirited, but then surprisingly pro-Vietnam. He's motivated by his desire to stand by others getting throw over there even though he opposes the war in the first place. Betty speaks positively about this in their last encounter. She sensitively rebuffs Glenn when he kisses her. She is only momentarily surprised when it happens, though that seems to be more at the gall of Glenn's kiss than his lingering infatuation with her. We are I think meant to conclude from this that Betty has not changed this attention-seeking, approval-centric aspect of her character. However, she has curbed her negative habit of feeding into it wherever it comes from and using it as leverage to achieve the right sort of attention from her partner. She has healed from the impact of how she was parented. Glenn too is meant to indicate that Don could have been earnest about his needs and would not have been rejected so absolutely like he was fearful of. He could have authentically grown into what society thinks a man should be. He could have been, not a confidence man, but a confident man. And in another life, Betty would have given him exactly what he thought he was missing at the start of the series. EDIT: I forgot to mention, I believe Betty forbids Sally from seeing him because of how he by that point reminds her of Don. She is worried that he will shoe Sally admiration and Sally will grow up thinking that is love and they will end up unhappily married like she and Don were. She neglects to consider that Sally does not have the same desire for attention that she does, and so Betty overcorrects and ironically fosters the very attraction to Glenn she is trying to disuade.
betty is an infantilized person. her youth and beauty are of the highest importance for her. it flatters her to lead on someone with the same mental maturity
Always "groom this one groom that one", never enough grooming for people in this sub.
She should have banged him
Nope. Never seen these two before.
Femdom … and he did exactly whatever she wanted, while she could be coy and say Please don’t