Mad Men and Philosophy

Relationships between characters on Mad Men are rarely what they seem to be. The picture-perfect couple is unhappy, distrustful, adulterous; the giggling gal pals are sharpening their knives with their white-gloved hands; the sweetly submissive secretary is the one really running the show. Nearly all of the characters use relationships with others to their own ends, of course—Mad Men is a show that seems to almost celebrate manipulation and subterfuge. But some characters in some situations use their particular gifts to subvert expectations of relationships during this time period, particularly between genders, to craft new relationships based on honesty and mutual admiration; in short, relationships that even Aristotle (384-322 BCE) would recognize as friendships.

Aristotle was hardly unique among the ancient Greek philosophers in his search for what represents goodness in human life and, like Socrates (469-399 BCE) and Plato (428-348 BCE) before him, his work in the field of ethics remains relevant today. Aristotle believed that the best and truest friendships exist among equals; specifically, between those who are at equal stages of moral development. So, to examine the friendships of Mad Men through an Aristotelian prism requires the following: an understanding of the Aristotelian ideal of friendship; an understanding of how morally developed our characters are; a sense of which characters are morally equivalent and why; and, finally, which of our characters form relationships with each other that fit this bill. Oh, and maybe just a dash of your favorite Belle Jolie lipstick.

Like Roger, Aristotle must have sensed that a friendship in which one person consistently judges the other for what he views as imperfect or unethical behavior will be an unsuccessful one. For Aristotle, friendship is “perfect” when it exists between people who are similar in goodness—that is, equivalent in moral development—and who wish good to their friends because it is good, not because it will benefit themselves in some way.

Well, this is a tall order for the men and women of Mad Men. Almost every character is constantly on the lookout for how they can spin a situation to benefit themselves. Rather than help each other as codirectors of accounts, for example, Pete Campbell and Ken Cosgrove (especially Pete) jealously protect their own account “territories” (“Out of Town,” episode 301). When Sal Romano, a loyal and productive employee, is put in a terribly unfair position by a client’s lies, he is quickly cut loose by Don so as to placate the client and not lose his business (“Wee Small Hours,” episode 309). Who among these characters is morally developed at all, when you look at it that way? Fortunately for us (and for Don, Roger, and the rest of the gang at Sterling Cooper), Aristotle’s discussion of moral development and friendship gives us some flexibility.

As Aristotle continues his discussion of friendship, he notes that all friendships, even those based primarily on seeking pleasure or profit from another person, possess an element of mutual well-wishing. If they didn’t, he observes sensibly, they could hardly be called friendships at all.⁴ The challenge, he goes on to say, is to develop a friendship in which mutual well-wishing is maximized and the mutual well-wishing minimizes any other motive, even though, of course, the most altruistic friendships have an element of a utilitarian ethos to them: “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” As Aristotle says, “Each [friend] is good absolutely and also relatively to his friend, for the good are both absolutely good and also relatively to another.”⁵

Any kind of friendship, Aristotle explains, must be based on similarity of some kind—chiefly, similarity in values. Moreover, the best kinds of friendships must develop over time after friends have had the opportunity to prove themselves as having the right intentions in the relationship. “It is to be expected that such would be rare,”⁶ Aristotle concedes, but they are the best kind of friendships, the kind for which we all should strive.

Now we’re getting somewhere. We have some characters in Mad Men who have proven concern and loyalty for each other, despite other mistakes large and small; we have some characters who value similar things, despite other values being perhaps somewhat lacking. How, now, do we judge whose values are most similar and whose friendships qualify as the most Aristotelian? To answer these questions, the staff of Sterling Cooper will go up against two more contemporary thinkers in moral philosophy: Lawrence Kohlberg and Carol Gilligan.

Kohlberg’s work, however, seems to assume that these universal principles of justice are indeed universal. Moreover, his work was based entirely on studies of adolescent men. Carol Gilligan, a contemporary psychologist, has found Kohlberg’s theory lacking, based on her studies of how women develop morally. Gilligan’s In a Different Voice (1982) was born from her dissatisfaction with the moral development theories of Kohlberg, which had been formulated from studies examining only men. Gilligan’s study found that women’s motivations for moral decisions were based less in laws and societal conventions, and more in their personal relationships and the emotions attached.⁸ While, in Kohlberg’s theory, this would be seen as immature and underdeveloped, Gilligan argued that this could simply be an alternative mode for moral decision making, which in its highest form could be as sophisticated and complex as Kohlbergian morality.⁹

How do these two theories apply to the world of Mad Men? The show gives contemporary viewers a glimpse into a time in which men and women were differentiated much more sharply in the workplace and in the home than they are today, and in which women’s roles were more narrowly and traditionally defined. But the female characters in Mad Men spend as much of their time subverting traditional gender roles as they do fulfilling them. A hybridization of Kohlberg’s and Gilligan’s theories, then, may serve us well as we continue to consider the ethics of friendship.

We can use the moral development of our (anti)hero, Don Draper, as a case study. Don seems in many ways to be a reprehensible human being. He steals the identity of his brother-in-arms in Korea, abandoning his family; he maintains this stolen identity indefinitely, using it to marry the beautiful Betty and begin his professional ascent in advertising; he routinely cheats on his obviously troubled wife, who is struggling to manage their two—and eventually three—children despite having every material comfort. Yet any viewer could just as easily argue that Don has redeeming qualities of compassion, foresight, and professionalism. He cares for the widow of the real Don Draper; he tries (though he fails) throughout the series to renew his fidelity to Betty; he puts his considerable talents to work for the great benefits of Sterling Cooper’s clients; and, most crucially, he enables Peggy to go on with her professional ambitions by keeping the secret of her child and encouraging her to come back to work.

Sometimes, then, Don acts ethically in his relationships. He cares for the people in the relationships he values—the real Don Draper’s widow Anna, Peggy, even Betty to a certain extent. This is why Roger’s stinging indictment of Don in the closing episode of season three—“You’re not good at relationships because you don’t value them”—does indeed sting. And Don seems to realize that Roger is right. He has not properly cared for the relationships he values the most. By Gilligan’s measure of moral development, Don has failed, and he spends the rest of the episode attempting to make amends for this failure (though whether he is truly making amends or making arrangements for the success of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce remains to be seen at the end of season three).

Despite his faults, Don seems to cling to certain universal principles of justice. His military service and his grief at President Kennedy’s death both speak of a certain patriotism, to say nothing of how often and approvingly he invokes the American dream in his advertising work. He admires people who embody the advice given to Peggy by Bobbie Barrett: “This is America. Pick a job and then become the person who does it” (“The New Girl,” episode 205). And his singular vision at Sterling Cooper is to not only promote his own work and the work of his creative team but to make clients realize that they’ve been given exactly what they wanted and needed all along. These qualities speak of a certain consistency and idealism, and Don does seem to strive to live up to them.

Neither by Kohlberg’s standards nor by Gilligan’s is Don a fully morally developed human being. But he certainly is not a sociopath. He is flawed, complex, and occasionally likeable; and, crucially, because he has been known to act correctly in situations in which he does not necessarily stand to benefit, he is capable of meeting Aristotle’s standards for the ideal human friend.

Since no one on Mad Men has much of a claim to being a better person than Don, it’s not hard to imagine this case study with another character. All of the characters can shock us with their callowness, greed, and insensitivity, only to surprise us at another turn with moments of pathos, honesty, and compassion. The challenge is to find characters who, due to their similar values, shortcomings, and triumphs, could enjoy the most equitable, and ideal, of friendships.

Morally Equivalent Characters in Mad Men: “Kids Today, They Have No One to Look Up To, Because They’re Looking Up To Us”¹⁰

Ain’t that the truth, Don. Everyone on Mad Men at least seems to realize that he or she is flawed. Whether it’s Peggy’s palpable discomfort in church, Don’s look of terror when he realizes that Betty knows his secret, or Roger’s heartfelt toast to his seriously wronged ex-wife at his daughter’s wedding, every character not only faces tangible moments of moral discomfort, but fights guilt from various poor decisions throughout their lives. Several characters who have evolved uniquely affectionate, respectful, and honest relationships—what we might call Aristotelian friendships—throughout the series seem to possess some equivalence in terms of their secrets, mistakes, shortcomings, and eventual moral development and possibly even something that could be called progress. The Aristotelian friendships in Mad Men are those that are shared among moral equivalents: Don and Peggy, and Joan and Roger.

What makes Don and Peggy moral equivalents? Each values his or her career and gives his or her best effort at work at all times; each loves his or her family in the abstract but struggles to take the individuals that comprise it seriously; and each has a nebulous sense of faith. Most important, each character is hiding a dark, painful secret. Don hides his past as bastard child and identity-thief Dick Whitman, while Peggy hides her own illegitimate child with Pete. Even if Peggy eventually reveals her secret to Pete, she’s hardly about to wrench him away from Trudy and bring their child into the picture. She may be concerned to protect Pete, but she’s more concerned to protect her budding career and her privacy.

By the end of season three, as previously noted, even Roger takes Don to task for devaluing nearly all of his relationships. He has taken advantage of Betty shamelessly, of course (though, to be fair, Betty has certainly played Don more than once); he went as far as to make Cooper agree to keep Roger away from him; and, most devastatingly for this viewer, he has taken Peggy’s work and genuine admiration for him very much for granted. Indeed, Peggy is so disillusioned with her work and her position at Sterling Cooper that she runs into the arms (literally) of Herman “Duck” Phillips and is almost tempted to join him at Grey (“Seven Twenty Three,” episode 307). But although Don has begun to make amends with everyone he has wronged by the end of season three, his reconciliation with Peggy is especially resonant.

Peggy and Don have always had a unique relationship. Many viewers may have almost forgotten, by this point, that sharp-tongued, tireless Peggy started off as Don’s naive, sheltered secretary. “I liked your girl Peggy, ” Betty mentioned to Don when she met her. “She’s fresh.” “As the driven snow,” Don drily replied (“New Amsterdam,” episode 104). But perhaps Peggy was not so naive—she’s bold enough to make a move on Don in the very beginning of the series. Perhaps Don fostered that bold streak, as Peggy quickly proved herself as a more-than-competent secretary and, with the Belle Jolie campaign, won herself a position as a copywriter. Don mentors her in this new position—not always gently, tactfully, or even especially helpfully, but he does mentor her. And one of the series’ most unforgettable moments comes in Peggy’s flashback to her time in the hospital in which Don comes to visit her and persuades her to give up her baby: “Move forward,” he tells her in “The New Girl” (episode 205). “This never happened. It will shock you how much it never happened.” Crucially, in this episode, Peggy is flashing back to that time period as she nurses Bobbie Barrett, who encourages her to stand up to Don more frequently and hold her own in the workplace. Ironically, Peggy’s cover-up, which may seem to be a subservient and tacit reinforcement of Don’s games, is actually what puts Peggy and Don on a more equal footing. Peggy is no longer merely grateful to Don for keeping her secret. Rather, she has the opportunity to do for Don what he did for her. This newfound equality, rather than Bobbie’s pep talk alone, enables Peggy to go back to Don with a new sense of confidence. Bobbie is right about this much, though: Don’s respect for Peggy clearly grows as a result.

One might argue that Don’s friendship with Peggy is based much more on a desire for profit rather than on mutual goodwill. However, by the end of season three it is clear that mutual goodwill is the primary basis for their relationship. Don doesn’t need Peggy’s work to keep him or Sterling Cooper afloat. His cutting remark that she hasn’t “done one thing here that [he] couldn’t live without” is not necessarily untrue, unkind though it may be (“Seven Twenty Three,” 307). Peggy might be a good copywriter, even an excellent one, but the place would survive without her if it had to.

For her part, Peggy no longer needs Don for professional advancement (if a sharp girl like Peggy ever really did); Duck Phillips is trying to (literally) woo her away from Sterling Cooper into a job with his agency, Grey. But when Don aims to convince her to join Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, he tells her—and you believe him—that “nobody understands that, but you do,” speaking of their intuitive understanding of the American dream (“Shut the Door. Have a Seat,” episode 313). Obviously, they understand it because they, more than anyone else on the show, are living it, for better or worse. By the end of season three, Don’s genuine (if belated) respect for Peggy and her work, coupled with Peggy’s genuine admiration for him, keep them hurtling into the future together at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. Their relationship, bound as it is by their secrets and the favors they’ve done for each other as well as the friendship they have developed, will surely continue to prove an interesting one.

Joan and Roger, on the other hand, are moral equivalents in very different ways. Both Joan and Roger enjoy pre- and extramarital sexual and emotional dalliances, for example, though Joan shows considerably more discretion in doing so. Both show at least a nodding respect to the outward trappings of family life. Both are clever and shrewd in the workplace but, unlike Don to a certain extent and Peggy to a great extent, they make their jobs look so easy that they seem to be almost an afterthought to the thrilling social opportunities the office provides. But, like Don and Peggy, their relationship portends a future in which men and women might interact on a more equitable plane.

“Look,” Roger slurs memorably at the end of season one’s “Indian Summer ” (episode 111), “I want to tell you something, because you’re very dear to me and I hope you understand it comes from the bottom of my damaged, damaged heart. You are the finest piece of ass I ever had and I don’t care who knows it. I am so glad I got to roam those hillsides.” Well, you could do worse for an endorsement from Roger Sterling, whose unbridled appreciation for the female form is a recurring theme in his own life and in Mad Men as a whole. But it’s clear from Roger’s behavior toward Joan, particularly in the latter half of season three after she leaves Sterling Cooper (only to join Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce), that he has a deep and abiding affection for her wit, competence, and company. He phones her in the middle of the night after his daughter’s poorly attended wedding in “The Grown Ups” (episode 312), saying, simply, “I had to talk to you.” When she admits to him in the previous episode, “The Gypsy and the Hobo,” that she needs to find a new job, he quickly offers to help, saying, “I’m glad that you thought to ask me.” And when season three’s final episode reveals the cloak-and-dagger founding of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce with a liberal poaching of Sterling Cooper’s clients, it’s Joan whom Roger trusts to sort through the paperwork and organize the new firm so it can hit the ground running. Bringing in Joan isn’t just efficiency and profit-seeking on Roger’s part. After all, as a partner, he surely could have ordered Harry, Peggy, or anyone do the work. And it’s not just altruism because Joan needs a new job. It’s a combination of Roger’s respect for her work and concern for her well-being along with the genuine esteem he feels for her that leads him to ask her back.

Joan, meanwhile, has always kept her cards closer to her vest. Far from trying to hoard the attention of the males in the office, she frequently encourages the other female employees to flirt and dress attractively.¹¹ She is the epitome of discretion during her affair with Roger, and, when it becomes clear that it has to come to an end, she moves on briskly, making it clear that her agenda is to marry—indeed, she is engaged a few scant months later.¹² It’s hard to know what she really feels for Roger because of her reticence when it comes to herself and her emotions. But her actions late in season three make it clear that Roger’s affection for her is mutual. How do we know? One thing that we know about Joan is that if she doesn’t like you or doesn’t want to waste one more moment of her precious time on you, you’ll know it. Memorable indeed is her seething at Jane, Don’s secretary turned Roger’s paramour and eventual wife: “What on God’s green Earth do you think you’re doing here?” after Joan had personally fired her (“The Gold Violin,” episode 207). She often has a pithy and withering word for Peggy, who, despite her greater ambition, lacks Joan’s considerable savvy around the office.¹³ So when Roger calls her after his daughter’s wedding and she bends her ear to him, the viewer knows that his attentions are welcome. When Joan comes back to Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce at Roger’s behest, it’s not just about the job—she wants to be there and wants Roger to want her there.

So with Don, Roger, Joan, and Peggy all casting their lots with Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, we might wish to return to Aristotle for his prognosis of the agency. What does he say about friendship as a unifying force for a government, or, say, an advertising agency? Well, he says this:

Friendship also seems to hold states together, and legislators appear to pay more attention to it than justice; for unanimity of opinion seems to be something resembling friendship, and they are most desirous of this, and banish faction as the greatest enemy. . . . It is not only necessary, but also honourable.¹⁴

9 Gilligan was careful to point out that the ethical theory she presented, which came to be known as “care ethics, ” was not necessarily gendered; although women more frequently employed it, men could and did employ it as women sometimes employed more masculine ethics. “The title of my book was deliberate,” she reminded her critics, “it reads, ‘ in a different [emphasis Gilligan’s] voice’, not ‘in a woman’s voice’” (Carol Gilligan, “Reply to Critics,” from An Ethic of Care: Feminist and Interdisciplinary Perspectives, edited by Mary Jeanne Larrabee (New York: Routledge, 1993), 209.

Friendship According to Aristotle: “I’ll Tell You Right Now, Don, I Don’t Like Being Judged”

Moral Development and Friendship as Understood by Aristotle

Contemporary Understanding of Moral Development in Kohlberg and Gilligan: “You Want to Be Taken Seriously? Stop Dressing (or Making Moral Decisions) Like a Little Girl.”

Morally Equivalent Characters in Mad Men: “Kids Today, They Have No One to Look Up To, Because They’re Looking Up To Us”¹⁰

“To a Place Where We Know We Are Loved”