"...maybe "The Ex List" isn't made for single women to watch at all. Maybe this tragicomic tale aims at soothing former single girls who settled for that special anyone years ago and need to reassure themselves that they made the right call."

Yup. That's also why the humiliation quotient of crap like this is so high. It enables insecure wifey/moos to indulge their schadenfreude towards "irresponsible" single girls who supposedly have the carefree life they now don't. In all honesty, I can't imagine who CBS thought this show would appeal to. Both married and single women have way better things to do Friday night than watch some nitwit go back to her "Top Ten Worst" for more punishment. See, when stories like this are made about men, you get cool movies like HIGH FIDELITY, in which people have actual lives. When stories like this are made about women, well...:P

"Ruggiero, a former "Veronica Mars" writer who quit "The Ex List" over creative differences with the network a few weeks ago..."

Understandable. :)

I’m one who just doesn’t like to over-interpret things, especially popular culture, as I generally like the comfort of things being just as they seem, just as they should be. But Ms. Havrilesky, if I catch her drift, seems to be on to something really quite interesting here, something that seems to support her implied thesis that no matter how banal and aesthetically painful, television does indeed unselfconsciously mirror the highs and lows of cultural and sociological evolution.

Creative writers like Ruggiero who seem to want to forge new existential territory for women and men will meet resistance from conservative systems like CBS precisely because the shot-callers at CBS are not thinking about how or who to appeal to, but are reacting unconsciously to the sense of discomfort that deviation from doxa brings, in this case deviation from legally contracted monogamy functioning to control sexual and reproductive behavior. That discomfort required reactionary tweaking of the character and story line to protect orthodoxy, to caution against the inevitable misery of “single life”, an interesting term which seems to refer to individuals who are free to engage in and disengage from intimate relationships as they see fit and learn to tolerate periods of solitude, as opposed to “married” women and men who are not at all “single” but instead enjoy the soulful connection and intimacies of another’s attentions in perpetuity, undiminished?

Some very talented writer someday will transcend the SATC ----- misery-of-singlehood dialectic to give us characters - ordinary women (and men) - who learn that emotional regulation and tolerance of solitude are learned and internal, not dependent on distraction by material consumption or even distractingly entertaining friends, whose existential courage and belief in human potential will allow them to model freedom from the fear- and scarcity-driven monogamy contracts that trade self determination for material security and social acceptance. That would be a start.

"Some very talented writer someday will transcend the SATC ----- misery-of-singlehood dialectic to give us characters - ordinary women (and men) - who learn that emotional regulation and tolerance of solitude are learned and internal, not dependent on distraction by material consumption or even distractingly entertaining friends, whose existential courage and belief in human potential will allow them to model freedom from the fear- and scarcity-driven monogamy contracts that trade self determination for material security and social acceptance. That would be a start."

I just have to second that. How's about a story about a single woman who is HAPPY about being single? Not enough conflict? There's plenty...because nobody BELIEVES her when she says she happy with being single (and blessedly barren).

And because the whole show is built around the idea of her finding this guy, if she does, the show ends. It's the nature of television. So she will NEVER find the guy until and unless the producers decide to end the show or they have enough forwarning by the network that they can wrap up the show at season's end. But considering how lame this show sounds, I'm afraid the main character is doomed to a life of desperate unfulfillment for eternity in the television ether...

Just that. Brilliant piece of writing! True and VERY well articulated.

Ms. Havrilesky talks about how disconcerting it can be to be single in your 30s. I'm a 40-something, never-married, urban professional. And let me tell you--I am far from alone. I have many friends who have never married, and none of us is as desperate as this character.

For some reason, I like to read the NY Times wedding announcements in the Sunday Style section. Every week there is at least one under-35 bride who exults that "I'd just resigned myself to being single." Please, child.

It's my observation that while many women do freak out about being single in their 30s, when you're still single in your 40s, it doesn't seem like a problem anymore. Maybe we've self-selected this state as people who geniunely prefer singlehood, or maybe we are subconsciously soothing ourselves. I'm not really sure; maybe it's a bit of both. Or maybe it's, as I like to say, that we're just skipping the bad first marriage that ends in divorce and planning to go straight for the good second marriage.

But the good news is that the state of panic described in this show and implied by relieved brides in the NYT wedding announcements pretty much goes away.

I liked your letter. But the type of show you describe in the future has already been done in the past: "The Mary Tyler Moore Show". The married woman (Cloris Leachman) was always the saddest most unhappy one underneath and you could see that. Rhoda might have always been looking for a man, but when she finally got married it ended in divorce and Betty Ann White's happy homemaker was a precursor to Samantha Jones--she wanted sex not a relationship. I suppose Georgette who married Ted was happy but neither were the brightest crayon in the box. Mary was the hero and she was happy with work and friends and the occasional promise of love.