The Case for Beth Dutton

If you follow me on Facebook, you may have recently read me waxing poetic about the Kevin Costner television show that airs on the Paramount network: Yellowstone.

Now, a television show that reminds us that the first American outlaws were the cowboys, and we may have glorified them through history, but the premier American outlaws are still cowboys…I want me some of that.

See, apparently they just live in sparsely populated areas where us city folk and those who don’t live among magnificent vistas or spend much (any) time on a horse don’t hear much about their antics.

So, as I’m waxing poetic about this show (Rip Wheeler) and obsessing on this show (Rip Wheeler) something that has happened before, numerous times when reading how folks talk about how they feel about heroines, happened again.

Something distressing.

You see, trying not to spoil anything (though, if you’re a no-spoiler freak like me, there definitely are spoilers in this, so beware – this show is not for the faint-of-heart, and if you’re an animal lover, wary watching, my friends – that said, it…is…epic)…

The men in this show do some pretty brutal things. Like, felonious things. Like, you don’t want anyone to tell you they’re taking you to the “train station” because, well, you do not wanna board that train.

But in my comments on Facebook, along with a number of folks sharing how much they like, even love, even worship Beth Dutton, the princess of Yellowstone, there were also a number of folks sharing how much they hate her.

How she is selfish.

How she is foul-mouthed.

How, “even if she were a man,” she wouldn’t get away with some of the stuff she pulls (though, she’s never taken anyone to the train station, just sayin’).

And although Beth is a very complicated, tortured, broken-souled woman, she was trained to be that, rather viciously, by her very own mother. Because she lives among these men, and for her own sake, to be able to do that and not get beaten down, she has to be able to hold her own.

Beth’s wicked smart and she’s a good learner.

But if you watch closely, there is almost nothing Beth does for Beth.

Everything Beth does is for her father or her family.

Or for Rip.

I’m not sure how that translates to selfish.

What I am sure is that we (women) hold each other to a higher standard than we do men.

Or, perhaps, a different standard. The standard of what we personally feel a woman should be.

I only noted one gal share she was turned off from the show due to the violence displayed by the men.

Now, why is this attractive for men? Men who are doing these things for ranch and family, so we “get it.” That drive to protect. That drive to, at all costs, keep what they, or their forebears, earned. That drive to do anything to respect the ones that went before and hold safe what they can give to future generations.

We exalt it.

We celebrate and champion it.

But a woman making moves to protect her own, and she doesn’t do this by keeping men fed or smoothing their brow, but she’s down to play dirty, is frowned upon and garners name-calling, dislike or even hatred?

Do I agree with everything Beth does on this show?

Absolutely not.

If this stuff were real and not fiction, and Beth calculated then took forward the moves she made to protect her family, seek revenge or make an unmissable point about how she expects the ones she cares about to be treated (the store scene in Season 2, Episode 9: sheer brilliance) would I agree with them?

Abso-freaking-lutely.

There are a set of scenes, deep into the second season, where the beauty of Beth just as she is, is unrestrained (see episodes 7 and the aforementioned 9).

Her mother rammed an ironclad backbone straight down her spine and not a thing is gonna bend it.

And not a thing does.

And I could debate the need for that, for a mother doing that to her daughter, willfully, with intent, but I don’t live on a ranch in Montana (but Lord, I wish I did – just for the wardrobe, and of course, RIP WHEELER!).

What I will say is all the men before with their sons, they did the same…damned…thing.

And we admire it.

Making a man a man.

But who is to say what the making of a woman is?

Hell, who’s to say what makes a man?

What I also will say is, I’m not a fan of this judgement we have for our sisters.

What we’ll not only allow men to get away with, but we’ll laud it. It makes them attractive. It makes them “worthy.”

But a woman does that, oh no. She should be baking apple pies. She should keep the F-words out of it, not use (in some cases) her greatest tool (her sexuality), and play by a certain, undefinable, feminine set of rules.

No, no offense intended, but if baking pies is not her gig, she should do whatever she wants to do.

Beth Dutton is one of the strongest, most complicated, most fascinating women on television. She is extraordinary. She is everything a woman should be, if they want.

Not because she holds her own in a man’s world.

But because she kicks ass her way in a man’s world.

And that’s the case for Beth Dutton.

Long may she wreak havoc on anyone who threatens Yellowstone.