# Ridiculous M\*A\*S\*H hypocrisy **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 4, 2011, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105 "2011-04-04T01:57:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Kaio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c68b51/32.png) [@Kaio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaio)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/81 "2011-04-05T21:28:30Z")
> [@Dogzilla](#): > > I don’t remember this episode, as the show ended when I was pretty young, but the vague impressions left in my memory tell me the whole show was nothing but horribly misogynistic. Major Houlihan was referred to as “Hot Lips?” How very denigrating and disrespectful, considering she outranked most of the guys she worked with. Seems like the women – all nurses – were treated like T & A/eye candy and the men – all the docs – did all the important saving of lives and such. They were pretty brutal to (and had zero respect for) Major Frank Burns, too. They weren’t too sweet to Winchester at first, either, although once Winchester got the stick out of his ass, they got along better. > [@](#): > > I watch old reruns of shows I used to love as a kid in the 70s and I just cringe sometimes. Archie Bunker is another one that sends me into histrionic rants. As noted upthread, Archie was supposed to make you cringe, that was the point. The show wasn’t saying that Archie was _right,_ but that he was very much a product of his times, and you know, people are complicated. [They had Mike to serve as Archie’s foil:](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archie_Bunker) > [@wikipedia](#): > > _All in the Family_ got many of its laughs by playing on Archie’s bigotry, although the dynamic tension between Archie and liberal Mike provided an ongoing political and social sounding board for a variety of topics. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/82 "2011-04-05T21:33:33Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > Come to think of it, Steele must have been in two episodes. In that scene, he knew that Hawkeye was a doctor. In the other episode, he thought that Hawkeye was a reporter for almost the whole episode. Nope. Same episode. Steele (“with a terminal e”) was a once-off. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/83 "2011-04-05T21:44:56Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > War is hell. I hear the 8063rd didn’t even get a water slide. Poor bastards. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/84 "2011-04-05T21:52:10Z")
> [@Kaio](#): > > They were pretty brutal to (and had zero respect for) Major Frank Burns, too. They weren’t too sweet to Winchester at first, either, although once Winchester got the stick out of his ass, they got along better. Winchester never really got the stick out of his ass as I recall. But he was an excellent surgeon which Frank Burns wasn’t, and was a decent human being if a somewhat arrogant one. ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/85 "2011-04-05T21:52:29Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I’m racking my brain, but the only occasion I can recall of Potter being drunk was when he was in Tokyo on leave. Obviously that wouldn’t matter. There was an episode when Potter cracked open a bottle of something (sherry? Burgundy?) that he and his mates found somewhere in France, during Double-ya Double-ya One. He was the last living survivor of that squad, and asked BJ and Hawkeye to join him in a toast to their memory. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/86 "2011-04-05T21:56:25Z")
> [@MPB\_in\_Salt\_Lake](#): > > Other than Cheers, is there another network TV show besides MASH that shows as much overall drinking, in a mostly positive (and in the early seasons, downright glorified) depiction?.. _Bewitched_ had a LOT of drinking. “Make that a double” was heard in every other show. Darrin was shown drunk quite a few times as well. Evidently witches can drink without any effect, as I don’t recall ever seeing Samantha or any other witch/warlock drunk. Mr Whipple (or rather the guy who played him) showed up in various roles always as the drunk guy, who hears Darrin call his wife a witch, and then tops him on how his wife is a BIGGER witch. ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/87 "2011-04-05T22:08:51Z")
Another drunk-Potter memory: they were drunk while being shelled. (Maybe just a few of them traveled to help out another unit?) Potter said something like, “why are they bombing us when we’re already bombed?” mmm ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/88 "2011-04-05T22:22:47Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > There was an episode when Potter cracked open a bottle of something (sherry? Burgundy?) … Brandy, IIRC. > [@](#): > > … that he and his mates found somewhere in France, during Double-ya Double-ya One. He was the last living survivor of that squad, and asked BJ and Hawkeye to join him in a toast to their memory. And also Klinger, Margaret, Winchester and Father M. Only time I remember the father taking a drink. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/89 "2011-04-05T22:36:14Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Nope. Same episode. Steele (“with a terminal e”) was a once-off. I guess they just cut that scene from the reruns then. Mulcahy drank in a few episodes. The best was when he had a drink just before giving a sermon on the evils of drink. He asked Radar to open a stained glass window. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/90 "2011-04-05T22:48:51Z")
nevermind, scooped. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/91 "2011-04-05T23:17:03Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > There was an episode when Potter cracked open a bottle of something (sherry? Burgundy?) that he and his mates found somewhere in France, during Double-ya Double-ya One. He was the last living survivor of that squad, and asked BJ and Hawkeye to join him in a toast to their memory. I recall him drinking in that case, not drunk. Again, I’m not claiming he never drank to the point of intoxiciation; I’m just saying I cannot recall a particular instance and would not be surprised if it never happened. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/92 "2011-04-05T23:38:21Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Again, I’m not claiming he never drank to the point of intoxiciation; I’m just saying I cannot recall a particular instance and would not be surprised if it never happened. You don’t remember a scene was so drunk that he fell down, and when he got back up he asked if he just fell down? And when told he didn’t, said “I didn’t think so.”? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/93 "2011-04-05T23:57:24Z")
> [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](#): > > Another drunk-Potter memory: they were drunk while being shelled. (Maybe just a few of them traveled to help out another unit?) Potter said something like, “why are they bombing us when we’re already bombed?” > mmm Potter and Hawkeye help out an aid unit. On the way back, Potter wonders if Zoltan (Klinger) packed anything for the trip. He finds a bottle, blesses Klinger’s heart, and he and Hawk get blasted while bombing down a dirt road. They come under sniper fire and decamp to a ditch. Potter returns fire, then orders Hawkeye to do the same. Hawk replies that he will heal their wounds, bind their wounds, but he will not _cause_ their wounds. Potter makes it a direct order, then says please. Hawk empties the .45 into the air. The sniping stops, and they discover that a passing US patrol has run the North Koreans off. They stagger out of the ditch and join the patrol. The End. I did that from memory. I need a drink. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/94 "2011-04-05T23:57:26Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > The original M_A_S\*H book is a true to life look at the 1950’s standards. > > People who weren’t around before the 1970’s and all that women’s lib stuff do not realize how deep the double standard was. Men could smoke, drink and have sex indiscriminately. Any woman who did so was labelled a tramp or far worse. > > Men were doubly praised for keeping to extremely high standards; women were doubly damned if they didn’t. +1. I read a lot. A LOT. And I read not just current novels, but novels that were written in other eras. I enjoy the Nero Wolfe, stories, for instance, and Golden Age science fiction stories. Men were not just allowed to smoke and drink and tomcat around, they were pretty much expected to. Women were shown smoking and drinking, and although these were considered vices for women, they were generally just accepted as something that most women did, like spend too much on hats. Sometimes it was hinted that women had sex outside the marriage bed, and this was frowned upon for the most part. Some authors treated casual sex as just another thing that adults sometimes did. But the majority of authors strongly implied that there were good women, and then there were tramps. Loose women were a lot of fun, but a man would NEVER want to take one home to meet his mother. And his mother probably knew that her darling boy was screwing around with every loose woman that he found…but she didn’t acknowledge it. When teenage boys left to go out for the night, Mom would say “Be good”, and then Dad would walk out the front door with Sonny Boy, and say “If you can’t be good, be careful” and hand over a condom. Now, not all parents were like this…but the prevailing thought was boys will be boys, but girls had damn well better be ladies. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2011, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/95 "2011-04-06T00:06:58Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > There was an episode when Potter cracked open a bottle of something (sherry? Burgundy?) that he and his mates found somewhere in France, during Double-ya Double-ya One. He was the last living survivor of that squad, and asked BJ and Hawkeye to join him in a toast to their memory. It was a tontine, wasn’t it?: [Tontine - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tontine) ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2011, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/96 "2011-04-06T00:19:58Z")
> [@MPB\_in\_Salt\_Lake](#): > > Other than Cheers, is there another network TV show besides MASH that shows as much overall drinking, in a mostly positive (and in the early seasons, downright glorified) depiction? **That 70s Show** had implied marijuana use in almost every episode and rarely showed negative consequences. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2011, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/97 "2011-04-06T13:48:26Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > **That 70s Show** had implied marijuana use in almost every episode and rarely showed negative consequences. Wasn’t there a flashback episode where we see that Kelso was a straight A student and all around bright guy until he started smoking pot? Or am I thinking of Taxi & Reverend Jim? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2011, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/98 "2011-04-06T13:52:12Z")
Taxi, I think. I don’t recall Kelso ever being anything but a pretty boy goof. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2011, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/99 "2011-04-06T14:27:11Z")
“… but know this: You can cut me off from the civilized world. You can incarcerate me with two moronic cellmates. You can torture me with your thrice-daily swill. But you cannot break the spirit of a Winchester. My voice shall be heard from this wilderness, and I shall be delivered from this fetid and festering sewer.” ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2011, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105/100 "2011-04-06T14:32:47Z")
> [@FoieGrasIsEvil](#): > > “… but know this: You can cut me off from the civilized world. You can incarcerate me with two moronic cellmates. You can torture me with your thrice-daily swill. But you cannot break the spirit of a Winchester. My voice shall be heard from this wilderness, and I shall be delivered from this fetid and festering sewer.” And then he found the rubber chicken in his teapot. 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ridiculous-m-a-s-h-hypocrisy/577105.md?page=6)