Why JD Vance Is So Smitten With ‘Emily in Paris’

To understand why JD Vance would call Netflix’s “Emily in Paris” a “masterwork of American television,” it helps to first consider the issue of arranged marriage.I’ve had a lot of fun over the years debating this topic with college freshmen. My students come from all over New York City, yet almost uniformly they object — viscerally — to the idea that they can be expected to spend the rest of their lives not only with a person they’ve never met, but a person selected by their parents.The fun part comes when I lure them into actually thinking about their preferred type of relationship — one based on their individual choices and personalities, that moves at their preferred pace, with a partner that is highly compatible.In other words, a typical American marriage. How’s that working out? By many measures, not so great. It is in this spirit, I think, that we should consider Mr. Vance’s recent transformation from vice president to TV critic and “Emily in Paris” fanboy. “If you’re just watching it superficially, “Emily in Paris” is about this sort of bubbly girl who goes to Paris and has a cool job,” Mr. Vance said in a video posted on TikTok earlier this week.In fact, the Netflix show, which stars Lily Collins in the title role, is the “Shakespeare of our time,” Mr. Vance declared. Headline writers — especially those inclined to clickbait — will have fun with that. And, admittedly, this is not the kind of show you might expect to make a Yale graduate and traditionally Catholic book author geek out.But Mr. Vance additionally called “Emily in Paris” a “massive cultural criticism of millennial decision-making.” You don’t have to be a staunch “Vance 2028” supporter to acknowledge that he’s identified a provocative topic that resists easy ideological responses.“It’s obvious to everybody watching [“Emily in Paris”] that she should end up with the French chef,” Mr. Vance continued. “She should marry this guy. They should start a family, whether in Paris or America. They should build a life together. That’s what they should be doing.” You can already hear Mr. Vance’s orthodox progressive critics howling: The “cat lady” guy is at it again! A lite version of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” he seems to want. There’s a whole lot more to life than marriage and kids, they might add, especially for highly-educated, credentialed women. Vice President JD Vance arrives on Air Force Two on September 14, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Via Mark Schiefelbein-Pool/Getty ImagesOn the right, meanwhile, someone is surely grumbling about a Frenchman taking a wife that should have gone to an American. Mr. Vance, whose memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” was adapted into a 2020 Ron Howard film released by Netflix, continued: “By the same token, the French chef should obviously end up with her, not the various craziest people that bump in and out of his life. And yet, what both of them do is they make a series of absurd, sometimes hilarious, sometimes not particularly believable mistakes, where she ends up with a bunch of random people or focused on her job. He ends up with a bunch of random people or focused on his job. And it’s like obvious: Fall in love, get married. You two were made for each other.” So, at “the risk of overstating” things (which is also what Mr. Vance himself said), the VP seems to be asking us to re-think the benefits of boundless choices. That’s the selling point, after all, for Silicon Valley’s latest and greatest technology. And, perhaps, of capitalism itself.Stroll into any supermarket and you’ll find entire aisles — dozens of brands and flavors, sizes and blends — of breakfast cereal or potato chips. The same goes for podcasts and streaming services and relationship apps. Anything and everything you could possibly want.Sure, there’s economic rationality here, and the inferior products will eventually fall away. In the meantime, too many promises are made that never deliver, especially on an emotional level.Empowerment — through costly education and endless options — has been relentlessly marketed to twentysomethings. These are the things that will liberate them from a broad array of social constraints. So much so that disappointment becomes a new kind of constraint. Not all those who wander are lost? Neither are they always content or satisfied.Lifelong commitments are terrifying, and making one sooner rather than later does not guarantee success. It also won’t get you to Season Six of a sitcom like “Emily in Paris,” which might be why a Netflix show was not the best cultural artifact for Mr. Vance to draw upon.Lily Collins attends the ‘Emily In Paris’ fourth season premiere on September 10, 2024 at Rome, Italy. Via Franco Origlia/WireImageNevertheless, the fact that the VP is more enamored of Lily Collins than of Maine Senator Susan Collins is entirely in keeping with his sharp contrast between 21st-century individualism and a more communal ideal: endless, Emily-esque wanderings versus settling down and starting a—preferably large—family.Both Republicans and Democrats are now fighting internal battles between factions that are highly individualistic (unfettered capitalism vs. unfettered bathroom access) and deeply communal (God for everyone vs. guaranteed income for everyone).“Love is … an ever-fixed mark / That looks on tempests and is never shaken,” as a certain London 16th-century playwright once put it. Americans — from Paris to Peoria — are told over and over again these days that they can live a “frictionless” life, free of such “tempests.”How’s that working out?

Why JD Vance Is So Smitten With ‘Emily in Paris’

Why JD Vance Is So Smitten With ‘Emily in Paris’

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