*In my Tweet Voice* “It’s me again! I’m grateful for another chance to bring you” my perspectives on the HBO hit series Insecure. This one is devoted to my girl, Molly. When have we ever seen the storyline of an Actress in a Supporting Role get so much attention? I can’t recall, but I want you all to know that I am most certainly here for it. I am not ashamed to admit that I have an obsession with Molly. Even though I don’t consider myself #TeamMolly per se, I think we all have Molly Moments. Like Molly, we need to do some deep soul searching and excavation to get down to the root of the problems that keep us on this residual journey of keeping our own damn selves from being great. Let me run that back, inasmuch as I love her, Molly DOES NOT WANT TO BE GREAT and it makes for some riveting television. Here’s why.
Walking back down memory lane a bit to Season One, we are introduced to Molly as Issa’s ride or die bestie. She’s a bawse on her job as a second year attorney at a lily white firm and she just can’t seem to find a man… that she feels like she deserves. Make no mistake, Molly can pull a man. She had a long stream of fine as frog hair men as potential suitors in BOTH seasons of the show but still had a reason for why NONE of them, except the one she can’t have fully (more on this later) work for her. I think one of the most telling scenes about dating in this show actually came when Molly went through the literal “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” life story that I’m told dating is and I don’t doubt can be. After the Engineer that went on three dates with her but decided that he wasn’t looking for a relationship because the thrill was gone, Molly has a very reflective conversation with Issa wherein she recounts the struggles of many a single person today. “If I am in to them, I am too smothering. If I take my time and try to give them space then it’s ‘oh, I didn’t think you were interested’. Sex right away? Lose interest. If I don’t have sex right away. Lose interest. If I don’t have sex at all… Mother*cker, nah! I am a grown ass woman and I didn’t sign up for that bullsh*t.” You feel bad for her in that moment, and it makes you want to jump up from the church pew in the back and you give your loudest “Amen”.
She meets a man, Jared (a rather important figure later in the season), whom she has undeniable chemistry with, but the infamous “Broken Pussy” rap runs him off after she reflectively acknowledges that it is about her. Here is the thing about Molly that is so redeeming, in my opinion: she is aware that she has real issues. She even pursues therapy in Season Two. Her struggle is working her way out of the tangled web she’s weaved to achieve the greatness she has created in her head. I honestly believe that being self-reflective and self-aware are the building blocks to achieving success in your life. I also know that it is not as easy as waking up and making a decision to be happy to actually realize it. In her personal life, we watch Molly go through a series of suitors. There was a fellow attorney and even some around the way boys, and as she’d previously intimated, either she does too much or her standards are too high to give any guy a real shot. Let’s not forget how she wouldn’t let a sleeping dog lie when one guy acknowledged that he failed to call her back the night before so he never called again or when she had the series of guys that spanned from Hotep to Hell Nah.
Re-enter Jared, whom she had a genuine connection with, even though he’d never gone to college and worked at Enterprise (a few points short on her rubric, y’all). The two seemed to really enjoy one another’s company and he had clearly made such an impression on Molly that she invited him to her gorgeous apartment for a meal she’d prepared herself. Trust me, nothing says “I’m into you” like a home cooked meal where you are preparing the plate for a brother. But, it was at that date, where we, through the lens of Molly and Jared being open, vulnerable, and honest with one another, see the double standard of the fluidity of sexuality as it is prescribed to men and women. Molly shares that back in college she’d had the experience of being with another woman. Jared, says, almost immediately and rather excitedly that he finds that sexy. Nervously, and after much prodding on Molly’s part, Jared admits that in a drunken haze he’d allowed a male friend to pleasure him orally many years ago – and he determined that it was not for him. She asked “how long before you knew” and he responded “Immediately”. Still, the mere admission that he’d had a sexual experience with another man made him undesirable to her – which she admits to him, ironically, while he’s pleasuring her orally. Let me just say – as a gay man – I ain’t even going to begin to know what to do down there with a woman and for the record, I have ZERO interest in learning. Any man who can pleasure a woman as well as he had been doing to that point shouldn’t become less desirable because he tried something and decided that it wasn’t for him. I once tried Greek yogurt and the consistency wasn’t what I think The Lord had in the plans for my taste buds and I haven’t turned back to it since. As Kelli eloquently and comically pointed out, how does one travel from Straight to Lee Daniels on the spectrum of sexuality so quickly? More to the point, how does exploring your sexuality make you a pariah forever? In this gay man’s humble opinion, it takes a lot to get from straight to Lee Daniels or (David Butler-Sims for that matter), and I think men ought to be free to decide how far to the right or to the left on that spectrum they want to experience without judgment. #LooseTheBallsFromTheViceGripofJudgment Furthermore, we need to confront the double standard of lesbian experiences and gay experiences. Neither of them are wrong, and neither one of them should be automatically gifted the aura of allure while the other sinks to the depths of what’s wrong with humanity. People like what they like and they don’t like what they don’t like. That should be more than okay!
Moving forward to Season Two we see that Molly is still in her precipitous phase of can’t get right. At work, she finds that a white man is making way more money than she is and she finds herself trying to navigate her options. The episode where she recounts her successes with the partners and suggests that it is time for her promotion is me SO MANY TIMES in my history that I simply couldn’t have loved her more in that moment. When placated with an excuse for why a promotion is premature, she shot back with receipts of historical actions they’ve taken in favor of other, poorer performing associates. She comes out of it with a moral victory but an L on the bottom line, which sucks.
On the relationship front, she gets interest from a fellow lawyer at her firm that is different from her norm (if a norm for her exists), but she friend zones him immediately – until she, in a vulnerable moment in his office in Chicago, gives him the business. She finds herself spiraling emotionally at her parent’s vow renewal party because she learns that her mom stayed with her father after he cheated on her, which shattered her dream of a perfect relationship. This revelation frees her to enter a disastrous sexual dalliance with a childhood friend who lends a shoulder to cry on and is apparently in an open relationship. Alejandro, or Dro as he’s referred to on the show, is a whole married man who shoots his shot repeatedly with Molly and it is not until she feels so broken inside that she allows the immediate gratification of a sexual conquest with Dro to help erase her pain… only it exacerbates it. Wait! Did I forget to mention that she brought a completely different dude to her mom and dad’s renewal? She cared so little about him that even though he was a great looking gentleman, established with an amazing career, and he was wearing a suit that had been tailored and fabricated by the arch angels themselves (come on now y’all that burgundy and navy pairing sent my rockets to the moon!), she couldn’t bother to get right what he did for a living after several dates. #AMess. Meanwhile, she still isn’t sure how this whole open relationship/marriage thing works (she’s not alone – I got damn questions about it myself) but she learns that serving up the vajayjay in her apartment, hotel rooms, and restaurant bathrooms doesn’t make you whole. As liberated as Molly is with her sexual exploits (and let me be clear, I love it), she should know by now that giving it to a married man, NO MATTER WHAT LIE HE TRIES TO SELL YOU ABOUT HOW OPEN THEIR RELATIONSHIP IS, won’t end well. To her credit, she tried to break it off, but… in the season finale, we see Molly don her best Vicky Secret ensemble and open the door to more hurt and pain. I wanted her to win. I wanted her to claim back her power and return to a place of self-affirming glory wherein she demands what she deserves and relentlessly pursues it – but that’s not what she wanted and I am devastated.
Final Thoughts:
You can be the best at everything at your job, but if you are at least two minorities in any situation, you will be told to shut up and wait your turn. Harness your worth and explore other opportunities.
The liberation of your sex life is something that is super important as a human being; There is no shame in having as many exploits as you desire. However, you can’t get angry with yourself for being unable to seal the deal with someone long term when you confuse the power of your sex organ with control in your life.
We must do better to talk freely talk about our sexual pasts with our current sexual partners. When the truth is shared, leave the judgment with The Almighty.
One does not become gay or straight after one sexual experience. Some people don’t know exclusively from the beginning – they should have the right to find out.
I’ve never seen an affair with a married person work out for both parties. I don’t care how open they claim to be with their spouse.
If you have to do things in secret – something on that sales rack was manufactured in China – Don’t buy it.
Life is not a fairytale. People cheat, and partners in those situations might choose to stay. That doesn’t make them weak or sad. Let people make the best decisions for them - without your condemnation.
Stay tuned for my thoughts on The Village – Kelli, Tiffany, Derek, Alejandro, and Chad. #WhatAboutYourFriends