Bridgerton: Justifying Horrific Classism with Charm and Empathy
Only the best people get to be in the ton.
LIKE all Americans, I have been a temporarily embarrassed millionaire my entire life1. Growing up I was fed the whole bit about America being a classless society, a place where anyone could become president or a billionaire depending solely on their grit and smarts, and I probably believed it for a while2. Of course, we’re not only one of the most class-defined societies on Earth, we’re also one of the most class-obsessed. We love us some royals, after all, and we have this disturbing tendency as a group to assume being rich is a sign of great intelligence and ability.
That’s American bizarreness in a nutshell: We’re fiercely dedicated to the whole don’t-tread-on-me myth of rugged individuals taking the piss out of the swells, but we all assume the swells are rich because they’re better (and, somehow, that if we could become rich we would instantly be better ourselves, as if money afforded improvement via osmosis or something)3.
On the other hand, there’s a deep and broad moralistic thread running through the American psyche. We like to see villains punished, and we like to imagine that money and power not only corrupt but ruin. So, so many of our stories end with the greedy and the power-crazed being punished brutally for their sins4. And the opposite pole is the Good Oligarch, the incredibly rich and powerful person who is extremely moral and principled. In fact, very often when we have a rich and powerful protagonist we go to extreme lengths to demonstrate their goodness. Rich, powerful characters can be ripe assholes—they can be rude, unconventional in their behavior, and irritating, as long as they are also good5.
Hence The Duke of Hastings and virtually everyone else in Bridgerton. Rich? Yes. Rude? Often. Poorly behaved? Frequently. But also, deep down, extremely good people, so we feel like they deserve their undeserved power and position.
Noblesse Oblige
This isn’t specific to romance or stories set in the Regency Period or any other historical period for that matter—it’s pretty reliable that when you have a major character who’s not the villain who is also rich and powerful, some effort has to be put into making their wealth and influence palatable. That means showing that they’re good people who have a real sense of old-fashioned noblesse oblige6.
In Bridgerton, The Duke of Hastings (well, most of the characters, since they’re all rich and aristocratic) is a pretty standard sort: Young, handsome, rich, powerful, and kind of a jerk. That’s not an uncommon trope in the romance genre (or outside of it), and his eventual revelation as kind of a good guy isn’t too surprising7. But it does require more than simply falling in love with the heroine. A lot of work is put into demonstrating that he deserves the money and power he accidentally inherited by virtue of birth8. This is necessary, because otherwise he’s just a lucky bastard who was born pretty and rich.
The key with a character like this is to establish their jerk nature first, then spend some time rehabilitating them9. The dynamic of despising someone and then discovering they’re not so bad after all is a powerful one, a redemption arc that allows the reader/viewer to feel like they’re getting to know the character in an intimate way. It’s presented as a defensive shell that we pierce via our attention and faithfulness, just like the romantic partner in the story.
It also makes it okay to like this guy, because we shouldn’t like him, should we? He’s an aristocrat who’s done nothing to deserve his life of easy pleasure and incredibly well-tailored clothes. And he’s the worst kind of lucky asshole, the kind who acts like all of his privilege and wealth are burdens. He’s exasperated, he’s irritable, and he is absolutely fucking convinced that his trauma trumps everyone else’s, thus excusing his behavior10. We should hate him. And some of us probably do, at first—and the rest of us probably would if the show didn’t put in the work to show us he’s actually a good guy.
The primary way this is done is the way he transforms into a gentle, supportive lover to Daphne Bridgerton, of course—albeit one with one last trick to play on someone he supposedly loves. But there are also the sequences where he worries over his tenants, the people who live on his land. These moments in the show serve no purpose other than to demonstrate that for all his angry bullshit, The Duke is actually a good person. Because if we don’t think he’ got a solid moral core, we’d absolutely hate him.
Frankly, My Dear
This isn’t an uncommon trope in literature—the asshole with the heart of gold goes back a long way, and continues to pop up regularly, from Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind to Severus Snape in Harry Potter to The Devil Wears Prada’s Amanda Priestly. The precise mechanics and balance of their jerkiness and their redemptive qualities is always a little different, but the basic pattern is the same: You hate them, a little or a lot, and then slowly you realize they’re not complete assholes11.
That’s what allows them some modicum of fictional dignity or happiness. The Duke of Hastings is an asshole. A pretty, rich asshole, but an asshole nonetheless. The show goes to some lengths to make him palatable—he’s good with children, he has a firm ethical code, and he cares very much for the people he is actively oppressing like the aristocratic parasite he is. So we can forgive Daphne for falling in love with him, and believe the usual lies about how he might someday soften and become a better person, which in turn serves as a defense for all the Jeff Bezos’ and Elon Musk’s of the world who are fantastically rich and actively destroying society and somehow humanized by brief, carefully curated moments of humanity12.
Of course, then there are people like me, who are 100 percent jerk but also have no power or money. And I can tell you from bitter experience we never get a redemption arc.
Next: The Suicide Squad sticks the ending.
The most American thing you can do, I think, is lug a jar full of pennies to the local supermarket in order to use their Coinbase machine because rent is going to eat 89% of your paycheck that month.
Then again, I once thought I was going to be a neurosurgeon, so I was obviously not the most self-aware or brightest of children.
I know better because any time I go to a fancy restaurant I spend the entire time petrified that I am violating obscure rules of behavior you only learn in boarding schools for the wealthy, and as a result no matter what happens I try to affect nonchalance. Waiter staggers out of kitchen on fire? I sip my drink and chortle knowingly at this obvious Rich People code.
In real life, of course, we tend to elect them President.
I mean, since I’m a plebian, I can only be rude, unconventional, and irritating in the privacy of my own home.
In real life, of course, the extremely rich spend most of their energies figuring out how to avoid paying taxes.
Unlike my own personal character arc, where most people initially think I’m an impoverished good person and then slowly realize I’m actually an impoverished jerk.
All I inherited was a tendency towards portliness and a love of alcohol.
Whereas I can tell you from bitter experience that when people figure out you’re a jerk, they spend exactly zero time working to rehabilitate you.
He’s also a guy who works out his frustrations/gets his exercise on by boxing a friend of a much lower socioeconomic status, and you know he’s never once thought about the ramifications of that. Because asshole.
The fact that in the 21st century the bar remains “not completely an asshole” is kind of depressing.
Brief, Carefully Curated Moments of Humanity will be one of my band names.