miss henrietta stackpole under observation, the irony of henrietta and ralph

the next chapter (ch. 10) sees the observation of miss stackpole the journalist. i don't need to say that she is the representation of industrious american professionals at that time, because the text itself asserts that. 

she's a correspondent of 'the interviewer'. she is travelling to england to see life and report it to her newspaper. she's interested in things related to human, she likes observing people from different cultures (or, i think it's better to say that she likes pointing out how they are different from her tradition and, even worse, how they are often worse than her tradition). at the beginning, to her, everything is reportable, without considering her objects' right not to like being reported. and here isabel shows her that her uncle and cousin might not like her reporting their life in gardencourt. 

in her conversation with ralph, in which she suggests him to get married, we can see one of miss stackpole's characters, that is, acting based on what is communally good (for people in her culture, American culture). she always says that one thing is good because other people do it. fir instance, marriage. to her marriage is everybody's duty. she doesn't seem to question the basic value behind marriage, thus she doesn't want to know certain condition when someone decides to put off marriages or not to get married altogether. she is a good example of the people of the crowd. 

later, in a chat session between ralph and isabel, we can read how miss stackpole is discussed and analyzed. isabel asserts that miss stackpole is 'the emanation of the great democracy', that is, america. and ralph doesn't like miss stackpole on that ground. 

this short notion of ralph's dislike of her patriotism somehow shows another character of ralph, being cosmopolitan, which is very normal for someone who has lived in a foreign country for so long and does not see the importance of holding tight the tradition from his homecountry while living in a foreign country. we can infer that he has known the insignificance of inherited custom. however, he doesn't seem to show tendency to be in accordance with the custom of the place where he lives. he is the kind of people who is either in the tense between succumbing to the foreign setting where he lives and leaving his country's custom or really free from any constraint of customs. 

there's an irony here, while miss stackpole who has a very liberal-like profession as a journalistand can travel to another continent separated by an ocean from her homeland cannot really free her mind from the constraint of her traidition, ralph who has a serious illness and cannot even choose a profession, inspite of his knowledge, is totally free from any custom and has a real freedom to do anything he wants, to be a real individual, to be different, or to be himself (as mtv generation suggests).