I will confess I have never seen the rom-com classic of 1984, Sixteen Candles. I don't do rom-coms, to be honest.
Perhaps that gives me the perspective to note:
1. The subplot described is, by 2018 standards (my standards in 2018, at least), horrible.
2. Had I watched it in 1984, I probably would have thought then that it was funny.
Is this an accurate summary of the subplot? I don't intend to watch the film (for even more reasons now), but surely someone who has seen it can provide some perspective. Just as it applies some perspective to the current events.
The rape culture of the 1980s, explained by Sixteen Candles
The beloved romantic comedy’s date rape scene provides important context for the Brett Kavanaugh accusations.
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Having seen the film many, MANY, times because my sister was a big fan of it: Yes, that's an accurate summary of the subplot. Molly Ringwald herself has written about her reflections on the John Hughes films she starred in, including Sixteen Candles, and talks about a conversation she had with the actress who played Caroline in the film years later here: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/personal-history/what-about-the-breakfast-club-molly-ringwald-metoo-john-hughes-pretty-in-pink
I was curious when the term "date rape" first appeared. It was actually bandied about in the 1970s, but it was discussed by wild fringe groups – you know, feminists, Ms. magazine, Mademoiselle magazine, and the like. The first comprehensive study of date rape was completed in 1987.
And even the Wikipedia discussion of date rape talks about college students (not high school students) and specifically mentions penetration.
(On a tangential topic, I've felt that the 1970s was, for better or worse, the most free decade in recent memory. Both George Carlin and Richard Pryor thrived during that decade – they couldn't have thrived in a previous decade (even the 1960s), and Pryor's act wouldn't be allowed today.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_rape#History_and_usage
This article was published in 2016 in Good Housekeeping. Yes, Good Housekeeping.
https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/parenting/a38915/teaching-my-sons-about-rape/
Good on Molly. If one individual is too incapacitated to properly reject, yet the other has the capacity to molest them – that's rape. And it's clear to me on which single individual the blame wholly lies. By the time you near a "grey area", both parties are unconscious, so it's irrelevant.
+Les Jenkins So, overall, ugh. And ugh to the idea that it would have amused me at the time (more from a tribal geek solidarity fantasy than in a slut-shaming fashion, but that's no improvement).
I don't think I would have behaved in such a fashion had the opportunity ever arisen (not that I was ever in circumstances when it might have). I certainly hope not.
Ugh.
+John E. Bredehoft I do actually remember when the term / concept of "date rape" became a thing, and how it was one of those concepts that was simultaneously novel and obvious once pointed out.
That is pretty much one of the subplots, though it wasn’t ever a “rom-com” as much as it was a teen comedy (they were big in the 80s during the summer, especially after Animal House and Porky’s (another movie with lots of issues)).
The other subplot that aged even worse (as in not more than 5 years before it was considered a racist stereotype), and I can only assume because the article was written by a white woman, was the Long Duck Dong character trying to find a white woman to have sex with. That character pretty much killed that actor’s career.
It’ll be interesting to see how long before Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, Some Kind of Wonderful or Superbad become taboo.
Why would Breakfast Club become taboo? I think that one tries to cast stereotypes as BS. It points out that no matter the walk of life, people have issues. Nothing is as perfect as it seems. The only trope that comes to mind is "pretty up the <outsider> girl, so she's physically attractive to the jock." But that's still used today in teen rom-coms.
+Brian Barth 2018 me is not sure, but it could in some way that I am not aware of right now.
The rape the what? I'm thinking k those movies out shine alot of today's stuff. Now says we don't have much that's fresh in terms of thinking.
One part where the article fails:
"That doesn’t mean that people went to see movies like Sixteen Candles and immediately thought, “Wow, that looks like fun, I’d better go get a bunch of girls drunk and have sex with them without their consent.”
That is exactly what millions of young men determined to be their most likely path to sex. Get a girl drunk enough that you can rape her & then get her to accept it as a "relationship" the next day. It's stupid but so is Axe body spray and they sell that crap by the truckload.
+John Poteet But was there a causation relationship between the movie and the desired activity, or just a correlation?
And don't forget Hai Karate.
http://makethelogobigger.blogspot.com/2007/01/hai-karate-original-axe.html
+John E. Bredehoft I think 50,000 beer commercials where D-cup blondes bounce eagerly over to fawn over the guy drinking Bud-Light may have also contributed. There was also the million square miles of booze ads in Playboy next to naked women.
One of the greatest benefits of the internet is that young men can now masturbate to porn without being exposed to alcohol ads.
Here in India, lots of songs still sound like a molesters lullaby