The Born Sexy Yesterday Trope

first pic has done me. had to step outside for some fresh air.

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Yeah. I guess it’s because of the point he makes about the writing clearly being about saying no means yes.

I mean in terms of context, these are not remotely new are they? Many films prior to this used the same dynamic. I’m trying to recall where I read it, but there was a piece somewhere about how at a certain point in time women were forced into behaving in this way due to chaperone rules or something? That society expected a negative response combined with overtures that a man should continue. I’ll see if I can find it. Obviously it wasn’t about excusing this sort of thing, just explaining a background to this view of relationships.

Back when I was at school (the 80s) I know it was a given that women would ‘play hard to get’. This was just the expected way of things that boys grew up with. Fucking hell.

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I have never heard of it but that means nothing

DiS favourite Laurie Penny has just retweeted this article. Atheist prayers for you and yours, Theo.

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I got it from cool band Labyrinth Ear.

I certainly felt that was still the case growing up the 90s/early 00s

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These tropes are nothing new. Look at Much Ado About Nothing - Beatrice and Benedict supposedly hate each other, fight a lot, slag each other off, but of course deep down they’re actually in love.

You just have to read it in the Bard’s tongue etc etc.

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Paterson.

Err, two people who are antagonistic but actually in love isn’t the same thing as a guy pursuing a woman who is antagonistic to him.

different trope

It’s not romancing though is it? It’s mimicking sexual assault/domestic violence. Whether or not Ridley Scott intended that is another thing but there’s a deep coding there which is a bit troubling. While I agree Deckard is certainly not the “good guy” as Dr. Jones or Han Solo (although solo isn’t far off at times) and is a much more complex character, there’s no denying that scene is quite off

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Well, he’s an anti-hero sure. Not sure about this “time before consent was worried about” comment though

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fair enough, certainly stands to reason, I don’t love Blade Runner as it is, maybe this is why/watching it wrong

no for sure it makes sense to me, I didn’t like him/Harrison’s performance at all the first time of watching, this reading does make sense

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@Severed799 has covered it really but I just want to say that this sort of excusing of the situation doesn’t wash with me. There are loads of ways you can frame the other situations to let the film off, but I don’t think that makes it alright.

Fundamentally the film is normalising a view of women and relationships that’s not good and if we’re meant to take some specific context for how this isn’t what it looks like, the filmmakers have failed to provide that explicitly. And they should do.

Characters who do bad things in the mind of the filmmakers are always shown to have done something bad, be it just by the reactions on the faces of bystanders or being pulled up by characters later.

Of course there are complex films where mulitple characters are at fault but, again, it’s clear where the faults are. Something like The Proposition comes to mind. We’re left in no doubt about the morality of different actions.

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Yeah there’s also the issue of a lot of stories treating the female characters as prizes to be awarded to the male protagonist at the end.

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There’s a good article here from Ta-Nehisi Coates about film noir.

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