To feel shocked about this on a comedy programme?

I watched this when it was first on TV. I don't remember the 'rape' episode, but it's almost certain 'ravished' was meant, and also that the heroine wants something, anything to happen to end her total boredom (I came across a similar desire in Joan Russ's 'Extraordinary People', also written in the 70s).

'Butterflies' was a groundbreaking series (my ex-DH got quite annoyed with it) showing a woman attempting to take her life into her own hands and not be forever fitting in with what was expected - she plays with having an affair. Other sitcoms at the time included 'Ever Decreasing Circles' in which Richard Bryers played himself (as usual) with a downtrodden wife who also fantasizes about having an affair, and 'The Good Life',which depticts a marriage where the wife's wishes are often subordinated to her husband (it's R. Bryers again) - a revealing episode was when the wife tears her only decent dress and Bryers tells her it doesn't matter as they never go anywhere that needs more than a pair of jeans and an old jumper.
They are painful to watch now because they were showing the lives of women who were mid-to-late-thirties who were articulate but without any options - only M/C women, of course, working-class rarely done and always badly (ditto now). Those lives were entirely built round their husbands and children, with no outlets to be themselves. 'Butterflies' was different in that the wife searches for options whereas the others mostly do not.
Those sitcoms made us sit up and think. Many women of my generation came to the same conclusion as I did: if I can earn my own money then what am I doing in an increasingly difficult marriage? We were brought to those conclusions not just by consciousness-raising groups (pretty thin on the ground outside universities) but by sitcoms like 'Butterflies'. None of the women in the sitcoms ever did have an affair but the women who watched decided they were not going to be stuck in a marriage like those depicted (all too realistically) and went out to make their own way. We owe Carla Lane that.

In the same vein I recently revisited a book by an author I love - more for for herself than her writing, if I’m honest, because she strikes me as someone who’s warm and witty and wise. Her stuff is generally light-hearted and this was an early one from 2006. I actually had to look at the publication date because there was a throwaway reference in it that stopped me in my tracks, it was so fucking awful and inappropriate and not funny in any way, shape or form.

I don’t believe it’s something she’d write today, and if it was brought to her attention I think she’d be mortified. But if you start from the assumption that she was not somehow a more terrible person when she wrote it, and that she wasn’t intentionally trying to shock or appear morally bankrupt, you have to assume it was deemed appropriate ‘humour’ at the time, by her, her editor, her publisher and her readers. And this was not that long ago!

People get educated and sensibilities change, hopefully for the better. The grim fucking stuff that passed for entertainment in the past can only serve - as with all historical artefacts - as a reflection of the times in which it was created.

YANBU OP but that was the 70’s 🤦‍♀️

Isn’t it alluding to the fact that as a respectable married woman she can’t say she wants to be ravished by a man who’s not her husband? Rape would be less of a scandal than being promiscuous 🤷🏻‍♀️. I’m not saying I agree with that but maybe that’s what was behind the writing.

alternatively rape fantasy is a thing and supposedly some women take it seriously and go rape baiting and get raped.

Well it was written during a time when well educated and intelligent women were expected to give up on any ambition, stay at home and raise a family. There was a lot of valium and gin addiction.

I've never seen the show, and from what you've said I agree it wouldn't be made now. Obviously rape isn't funny and shouldn't be a punchline.

This story, though, sounds like a poorly expressed wish to be overpowered by a handsome stranger and have actual satisfying sex for once, without having to take responsibility for cheating on her husband or having bad morals. This kind of rape fantasy thing isn't really about actual rape, is it

As a pp said, rape carried on being a 'joke' far more recently than you think. I went to Uni in the late 2000s and lots of the 'lads' I knew would say things like 'oh I'd rape her' to mean 'I'd like to have sex with her but she wouldn't want to have sex with me'. It used to make so angry because I knew that one of their friends had actually been raped.

I bet they're all horrified now they used to speak like that. It was all the Russell Brand type culture.

I'm mortified that we all used to call things 'gay' in the 90s to mean lame or rubbish. I'm glad times have changed.

Hasn't rape always meant rape though?

It was a drama written in a light hearted manner about a desperately unhappy middle class housewife. It is how many middle class housewife's felt, which is why it was so popular.

Follow up on the Daily Mail article from the end of June?

I agree, I always saw Rhea as a very sad unhappy character (who also moaned alot 😂).
I watched it with my mum because the oldest son was hot.

It is very melancholic. Plenty of sitcoms have copied the formula though. I always saw ‘My Family’ as a more lighthearted ‘Butterflies’; grumpy dentist dad (both called Ben), lazy kids, teenage single parent, mum who was terrible at cooking.

I watched Butterflies as a teenager in the 90's. I don't remember this scene but I was definitely affected by the programme. A pp mentioned gilded cage. Yes. It made me determined to always work and never be totally reliant on a man.

Lots of things aren't funny eg rape, incest, child abuse, cancer, domestic violence, murder etc etc but it doesn't stop someone somewhere making a bad taste joke about it.

It was shocking at the time and criticised.

I just look at comedies from the 70's and am thankful we're not here anymore.

Some of the stuff that comes up in shows that look back at the 70s are pretty eye opening.

@WLGYLMLAAG

Interesting, recently working with an African woman victim of DV, explained marital rape was illegal in the UK. She laughed out loud and said you English have funny laws.

I think some of the younger posters on here have no idea about the objectification of women which continued well into the future past Bread and into the new millennium. It's only in the last 15 years or so that what used to be everyday stuff has become taboo.

I haven't seen it but I know my Mum used to watch it. She would also joke about "trying her luck" when people said about not walking home in the dark on her own when I was younger. But then I've also told her off in the last 5 years or so for saying my niece was "asking for it going out dressed like that". I genuinely have no idea where she got her attitude from as her parents weren't like it and we all pull her up on it

Modern family had a few bad jokes like that

Watching it now there's nothing comedic about Butterflies, it's desperately sad imo.

Oh dear lord. I never said it was.

I’m sorry for what you went through. I didn’t write the script! I was merely saying 40 years ago, some bright spark thought it was ok. We’ve learnt a lot in society since then.

Was the point that she was so miserable and fed up she actually thought rape might be 'a nice change?'

We know better now for sure but it was years ago, a different time altogether.