Programme - it was alright in the 70's FUCKING HELL!

[PatButchersLostEaring]

Anyone else watching this and feeling utterly shocked that it was only 40ish years ago?

My dh who is 58, worked in sales in the 90's and during his training was told over and over again that 'sex sells' Pretty girls draped over the products etc. It still happens.

See the first episode of this seasons Apprentice. First challenge - lots of selling. Men versus Women. The leader of the women's team instructed them all to wear short skirts and lots of make-up and looked utterly bemused when some refused, said they hadn't even brought a short skirt with them, weren't going to plaster themselves in slap and that it was unprofessional. She still thinks sex sells. Horrible. Stupid woman. Can't forget the looks of horror on some of the other women's faces.

Wasn't there a crack down at this years World Cup on the close up shots of women in the crowds watching football" close up of stunning looking women and cleavage", because it was so obvious the cameraman was a man .

Perhaps rape was used sort of casually back then when people meant taking a partner but who wanted them back? And not the way we see it today as non-consenting sex?

I don't think it's as enlightened as that. I think it was more that the idea was that women couldn't possibly want sex (hence when they were shown wanting sex it was done in such a ridiculously cartoonish way) / or shouldn't want sex and hence men take it by force, as that is the way things work. When the women were talking about "rape fantasies" this is what they meant - that the men were taking sex by force because that was how it worked but they did actually want to have sex. Confusing, damaging. I would say I'm glad that is in the past, but it's not really.

It explains a lot to me about my mum's attitude to men. I find it depressing. I think that in the most part it is better today, but the parts where the media is still exploitative are much worse.

I found it a bit ironic that Matt Lucas was saying how shocking/ridiculous the attitudes were, especially to the Miss World stuff, yet near the end he made a comment about the appearance/fanciability of a newsreader.

WhereYouLeftIt - I can remember thinking at the time it was incredible that Jack with the wild pensioner hair and tombstone teef was somehow irresistible to women. Or "dolly birds" as they were then called. And Stan, who was maybe 60, also being a would-be Jack The Lad...

But what else struck me at the time (and does even more forcibly when you watch these back) is the characterisation of Olive as "fat" and "ugly". She looked to be about a size 12-14, onscreen at least, and actually slimmer than a lot of women who were, at that time touted as 'sexy' (before our fascination with women being size zero). Same in 'Fawlty Towers' - when you see the re-runs and they're always going on about Sybil being fat. She truly isn't.

In the 70s I had a tiny waist and was so skinny they didn't make women's clothes in the shops that fitted me (I remember clothes often started at size 10, even finding size 8 wasn't easy\ and that would have swum on me when I was 15-19). My stepsisters were all easily size 14 or 16 and constantly telling me how ugly and repulsive I was as I was "too thin". About a size 14 was the societal norm/ thing to aspire to. Or so I felt. Can remember another thing I loathed about beauty contests was when they read out their "vital statistics" - they always had 24" waists which was way bigger than me. And I was made to feel a freak. In other words: Olive and Sybil weren't fat they were actually the desirable size, at that time...

Things like 'Love Thy Neighbour' are easy targets and rightly so, but we forget even hallowed shows liek 'Fawlty Towers' were full of sexism and xenophobia. (Polly, the 'pretty one', had all the desirable characterics, but was also really little more than a cardboard cut out, no more realised as a character than, say Stab's mum in 'On The Buses').

Over 40 years or so the view of what is the norm but also what women are told by the media to aspire to, has shifted. But I was a bit sceptical about the Gogglebox style staged reactions of people like Shappi Khorsandi, as I do wonder if a lot of the stuff that shocks us about 70s' TV isn't still there, but in a different guise, in contemporary culture?

We watched this last night - I am very open minded but I was SHOCKED at what passed as entertainment back in the 70s! Truly shocked at some of the stuff - especially the leering over school girls and the grandad thing - that was just yuck! Thank goodness things changed somewhat!

*Stan not Stab. Doh!

Tardis my Mum was offered a part in The Benny Hill Show and turned it down. My Dad used to watch it and laugh though .

Me and DH watched some of it. We were both born in the 60s, so did remember some of the shows. However we didn't remember how wrong some of the scenarios really were!

I think will make DS (16) watch it on catch up at some point - just so he can see how things are changing for the better. Slowly.

it was the beauty contest that really got me open mouthed. Awful, awful, awful.

Oh, and the shampoo add - we all need bouncy hair when about to be raped by a viking.

sigh. ):

Was this on ITV ? I can't find it.

No. It was channel 4. Found it. :)

You have a lot to learn about parenting.

'No more than you had to learn when you had your first'

Call her on every single thing, every single time. Do not let her get away with snide remarks. There's no need to be confrontational, just a simple 'what was that?' Or 'can you repeat that?' Every. Single. Time.

She wants to mother your baby, she has made that very clear. You need to put your boundaries up NOW so she knows what to expect. Decide what you want and make it common knowledge NOW. Only DH at the hospital. Time to bond as a family and for you and DH to get to know your baby so she doesn't think she's moving in for a month after you give birth. Therefore visitors will be invited for short periods while DH is on paternity leave. Admission by invite only and for an hour (or whatever suits). You will be emotional after the birth OP so be prepared and do not let her ride roughshod over you. DH gets on board now and he is the one to tell her.

You're going to have to protect your child so now's the time to start doing it. There's absolutely no need to be alone with her - I assume your DM doesn't call round to impose on your DH when he's home ill and needs to rest? If you don't expect him to do this for your DM, then why should he expect you to do it for his?

Joffrey im glad im not the only one to be bewildered by the references to Olives weight in that "sitcom" She is nowhere near fat.

What also didnt sit very well with me was that Arthur and Olives relationship (which was obviously an abusive one) was seen as something to be laughed at.

FFS! How on earth has my phone managed to post on the wrong thread?!

As you were

Some of this of sexist stuff still continues- even in the past decade we have had shows like Brainiac- a kids science show, disgusting portrayals of women.

The thing that stood out for me was that they were all (rightly so) sneering about things like the viking rape shampoo advert and the use of women draped over game show prizes but then it cut to the ad break, where a half naked woman was writhing around on a silk sheet to advertise a car. So the broadcasters didn't even have the tact to accept only non-exploitative adverts for that timeslot.

Ugh, I didn't see ads as watched online but that's quite jarring, isn't it?

I was brought up in the 70's. I only saw a snippet of the programme and can well understand how shocked younger people must be.
On the up-side of the 70's, we had:
No social media bullying.
No suicide websites.
Far less self-harm and messed up kids which is now very popular.
Very few fat kids, we walked to school.
Drugs if you could afford it, not given on "tick" which ends in tears (or worse) if you can't pay up.
Less opportunity to buy drugs.
Less gun and knife crime.
Tougher magistrates.
Greater respect for our elders, police, teachers, seniority and authority in general.
Christmases, birthdays and holidays we could afford, not on credit.
The IRA which was more worrying as a child than Benny Hill etc !
I could bang on for hours. There are truly far worse things going on now than the seventies.

I watched this last night on 4od having seen this thread yesterday. I was born in 1969, so was a child in the seventies and watching this sort of telly.
This programme was very selective in its depiction of telly then; much of it would have been pretty benign.
It was stated on the programme that the grandad/ granddaughter thing with Alison Steadman was not actually broadcast when programmers realised how offensive it was, so why are people making a fuss about it now?
Likewise, the viking shampoo advert was pulled.
Back then, those short-skirted cleavagey pouting women were called 'dolly birds'. I knew that men liked them and wanted to kiss them and take their clothes off (though I didn't know what sex was) but they bore no resemblance to the real life women I knew: mine and my friends' mums, my teachers, other working women or housewives, so I didn't think I was supposed to grow up to be one. They were male fantasy figures, essentially, that shouldn't have featured in mainstream telly.

The schoolgirls as sex objects was disgusting and shocking, as were the comedy references to rape though I think they were hardly commonplace.
And yes, I agree with others that in many ways thaings have not improved much.

I was born in 58, and remember 70s tv the first time around, thanks! Benny Hill was already on the way out thank goodness. My parents thought he was ghastly.

I shall try to steel myself to watch it on catchup, and see what other, er, delights were featured.

There was some good stuff, honest! Chronicle was often pretty good, iirc.

I remember the viking rape ad - it must have been on a while?

What about all those 'Hai Karate' and 'Brut' ads, as well with men using it then pulling dolly birds? Same as the Lynx ads, I guess, only today they dress it up as post-modern irony. Whilst still showing bikini-clad women.

And the Lambs Navy Rum ad

The Viking shampoo thing I thought was more about her boobs about to fall out of her top!

she seemed happy enough to be carted off by him though!

Don't agree about Faulty Towers. All he characters are caricatures except Polly, whose common sense shows up the stupidity of all the others, not just Sybil.

Also, with the exception of Mr O'Reilly the Irish builder, the humour is anti-racist. The chef and the Major are not held up for admiration.