There was a spy show which actually discussed this trope, cannot remember which, where it was said that if a man was smart enough to be trusted with whatever important responsibility he has, he probably would not be too dumb to realise that the pretty girl is a distraction. So honeypots rarely work.
(Okay, I’ll stop, I know this and the similar comment on the other thread are either at or just over the border of hijacking. No more I promise.)
It doesn’t annoy me on general principles, because I know that it works in some real life situations. For example, we’ve all seen the videos showing racism/sexism in which someone is trying to steal a bike in a park. The black male is accosted almost right off the bat by people trying to stop him. The white male gets a few sideways glances, but is eventually stopped. The pretty blonde girl has people offering to help her steal it! No one tries to stop her. So this TV trope might actually be one of the most true to life.
I’ve seen a similar video showing people struggling with luggage. Again, the pretty girl has people falling over each other to help.
On the other hand, yes, it is often a sign of lazy writing and is often done in cases that do not make sense. People interacting with strangers at a park or airport are in a different mindset than a guard with a specific duty.
I think it’s sexist too. But it’s also sexist to depict a professional woman to be the type to prostitute herself to get what she wants.
ETA: So I guess they cancel each other out. 
My wife and I were watching Doc Martin the other night. In the episode, a rich, extremely flirtatious woman set her sights on the Doc, with the plot line being that she was supposed to make his unrequieted love interest horribly jealous and insecure. Halfway through, I commented to my wife how incredibly unbelievable the whole thing was. It was almost insulting to expect us to believe that this character would fall for such a ridiculously blatant grab for his affections. In the end, the writing was a bit cleverer than that, but still, it’s the same point. SOME men are genuinely able to maintain affection for female A, even if female B begins flirting with them.
It can also work if she has tats.
“They’re called boobs, Ed.”
It is sexist. The only reason I forgive this and other shortcuts is that shows have 42 minutes to get to their conclusion. It is unrealistic, but real is boring TV and getting past the point in 30 seconds gets to the real reason I’m watching whatever show it is.
As a man I find the whole thing highly offensive and…
Look! Boobs!
I’ve helped pretty girls with luggage more than once, but if one of them asked me to let her onto our trading floor without a badge, I’d immediately have security hold her until the police arrived.
This was something I wondered about in Catch Me If You Can. Frank Abignale gets women to help him out with little indiscretions throughout the flick. The reason it’s not as annoying is a) It’s based on a real con man, b) it’s understood that he has a special talent for it, and c) it doesn’t always work.
That seems like a really bad way to decide if something is sexist or not.
Right, there are plenty of incompetent dads out there but commercials where the dad is always bewildered at the baby are still sexist and gross
No question, a female cop/detective/spy/agent/thief flirting her way past security is a cliche. Sexist? Eh, a little, I suppose.
Is it realistic? Well, remember that there are all different types of “security” personnel at all different types of buildings. Sometimes, security is an absolute joke, and even a big ugly guy like ME could walk past a lazy, bored, distracted minimum wage “guard.”
In such places, COULD a pretty girl get past “security” with a smile and a wink? Probably.
But there are other places where that kind of thing would be utterly impossible. For example, I had a co-worker who was a colonel in the Air Force. He used to laugh at movies like
Iron Eagle, which showed a bunch of kids who went all over an Air Force base without any supervision, and eventually stole an F-15 to go to the Middle East and rescue one of their fathers.
This co-worker told me that at REAL Air Force bases, security was no laughing matter. If he himself, a well-known aviator, tried to get into a plane and take off without his ID badge and a flight plan, armed guards would have turned him away immediately. That is, even guards who KNEW and RECOGNIZED him would have turned him away if he didn’t have proper official clearance, and wouldn’t have hesitated to draw their guns if he’d tried to proceed without them.
At that kind of base, a cute chick in a miniskirt isn’t going to flirt her way past security.
Nitpick: they stole two F-16 Fighting Falcons. Which made no sense, given the title of the movie and pissed me off when I saw it. I love the F-15 Eagle.
I hate this, too. It smacks of ‘sex tips’ type advice from Cosmopolitan magazine, which puts the foolish idea in womens heads that they can bring any man anywhere in the world to his knees just by flashing cleavage. (something along those lines.) 1) it doesn’t work. 2) when it doesn’t work on TV or a movie, my heart soars like a hawk.
If I could tax your memory just a bit, which episode was this, and about how many minutes in did this scene happen?
You know, so I don’t see it by accident and get offended.
“Agents of SHIELD” had a bit of fun with this trope in one episode. Grant, the chiseled, emotionless agent, was taking the place of a captured female enemy agent. The captured agent had an implant in her head so her controller could print instructions to her directly in her field of view - SHIELD had intercepted the signal and was transmitting them to Grant as well. He infiltrated the facility, got to the final room with a male security guard, and the instruction “SEDUCE HIM” popped up. Grant knocked him out instead, and of course it turned out he needed a code that only the now unconscious guard knew to prevent the alarms from going off.
Yeah, exactly my point. The context of the situation is incredibly important. The TV trope is very true to life in certain kinds of situations. The problem (for me, anyway) is only when the script writers think that what works for luggage should also work for Fort Knox.
It doesn’t bug me because it’s sexist, but because it’s overused and lazy.
I’m not even sure I would call it sexist, because it demeans both the woman and the man, ultimately. She can only get what she wants because she’s sexy, and he can’t think with his big head instead of his smaller one.