He’d probably been a decent human being for several iterations. He had a routine - every day he saved the kid falling out of the tree, saved the choking guy, changed the tire, and many other things I forgot. He had the timing and sequence memorized. He gave the best broadcast with the rodent that had the townspeople weeping. But yet, he kept repeating. What changed? He got the girl and he got insurance. Pick your favorite.
The time loop for Phil stopped not because he “got the girl” but because he had remade himself into someone that was an excellent and decent person. He didn’t now “deserve” Rita, but he was now deemed worthy of her by whatever force or entity caused the loop.
If you want a real ethical knot, try Predestination, based on the Heinlein story, -All You Zombies-.
The time traveler, as a man is the father of the baby she/he, as a woman, gives birth to, which turns out to be him/her. (and that’s as clear as it can be in one sentence)
You’re asking if a rapist is still bad if they raped in a supernatural setting. My reading of the OP doesn’t suggest rape. Let’s take it down a level instead.
If, on a first date, you show up with your best suit, expensive cologne, flowers and take her to an expensive restaurant, is that taking advantage. Clearly that’s not something you can, or will even be willing to do every time you see her but you are using “tricks” to ensure she will see you again.
Even in the real work, without the hypothetical, if I learned a girl who had caught my eye loved chocolate covered cherries, I might buy her some to hedge my bets. If if worked, does that make me a rapist?
Using prior knowledge of a persons likes/dislikes to ingratiate yourself to them does not equal rape.
Does it become more or less ethical if you can actually control the time loop?
In About Time, Domhnall Gleason has the power to loop back in time at will (as did his father played by Bill Nighy). He uses this power to advance his career and start a relationship with Rachel McAdams.
Now is character behaves very ethically. In fact, he almost looses the love of his life because he ends up using his time travel abilities to help a friend. But he could very easily have misused such powers.
But I would say that even if a person forgets what happened to them the next day, that doesn’t somehow negate all the actual harm, i.e. consequences, of something like rape or torture for the period of that day, or even that moment. Yes, the consequences are (potentially) much less severe than they otherwise would have been, but still significant enough in the case of rape or torture that it’s easy to condemn those actions, IMO, even if a person forgets what happened to them immediately after.
An interesting real world example of this is neonatal circumcision without any (or adequate) (local) anesthetic. Many may and have argued this is totally fine since putatively no one who was circumcised grows up to remember or complain about the pain and trauma this might have caused if they did remember it. I would say that it is still wrong to circumcise without anesthetic since it causes unnecessary pain. Some (orthodox) Jews may disagree and call me an anti-semite.
I liked it as well. The actress is Erinn Hayes – Process Elizabeth in the most recent Bill & Ted movie. I never watch Children’s Hospital. Here is her wikipedia page:
A perhaps even more appropriate real world example is, let’s say you’re going for your colonoscopy, and they give you that stuff that keeps you conscious but prevents you forming memories. And say after they take the scope out, they all take turns sticking their own “scopes” up there. And you kick and scream, but it does no good. They all have their way with you. But later you remember nothing. Can you prove harm if you have no trauma?