# Television episodes that wouldn’t fly today **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 20, 2017, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312 "2017-02-20T12:21:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/141 "2019-01-15T16:03:33Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > And when it comes to complaining about obscenity there was the episode in which a woman vandalized a painting in the window of an art gallery. It was a female nude, and the vandal complained it was inappropriate. The painting had been done decades earlier. Barney looked at the woman, judging her age, and guessed correctly that the woman had, in her youth, been the model, and was now mightily embarrassed about it. Then there’s the _Dick VanDyke_ episode where Laura is so proud of a black sweater she bought she, commissioned a struggling artist to paint a portrait of her wearing it for $25. Thing was, using his imagination he painted the portrait without the sweater (or anything else) on her. She was so mortified she fled without taking the painting. Years later he’s made it big time and the Laura nude is included in a big art show in Manhattan. Rob demands he take it down but the artist refuses, saying he had two potential buyers for about $5,000, one in New York and the other in Brazil. Rob points out the painting had been sold to Laura and the artist had no right to resell it. “I’m not gonna hand you my painting and watch you destroy it!” “Oh, no, I wouldn’t do that; it’s too good and I wouldn’t want to deprive you of the money. But you know that guy on a mountain top in Brazil…” “Gone like it had wings!” ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/142 "2019-01-15T16:11:51Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > Let’s just imagine we had a huge debate about this and skip to the end.🙂 We did [https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb//showthread.php?t=799498](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb//showthread.php?t=799498) ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/143 "2019-01-15T16:17:54Z")
episode where Mrs. Cleaver says “Ward don’t you think you were too hard on the beaver last night?” 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/144 "2019-01-15T18:33:27Z")
**[Moderating]** > [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > If you are too damn lazy to click on a damn link and read a description, why the hell should I jump through hoops to spoon feed you? Please imagine I have made a suggestion that can be used only in The Pit. First of all, it is indeed the customary and polite standard practice on this board, when posting a link, to include a brief summary of the content of the link. Sure, clicking a link might not be much effort, but it’s even less effort for one person (who’s already followed that link anyway) to give a summary than for all of the readers to view it. Second, your response here to this social norm is _way_ more heated than it needs to be. Cool it, right now. I recommend that you take a step away from this thread for a day or two, if that will help you keep your temper. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/145 "2019-01-15T18:47:20Z")
Sick over the last couple of days and was bingeing **NCIS**. Went through almost all of the first 2 seasons. In every episode, Tony does something that would get him called in to HR, if not outright fired for inappropriate behavior. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/146 "2019-01-15T20:56:16Z")
Speaking of, The Todd in _Scrubs_ is an HR’s worst nightmare. ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/147 "2019-01-15T21:10:49Z")
_Get Smart:_ the two-parter at the end of Season Four, where a bunch of CONTROL agents (including Max and the Chief) are prisoners in a secret KAOS POW camp (it’s supposed to be a spoof of _Hogan’s Heroes_ and _The Great Escape._) At one point, Max has a plan to try to climb the electric fence surrounding the camp. The Chief rebuts this idea, pointing at an African-American man standing a few feet away and saying that _he_ tried that plan last week. Max: “So? He looks okay to me.” Chief: “He was _white_ when he got here.” :eek::smack: ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/148 "2019-01-15T21:19:51Z")
There were many episodes of Gilligan’s Island where Ginger, or occasionally Mary Ann, would act sexually suggestively to one of the unmarried men (Gilligan, the Skipper or the Professor). The man would become uncomfortable and find an excuse to flee the situation. Today that type of scenario would only be used if the male character were gay. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/149 "2019-01-15T21:42:08Z")
> [@MrKnowItAll](#): > > I’ve been rewatching a lot of “Barney Miller” lately. While it’s still very, very funny, there’s some pretty cringe-worthy episodes. And not even the ones that they intended to be uncomfortable. > > (snipped) > > There’s “Atomic Bomb” in which a college student builds a thermonuclear device as a physics project, and gets little more than a slap on the writst. That was likely inspired by this story. > **[A Princeton Tiger Designs An Atomic Bomb in a Physics Class](https://people.com/archive/a-princeton-tiger-designs-an-atomic-bomb-in-a-physics-class-vol-6-no-17/)** > > A Princeton Tiger Designs An Atomic Bomb in a Physics Class More on the guy who did it: > **[John Aristotle Phillips](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Aristotle_Phillips)** > > John Aristotle Phillips (born August 23, 1955) is a U.S. entrepreneur specializing in political campaigns, who became famous for attempting to design a nuclear weapon while a student. > Phillips was born in August 1955 to Greek immigrant parents and raised in North Haven, Connecticut. > Phillips attended Princeton University as an undergraduate. He was a major in physics, and played the tiger mascot at sports events. > While an undergraduate physics major at Princeton University, he attended a sem... How about the “Maude” episode where she found herself pregnant in her late 40s, and had an abortion? None of that would fly nowadays either, not on a sitcom anyway. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/150 "2019-01-15T21:44:00Z")
> [@Patch](#): > > To be fair, the bomb had no explosive components in it, but the design would have worked. I recall a story from Reader’s Digest from the 70s about a physics student who designed an atomic bomb as a research paper and only had the paper confiscated His name was John Aristotle Phillips, and he wrote a book about the experience, called _Mushroom: The True Story of the A-Bomb Kid._ I met him at a conference once, where he was representing a software company he later founded. Nice guy, and we had a couple of good laughs quoting some of the lines from the book. ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/151 "2019-01-15T22:16:12Z")
> [@psychobunny](#): > > The Honeymooners has always bothered me. I never understood why threatening domestic violence was considered funny. (“One of these days Alice-right in the kisser!”) I would hope that wouldn’t be acceptable today. It reminds me of an episode of _Leave it to Beaver_ I saw recently, where all his friends have convinced the Beav that Ward is going to beat him when he gets home. Obviously, Ward doesn’t beat the Beaver, illustrating what a magnanimous, even tempered, wise, modern dad he was. I think of that when I watch _The Honeymooners_. I figure, in a world where domestic violence is extremely common (and as others have mentioned above, in this time period movies where a man spanks his wife were frequent and applauded by both sexes), the fact that Ralph just _talks_ about it, and never actually lays a finger on Alice, shows what a big lovable galoot he is. All bark and no bite. For the 1950s, that was fairly progressive. It’s not hard to find contemporary media where men are shown to be weak and/or cowardly for _not_ committing violence on women and children. _It’s good for them, don’t you know? Builds character. Really, you are withholding important life lessons by **not** beating them. So beat your wife and kids, for their sake. Brought to you by Winston. Tastes good, like a cigarette should._ ---
**Author:** ![SuntanLotion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/suntanlotion/32/16165_2.png) [@SuntanLotion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SuntanLotion)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/152 "2019-01-15T22:45:25Z")
> [@CaptMurdock](#): > > - > > Chief: “He was _white_ when he got here.” > > :eek::smack: Oh my god, that’s funny. What I would like to have seen is going back in time and showing South Park to viewers back in the 50s. ---
**Author:** ![Tinker\_Grey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tinker_grey/32/8136_2.png) [@Tinker\_Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tinker_Grey)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/153 "2019-01-15T22:58:08Z")
> [@wguy123](#): > > Why wouldn’t this show/scenario fly today? I’m pretty sure I see more overtly sexual things on TV today. Of course, I watch entirely through Netflix and other streaming platforms so I’m not always sure where something came from (I can pick out the HBO shows though so I’m not talking about them). You’d have to ask the poster who referenced it originally. I don’t know that the OP said it wouldn’t fly, just that he/she was surprised it made it passed the censors. ---
**Author:** ![Tinker\_Grey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tinker_grey/32/8136_2.png) [@Tinker\_Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tinker_Grey)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/154 "2019-01-15T22:59:16Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > It was me that was suprised that it flew on NBC in Prime-Time in the 1990s. Ah, yes. ---
**Author:** ![Patch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a183cd/32.png) [@Patch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patch)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/155 "2019-01-16T00:27:32Z")
> [@Typo\_Negative](#): > > Sick over the last couple of days and was bingeing **NCIS**. > > Went through almost all of the first 2 seasons. In every episode, Tony does something that would get him called in to HR, if not outright fired for inappropriate behavior. Probably getting stuff wrong, but I recall an episode where they all had to go to sexual harassment training (?). Anyway, they kept asking ‘hypothetical’ questions about their behavior, and kept getting shot down by the instructor. I remember Abby looking horrified that she wasn’t supposed to be hugging people at work. ---
**Author:** ![Fair\_Rarity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fair_rarity/32/153_2.png) [@Fair\_Rarity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fair_Rarity)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/156 "2019-01-16T01:45:03Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Just Shoot Me was an unbelievably bad show, with one outstanding episode: Slow Donnie. > > Try getting that one on the air today. Chicken Pot Chicken Pot Chicken Pot Pie I probably haven’t seen it in 15 years and yet it haunts me. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/157 "2019-01-16T02:45:19Z")
NuBSG washed both the main African-American characters from the Original. Also at some point… while resisting their occupiers who follow a different religion… the humans resort to suicide bombing while vaguely middle-eastern music plays. I don’t think the above is by default bad…but I’m sure some HuffPo and AV Club writers would have something to say. ---
**Author:** ![x-ray\_vision](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/x-ray_vision/32/351_2.png) [@x-ray\_vision](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/x-ray_vision)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/158 "2019-01-16T04:15:00Z")
There are lots of old cartoon episodes with blatant racism that wouldn’t fly today, but an episode of The Flintstones seemed to have slipped in a dirty joke not meant for everyone to get: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/3Vcn-_BQEmY/hqdefault.jpg "Dirty joke on the Flintstones") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vcn-_BQEmY) I can’t see how that could refer to anything innocent. No one would try to get away with slipping something like that into a kid’s show in the internet age. Sure, a lot of the jokes were meant for adults to get, but nothing that pushed the envelope and it was probably mostly watched by kids. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/159 "2019-01-16T04:20:55Z")
> [@x-ray\_vision](#): > > There are lots of old cartoon episodes with blatant racism that wouldn’t fly today, but an episode of The Flintstones seemed to have slipped in a dirty joke not meant for everyone to get: > > [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vcn-\_BQEmY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vcn-_BQEmY) > > I can’t see how that could refer to anything innocent. No one would try to get away with slipping something like that into a kid’s show in the internet age. Sure, a lot of the jokes were meant for adults to get, but nothing that pushed the envelope and it was probably mostly watched by kids. I remember that joke! I always interpreted it this way: that Barney and Fred were planning to go as some kind of conjoined-twin sort of thing. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312/160 "2019-01-16T10:58:03Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > The episode of _One Day at a Time_ where Ann leaves her boyfriend to chaperone a party for Barbara and Julie, and against Ann’s orders, they have beer at the party. The party gets shut down when the adults figure it out, but no one gets in any real trouble, and they show teens getting really drunk. > > **I’m not sure what the drinking age in California was in the mid-70s, where the show was written and filmed, and I realize that in much of the country it was 18, but in Indiana, where the show was set, it was 21.** However, even in Indiana, underage drinking was kinda pooh-poohed. I was about five years younger than Barbara and Julie, and went to high school in Indiana, and underage drinking by 17- to 20-years-olds was not a big thing even in the early 80s. > > Nowadays, on TV, it usually has to end with someone in the hospital for alcohol poisoning, or some other really dire consequence. Drinking age in California was 21. As a Californian of 62 years, I cannot remember a time when it wasn’t. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/television-episodes-that-wouldn-t-fly-today/780312.md?page=9)