"Observe And Report" Date Rape Scene Sparks Outrage (VIDEO)

Seth Rogen's new film Observe and Report is under fire over a "date rape" scene in which Rogen's character has sex with an unconscious female after heavy drug and alcohol use.

"The movie doesn't mitigate that sex scene at all," writes New York's Dan Kois of the scene, portions of which are featured in the film's R-rated trailer (below). "In fact, it makes it even more clear than the trailer does that when Brandi and Ronnie get home from dinner, she's unbelievably trashed on antidepressants and tequila. Not only does she throw up all over the place, she can barely walk -- and she certainly can't give any kind of informed consent. She's way too wasted for her yelling at Ronnie to mean anything."

Seth Rogen discussed the scene in a recent interview:

SETH ROGEN: When we're having sex and she's unconscious like you can literally feel the audience thinking, like, how the fuck are they going to make this okay? Like, what can possibly be said or done that I'm not going to walk out of the movie theater in the next thirty seconds? . . . And then she says, like, the one thing that makes it all okay: "Why are you stopping, motherfucker?"

But critics, including several prominent feminist writers, aren't satisfied. Courtney at Feministing.com wrote on Friday:

It's not funny Seth. First of all, one out of six women in this country is sexually assaulted in her lifetime. Which means a whole lot of your bromen are confused about what consensual sex is. Is the laugh you get worth making them even more confused? Basically giving them permission from one of the most adored dudes of the moment to not take rape seriously? Yeah, we didn't think so.

Lindsay Beyerstein added:

Rogen excels at a brand of awkwardness-based humor where much of the laughter is tension release. Which means that the scene fails on its own terms, unless you believe that an unconscious person can consent. Without the unexpected "evidence" of consent, it's just a rape scene. If you see the encounter as rape, Brandi's slurred semi-conscious interjection just seems piteous. It doesn't make anything "okay."

A clip of the scene is featured in the film's R-rated trailer (at 2:35):

Quick Poll

What do you think about the "date rape" scene in Observe and Report?

Totally unacceptable. It's sick and wrong.

Sure, it's Rogen's movie, he can do whatever he wants, but can't we just avoid jokes about RAPE?

I thought it was funny (though I feel a little guilty about it).

It's a JOKE people. Get upset about more important things.

Share your vote on Facebook so your friends can take this poll

Comments

[Forrest Seymour]

For an interesting viewpoint on Observe & Report check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGIQPTa4s_g

[Turtleposer]

Is it ok for you to break into my house just because I have the lights off & I may or may not be home? You can't do just anything to a person just because the person's conked out and asleep. A woman's getting drunk is not the same as being invited to have sex. A man who can't get a woman to sleep with him without her consent is a coward & a thief.

[TheKidd]

also this opens a whole other Pandora's box. Are drug and sex addicts raped every time they have sex? Super heavy drug users often seem like they're in a daze even when they haven't just consumed drugs. does that mean they're never able to give consent and that anyone who has sex with a heavy drug user at anytime is a rapist? do people need to have a PHD in psychology and be medical doctors in order to have sex with other people? anytime people get married and go on their honeymoon, if they drink and have sex, are they being raped? even if they give consent before getting drunk, once they get drunk they are not capable of canceling consent. so women and men are not allowed to have drunken sex?

as we can see, it's not as black and white as people think.

[emmeaki]

I am a woman and I agree. In the scene, she asked why he was stopping, so she knew what was going on and she had no problem with it. She didn't scream and try to get out from under him. I' ve had drunken sex and my date was in no way a rapist!

[Sirkll]

Gah! I keep coming back and people are still arguing! You CAN"T say "Well I haven't seen the film, but I will type a thesis on how the film condones rape based on a quickly edited trailer". You can't. You haven't seen the film. You don't understand the movie, I don't care. See it and hate it. But stop being so intolerant. This is the height of arrogance to pass judgment based on your misunderstanding of a trailer. That is what bothers me. People are frothing at the mouth and quoting rape statistics based on 15 seconds from a trailer? Read the quotes from people who have actually SEEN the film. Stop screaming until you have.

[moreDumber]

I always get my morals from movies.
I always thought date rape was wrong... but now my eyes are opened! Date rape rocks!
Next I'm going to watch "Funny Games".
Wheeee!

[tres tragique]

Hi. I'm a guy, and totally understand nymag and feministing's criticisms - at what point do we stop laughing at everything, and start speaking up our conscience? "Shut yer yap - it's a joke" is precisely the kind of zombie-lemming, order-following that feminism is against. I understand the disappointment in Seth Rogen too. Especially since these concepts don't seem to be totally foreign to him. As co-writer of Superbad, he definitely conveyed enough of the bro-man, gonna-score perspective, while simultaneously counter-balancing it with alternative messages (condoms, spermicide, not having drunk sex, not drinking).

Anyone who refuses to see how this rape scene could be offensive is just not being honest with themselves about the normalization of the male perspective in the field of movies/ent­ertainment­/comedy, and its effect on what we consider funny.

[hellameangirl]

Thanks tres, for getting it. You are a true progressive :)

[TheKidd]

c'est tres tragique a quel point la société deviens puritaine.

[Promethea]

I want to hug you.

[deandallen]

This should skew the results: I'm a gay male and I think the movie looks, mostly, funny. The sex seen is not a rape scene. Take my word for it ( nobody wants to hear from a guy who was raped several times when he was young by big, powerful men), so I can say so.. The scene was obviously written to make sure no one would see it as rape, except, possibly, someone who only knows rape from their fevered imaginations. This is a movie feminists and neurotic women should not see anyway. It's a guy movie, not a chick-flic. I might wait until I could rent it for a buck or two, but I'd watch it and enjoy it. I'm fairly middle-of-the-road. I don't see anything to be upset over, except some really rotten acting, here and there. I'd say that Brandy steals the movie as doing the best acting in it, from the trailer.

[tres tragique]

I will take your word on your own personal experience. I would just offer that rape a lot of times also tries to be pass itself off as not rape. Of course! the makers of the movie will dress up the context of the scene to point the viewer in every direction besides rape. That's how it will remain unquestioned, and untouched in the realm of "comedy." But I have to wonder about the ramifications of what you suggest when you say that this is a movie for guys, and certain women shouldn't see it: I think that fairly epitomizes what is being argued against. Precisely in light of undue violence against women, there is no place for an exclusionary, boys club mentality. Those who take issue with this movie see the responsibility of culture in shaping these arguments.

[itchcity]

that scene does not depict rape, peace.

[That Guy]

If that woman wanted to press charges the next day, I promise the DA would disagree with you.

[TheKidd]

but would the jury agree with her?

[BelGazou]

From the clip, it doesn't look like rape; it appears to be a tasteless exercise in male adolescent fantasy but doesn't appear to be rape.

[phauxtoe]

"It's not funny Seth. First of all, one out of six women in this country is sexually...
Blah, Blah, Blah!

Anyone that says ..."I have sense of Humor and that is not funny!"
That person Does not have a sense of humor.

Seth, Keep joking and Leave nothing un-joked about!

DAMN special interest all to HE LL!

[Johanna]

Do you find jokes presenting racism as acceptable to be equally humorous? Would you tell a black person who is upset about a racist joke to "just lighten up"?

The positioning of my outrage at a racist or sexist joke as "just a crappy sense of humor" is inappropriate, not to mention downright stupid.

Murder has a multiple of social sanctions preventing everyday normal people from acting on their impulse to murder, while rape is socially approved. No wonder the prevalance rate is so high! As soon as people internalize the exact same disaproval in their attitude toward rape as they do for any other crime, the prevalance rate will decrease. This is not rocket science...

[PunFun]

Johanna, that was an awesome pun you made there. Telling an offended black person to "lighten up" is absolute genius. For anyone who still doesn't get it, especially those putting their terrible sense of humor on display for us all, she's referring to skin tone.

My friends and I had a great laugh at that one. I can't thank you enough. Finally someone who appreciates racist jokes as much as my close friends and I do.

And to those who can't stomach a little inebriated intercourse, grow a pair.

[elatas]

I am a woman and from the trailer, I didn't see the sex scene as a rape. She's very drunk and barely conscious, but she does not seemed passed out. This being said, I would never ever see this movie. I didn't find anything funny... It's just plain dumb.

[LeftHandedMama]

Agreed on all counts. (I'm a woman, and all the rest of what you said.) It looks like it sucks, but there was nothing outraging about that scene as it's shown.

[EllaRayne]

elatas, if I woman is too drunk to be fully conscious, or to keep from vomiting all over herself, she is too drunk to consent to sex. Sex with somebody who has not consented is rape.

If a man has sex with a drunk woman knowing she is in no position to consent or refuse, he is a rapist.

It really honestly is *that simple*. This is a rape scene, being played for laughs.

Your own gender really doesn't make any difference to the issue here.

[Symphysodon]

Feminists are always really fun with great senses of humor.

[stepper]

As are male chauvinist pigs.

[LeftHandedMama]

LOL symphysodon

[hellameangirl]

Spoken like a true Republican t r o l l. I bet all gays are icky and all liberals are wackos, right?

[Phillup Textfield]

[this will not go over well, but the Evolutionary Pychological Macroscopy needs to speak:] Even doe-eyed college girls know intuitively what cliques of men are utterly safe (and androgynous and boring) and what groups of guys may be complete scoundrels and borderline sadists/rapists (but ultimately more exciting and compelling to be around). Unfortuntately these men have better genetic material than safe men, and women are aroused by them. there is nothing wrong with that by the way. the average height of european homo sapiens has increased for both sexes by almost a half foot in a mere 2,000 years because women were going with their instincts and copulating with large, aggressive men.

[stepper]

Who checked your research notes, Jimmy the Greek? People who know how to spell Psychological might offer a different theory, that tremendous gains in human height are attributed to better medicine, including the field of neonatal care which didn't exist a couple of centuries ago.

[Phillup Textfield]

those are phenotypic advances, not genotypic. length of bone is a universal attractor in all cultures because it is an indicator of high testosterone, which is vital to the immune systems of male and female infants. women know this instinctively when they make partner choices.

[tres tragique]

ouch. seriously. what's more, first year psychology usually introduces the notion, "correlation does not imply causation."

[Phillup Textfield]

Snarky. What makes men and women tall? Which hormone stimulates bone growth and elastin and fibrillin? Could it be testosterone? Why do women in all societies across the globe crave tall men with long fingers and square jaws during their days of ovulation?

[BelGazou]

The increase in height has more to do with improved nutrition and health care than women wanting "large aggressive men". Had simply a predilection for large, aggressive men been the case, thousands of years of short, relatively malnourished, disease-pocked, common folk wouldn't have been the norm.

[Turtleposer]

That woman in that video didn't look particularly aroused, so I don't think this video fits your hypothesis. If you don't know what arousal looks like, then you don't know how to satisfy the ladies.

FYI, the country with the most people in the world is China, a place predominantly inhabited by short people. That obviously hasn't stopped them from having fun in the bedroom. It's not the size of the wave, it's the motion of the ocean, bud.

[Stanley]

Funny isn't real! It's just funny! If there needs to be more about date rape said then do it! If this movie was the reason well you need to remember it is a comedy. There are scenes in every comedy that are offensive and even ridiculous but don't condone or promote the behavior but just try to be funny.

[rektruax]

Stop being reasonable...

[robjh1]

i realize this is only a movie...but the premises is really sad...really, really sad. I guess anything to make people laugh.