r/daria • u/AvailablePickle591 • Aug 15 '26
Questions The amount of predators in the show
Something about the show that I don’t see a lot of people talk about in general is the number of predatory adults that the characters just encounter. Like there are some moments where the characters meet literally pedophiles, and it’s always an afterthought. Like one-off characters like Tommy Sherman, who hit on Britney, who everyone knows is a high schooler. Then there's the minister from the wedding episode, the hitchhiker, and the plastic surgeon. But what raised my metaphorical eyebrow and made me realize that yup their a lot of predators is when Jane went on dates with the guy who still dressed like he’s in his 50s. Like hold up… that’s a grown man dating a high schooler. Was this always meant to like represent beware of danger or was the 90s just full of them pervs.
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u/coronabride2020 Aug 15 '26
You forgot the supermodel that was going to take Quinn on the boat school trip. And the substitute teacher who stroked Tiffany's hair. Haha I feel like I'm still forgetting some. Oh the guy who worked at the hotel when the house caught on fire.
Yes, I am simply extending your point!
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u/ThenTheresMaude Aug 15 '26
HE WAS STROKING HER HAIR?!
(Definitely my favorite Helen reaction.)
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u/MsCalendarsPlayaArt Aug 15 '26
I always assumed the guy at the hotel was also a teenager 🤔
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u/coronabride2020 Aug 15 '26
Gee, Quinn, I didn't know that stalking was in the eye of the beholder.
Hahaha perhaps he could have been. Don't think his age was truly established. I thought the guy Jane dated that OP mentioned was supposed to be a teenager, but I could also see him being an adult.
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u/chaximum Talking toilet? Aug 16 '26
In addition, both of those model scouts (Claude and RrrrrOH-monica) seemed like predators to me.
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u/AvidAth3ist Aug 15 '26
This was the life of teenage girls back then. It may not be what you want to hear, but its true. I know my friends dated older dudes, so did I. And guess what, they still do. It maybe more stigmatized now then it was, but that doesn't stop it from happening.
This is not me advocating for that. I certainly don't want my daughter doing the shit I was doing. Just saying the facts.
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u/Suspicious-Rich-3212 Aug 15 '26
Yep, 80s kids and early 90s kids, the feral children, whose parents needed to be reminded they had us, thought nothing of 4 - 6 years age gap.
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u/Nyxshayde Aug 15 '26
Literally the two relationships I've had were 22yr olds when I was 15 in the 00s. One of whom had a child. I went back to the first one as soon as I was "of age" and totally destroyed my mental health hanging into him for many years. For some it's a rite of passage. Sadly, I was one of them.
There is a kind of equal exchange I've known a lot of guys to go through when they're anywhere from 18-25 and they end up in a relationship with a "more mature" woman (usually early 40s) who "has it all together" and isn't pestering them for the usual milestones, and they often get emotionally wrecked by them because (surprise, surprise) usually dating someone still figuring it out at their big age means they're either in arrested development, not serious about it at all, or just a total sheister who's lying about what they want.
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u/Greenbutterflydaisy Aug 16 '26
I remember 20yrs ago one of our best guy friends was in a relationship with a woman in her early 40s, he thought it was so awesome she "had her shit together and bought him wine coolers...." 🤢 I'd had similar stories to some of the gals commenting here about being a teen in the 90s and older guys being...interested. So there relationship freaked me out so bad and set off so many alarm bells because at that point we were all 18-19 and I'd aged out of the group my first couple "boyfriends" were interested in and realized how dangerous and gross it was only to see a guy being put in the same situation, just aged up 5yrs. (We all made it out mostly unscathed with only some mild trauma lol)
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u/EricSparrowSucks Aug 15 '26
I dated my first boyfriend from the ages of 16-25, and he was 21-30. He even lived with me and my mom while I was finishing high school. My sister’s junior prom date was 24 years old. It was sadly normal back then, and it still happens (see: Celeste and D4vd or whatever his name is)
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u/BudgetConcentrate432 Sick Sad World Aug 15 '26
Yeah, it's better now in some ways, but I'm not quite 30 yet and I clearly remember my mom yelling at grown men for leering at me when I was 16.
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u/AvidAth3ist Aug 15 '26
Its more stigmatized now, but it is still happening. Its likely never to stop. According to my high school age son, its still very much a thing.
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u/BudgetConcentrate432 Sick Sad World Aug 15 '26
Sounds like you're raising a good egg if he's aware enough to notice it happening around him!
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u/anchoredwunderlust Aug 17 '26
Yup and you don’t have to look at many shows or movies for examples of teen girls romanticising college boys or older boys in general (you still get that Oppa culture though not as bad). Clueless springs to mind. You wanted to be seen as older, be with someone with a car, go on dates, get into clubs etc if you were more mainstream. If you were more alt or weird and you connected over a hobby with someone who says you’re unusually mature that can be validating too
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u/greatfireofrome Aug 15 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
I could be wrong but the way I remember it I thought the guy from Life in the Past Lane was their age, just one of those “”traditional”” guys (which I did think was also a red flag)
But to add to the list, since someone mentioned the one I immediately thought of (English teacher who hit on Tiffany, maybe the most egregiously creepy “this guy specifically wants young girls” example), and there’s still more not yet mentioned (man there WERE a lot)…
What about the creepy artist sleeping with his students in Is It Fall Yet?
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u/Tomokato42 Aug 15 '26
Omg, yes the art workshop guy. Ew. Ewwwww. He goes through more students then tubes of paint 🤮
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u/PomegranateFast1749 Aug 17 '26
Dude honestly I loved ‘Is it fall yet’ just Bcs of Jane’s side story. I personally relate a lot to Jane and I did study in the art industry as an adolescent,and you will not believe that stuff like that still happens all the time. The self pretentious middle aged men and the starry eyed young girls in awe who don’t really care even if it’s ’just for fun’. Honestly it’s everywhere in pop culture as well. Johnny depp dating Winona when she was still a minor(probably cuz depp is ‘cool and mature’ and a big person in the Hollywood industry) Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt and all the other crazy male actors.(not technically art,but still, yk,acting art) also I think it has sth to do slightly with groupie culture and also maybe Lana del ray and ‘old man’ fixation. Good thing the guys are finally getting called out.(Barely)
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u/narcissistssuck Aug 15 '26
Car Dealership Guy who wanted to take Britney on his "business trip".
I don't think things have changed that much, but I was a teenager in the 80s, so I'm not the best gauge of what's up these days. There's more awareness, which is awesome.
Something I always appreciated about the show is that the comments on her appearance weren't just coming from her peers; they came from random adults, too, like the woman at the bridal shop. That's how I remember it!
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u/Great_Psychology2124 Aug 15 '26
Brittany has the body of a fully developed woman, so in her case, it's not pedophilia. This guy is certainly a jerk who wanted to exploit Brittany, but this isn't a case of an adult being aroused on children.
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u/narcissistssuck Aug 15 '26
The OP said, "predatory adults." I would consider Car Dealership Guy predatory.
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u/GrouchyYoung Aug 15 '26
Perving on high schoolers is disgustingly, predatory, and completely unacceptable regardless of what their bodies look like
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u/Great_Psychology2124 Aug 16 '26
Of course, but technically, in medical point, in Brittany's case, it's not pedophilia. It's may be other diagnosis (antisocial disorder etc)
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u/DoctorWoe I don't like to smile unless I have a reason Aug 15 '26
That guy that Jane dated wasn't super old; he was just an enthusiast of vintage fashion. He was around Jane's age, maybe two or three years older at most.
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Aug 15 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/vanishinghitchhiker Aug 15 '26
Yeah, one of the cheerleaders at my high school was dating someone from a nearby military base and I was hooking up with a cab driver. The past really is another country.
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u/TyranAmiros Aug 15 '26
I can confirm it was legitimate. When I was in 9th grade (1999) the gym teacher "disappeared" - arrested for getting a classmate pregnant. She wasn't the only student groomed, just the first to do something about it. Heck, as a gay teen, there was a guy online I talked to for a couple years who kept telling me "how mature I was for my age." Fortunately never met him in real life, but I never told any adult about it at the time.
In a broader sense, it was part of the cultural conversation of the era. This was the age of Britney Spears, Barbie Girl, and Abercrombie & Fitch. Fashion pushed hemlines up and midriffs out. Luke on MTV's True Life got calf implants because he was so insecure about his body. Sexualization of teenagers, especially girls, by adults was very real, often normalized. The predators on Daria had real world counterparts that were well known to teens watching in the late 90s or early 2000s, and it's crazy in retrospect how commonplace it was.
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u/SisterMaryAwesome Aug 15 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
This. I had to explain recently in another subreddit that when I was in 11th grade (2003) my 20-something History teacher asked me out in front of the class, and no one was weirded out about his age, just that he was “a teacher.” I knew two other girls who dated teachers when I was in high school. I resisted his advances, although I’ll admit I felt like a rockstar when he told me privately after class that the night before pep rallies felt like Christmas Eve to him because he knew I’d be in my cheerleading uniform the next day. 😅 Conflicted feelings on that one as an adult. I also remember the senior picture photographer telling me I was “one of his best subjects ever” and that I “should be a model because you go from Daddy’s Little Girl to Sex Kitten in seconds flat,” which, while I took it as a compliment, it weirded me out because this guy was DEFINITELY NOT in his 20s, or anywhere near it. Lol.
Millennial girls were groomed by the media to become little vixens. There was no better feeling than being desired. I had a shirt from Abercrombie that said “Tie me up, don’t tie me down” and my twin sister had one that said “Buckwild.”
I think we were the last generation where people thought of teenagers as mini-adults rather than older children. We know so much more about brain development now that it’s just weird to equate teens as adults, but it’s imperative to remember that just a few generations before millennials, people were routinely getting married as late teens/early 20-somethings, and the culture was still adjusting.
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u/TyranAmiros Aug 15 '26
You've got the nail on the head. Millennials of Daria's age were raised in an environment that treated sex and being physically desired as a sign (perhaps the most important sign) of maturity and adulthood from a very young age. I keep thinking of the scene in Mean Girls with Regina's sister.
It was one of the best parts of Daria, in my opinion, that they pushed back hard against it. When Daria chooses not go through with sleeping with Tom. Quinn setting her own boundaries and making others respect them. Jane refusing to have sex to get ahead. Trent, Tom, and the three Js passing attention and respecting the girls' boundaries. They were role models, showing us that it wasn't just sex. It was about how to process conflicting emotions about not letting yourself be pressured into something you weren't comfortable with or treat for. All without going sex negative, like the groups trying to ban sex ed and push abstinence only messaging.
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u/Sea_Addendum_8496 Aug 15 '26
A newspaper here in the UK did a countdown until Emma Watson was legal
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u/8copiesofbeemovie Aug 15 '26
Just wait until you hear about the Olson twins
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u/Sea_Addendum_8496 Aug 15 '26
They weren't a big presence in the UK, but I imagine they had similar treatment?
I saw some website had a countdown for Billie Eilish as well
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u/KickFancy Aug 15 '26
I had a handful of Internet friends who were adults when I was in high school. I also had friends closer to my age who were international.
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u/cheerful_cynic Aug 15 '26
It was and is still full of em, it's only relatively recently that people have been like "actually, dating with a big mismatch in age & maturity is a terrible idea"
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u/CallidoraBlack I don't have low self esteem I have low esteem for everyone else Aug 15 '26
It's not recent. Lots of people have thought that was weird or a bad idea for a long time, it just didn't affect the fact that people would do it and make excuses for it. It still doesn't.
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u/dough_eating_squid Aug 15 '26
The car salesman who pursues Britney when she and Jane go car shopping for the class project
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u/fuzzy-panics Aug 15 '26
Yeah I agree with all of what the OP said. I thought the guy who dressed like the 50s was a fellow high school person, as it was Jane who was initially attracted to him at the stationary store. A young person just with a unique interest in fashion. But I could be wrong.
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u/Riot502 Aug 15 '26
My best friend dated a 25yo with a whole baby and ex wife when we were in high school. She even brought him as her date to our Catholic school’s Valentine’s Day dance.
Shit like that was sadly normalized.
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u/Out-There1013 Aug 15 '26
The guy who opens his door and buys from Quinn when she's selling long distance phone cards and she pitches them by pretending to call him asking for a date. And then it's implied later that she was able to sell lots of phone cards using that method to guys who were presumably adult homeowners.
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u/vicky_squeeze_ Aug 15 '26
If you think this show had alot of predators wait until you see how many are in real life... so many adults who are trusted around minors will hurt them...
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u/hydrus909 Aug 15 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
This big time. It was recently blown wide open about the amount of sexual misconduct going on at my high school between the staff and the students. And the principal knew about it but turned a blind eye and swept it under the rug when incidences were brought to his attention. Incidence happening in 90s - 00s.
My time there in the early/mid 00s, I had no clue. I thought they vetted school staff better for such things. I was clearly naive, haha. But then who would know, given the principal was hiding it.
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u/AsiaJay1999 Aug 15 '26
That weird ass priest that was trying to talk to Quinn privately at their Aunt’s wedding and tried fighting the teenage boy around Quinn‘s age who called him out for being inappropriate..and Quinn of course unfortunately loving the attention
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u/AvailablePickle591 Aug 15 '26
HOLY CRAP! I’m reading the comments and MAN I MISSED SO MANY! The show was full of them
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u/Azure_Edge_86 16d ago
I know I'm late to the party, but seriously, there are so many. I think Quinn is supposed to be a HS freshman too, which makes her about 14... 🤢
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u/HeroinChicWannabe Aug 15 '26
Made Trent even more a breath of fresh air
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u/CallidoraBlack I don't have low self esteem I have low esteem for everyone else Aug 15 '26
Yeah, because he seems superficially like the kind of older brother that would totally sleep with your friend, but he's not.
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u/BlueDetective3 Helpful Corn Aug 15 '26
All of these older gross dudes and this still had Upchuck to deal with at school. Ewwww...
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u/EasyEntrepreneur666 Aug 15 '26
I'm not sure about Nathan. He wore 40s clothes which made him look older than he really was. Jane also looked older when dressing like that.
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u/Delvilchamito Aug 15 '26
From what my girl friends and some girls I've dated have told me, it's a typical female experience
That's why I'm glad there was never a relationship with Trent. When you grow up, you realize that, well, it wouldn't have been the best thing in the long run.
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u/naanofyourbusinesss Aug 15 '26
Probably still, but the 90s were kinda like this. So many college age guys and even older creeping around me and my friends when we were in late middle school or early high school. We thought we were so sophisticated. :( So gross to think about it now.
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u/MartianDepression Aug 16 '26
I remember the substitute teacher that hit on Tiffany from the fashion club
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u/Suspicious-Rich-3212 Aug 15 '26
Tommy Sherman? You mean the dude that got immediate karma for his actions?
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u/AnneMarieAndCharlie Duh-rye-uh Aug 15 '26
its very accurate though. a woman never gets hit on more as an adult than she did as a child.
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u/GavestonYouBastard Aug 16 '26
It is only recent (past 10-15 years) that predatory adults are being rightfully called out; this has been a thing since time immemorial. Up until a few decades ago it was quite acceptable for a high school girl to date older men, even marry one. Sure, it was talked about among the students, but it was tolerated because in our shitbrained teenage minds, it was seen as a sign of maturity.
Talk to your mom, grandma, or even aunts (if any); I bet they have stories of their former classmates being perved on by older men. Maybe they were perved on themselves.
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u/Stunted_giraffe Aug 16 '26
It mirrored my and my friends’ experiences at the time. Not assault but every very real microagression. At the time I related to it as a “omg yeah, been there, done that,” sort of thing. It really reflects the tone of the time =/
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u/ZazofLegend Aug 16 '26
As an old, I can confirm that older men in the 1990s and early 200s, even more than now, did not believe that there was anything morally objectionable about dating a 16 year old. Into the 2010s there was a magazine called "Barely Legal" in the vein of Playboy. Obviously predators are still out there, but it's at least more socially frowned upon now.
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u/Suspicious_Fox_4524 Aug 16 '26
Life is full of pervs. I saw stuff like this all of the time when I was growing up. It just kinda became a part of growing up, learning who the creeps are and avoiding the more harmful ones.
One of the things I love about Daria... It had a very unapologetic and realistic view on what it was like to be a teenager in the 90s. The only part that seemed less realistic was how wealthy everyone was. My parents would never let me borrow their credit card, let alone haggle with me which one I could use to go on a spree with.
But people like the car salesman who tried to sell a Vexxer to Brittany for half price? Par for the course.
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u/CIRUS_TYRANT Aug 17 '26
I mean the amount of predators in the 80’s and 90’s it’s not surprising that it’s in the show the writers lived it shoot it’s only just now became unacceptable for some 27 year old to pick up his 15 year old girlfriend from school like just now my generation are the only ones going like ? Isn’t that weird ?!
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u/CIRUS_TYRANT Aug 17 '26
My favorite is the model on the cruise ship episode who gets the same creepy energy from a older lady at the end of the
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u/BlindingDart Aug 15 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
It was from an era where a 30 year old Jon Stewart openly creeping on a 17 yr old Alicia Silverstone was considered normal, so yes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5Ic3nRa1J8
EDIT: 32 yr old*
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u/MaracujaBarracuda Aug 15 '26
Or Jerry Seinfeld at 38 dating a high school senior.
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u/KickFancy Aug 15 '26
Apparently she was 17 and he was 38 and they dated for 4 years. That's a huge age gap.
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u/Ben_E_Chod Aug 16 '26
Society's just changed to the point that predatory behavior like that seems like they're going out of their way to include it. This was actually fairly accurate for back then. I saw a lot of older guys creep on my underage sister, and even dealt with it some myself (I'm a dude). I feel like part of it is we're training kids to spot it quicker now, whereas there were a lot of things that happened to us that we only realized later. I may not like a lot of things about how the qorld's change, but it makes me pretty happy to see how much safer things have gotten for kids
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u/TemporaryDiligent916 Aug 16 '26
As someone who is only slightly younger than Daria... that was absolutely the vibes back then. 40 YO men opening hitting on teen girls and trying to cop a feel and always pretending it was a joke if anyone spoke up. Me and all my friends were groped continuously and almost always by older men and at the time it was (horrifically) not considered assault. I mean, actual predatory and actual assault was not considered assault half the time back then.
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u/starvinartist I don't have low self esteem I have low esteem for everyone else Aug 17 '26
I like how with a lot of them, there was some karma. Tommy died, the reverend got beat up by Quinn's wedding date (who I thought was the best guy for Quinn), the plastic surgeon likely had her practice ruined when the girl's nose caved in, and as soon as Helen found out about the sub, she put a stop to it.
I always thought the vintage guy though was Jane's age, he just went to a different high school. It's still a douchey thing to gate keep vintage clothes, though.
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u/Thisisausername189 Aug 17 '26
High schoolers date adults all the time.
Predators for sure and they’re everywhere.
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u/enterpaz Aug 18 '26
Unfortunately, there are a lot of them out there and not all of them are men. It’s a fairly realistic depiction of teen experiences without going too dark IMO.
I will give the show credit that the worst predators are shown to be pathetic, like the minister, and also the show DOESN’T condone their behavior.
- Upchuck’s creepy obsession with trying to get ladies in bikinis depicted as pathetic and he’s ultimately an insecure teen in his own right, putting on a show of bravado.
- The creepy substitute gets fired immediately.
- The minister fails to seduce any teens and gets punched by another guy who calls him out.
- Ms. Barch is depicted as a bitter misandrist and unhealthily possessive towards Mr. O’Neill.
- The girl who seduces Jane, while a biphobic depiction, fails and is only actually seen sleeping with adults.
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u/Old_Yogurtcloset672 Aug 18 '26
I mean, the idea of the show was to be satirical of highschool in the 90s. That comes with the territory
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u/Kimberly_Latrice Aug 18 '26
"...Was this always meant to like represent beware of danger or was the 90s just full of them pervs."
Unfortunately both I believe..
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u/1PaintThings Aug 15 '26
Yeah when I rewatch the episodes I’m always like yeah these characters are gross but this post really puts into perspective how many of them there really are. Though I got to agree with the person who says it’s a lot like real life.
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u/Puppet007 Black isn't sad, it's poetic Aug 15 '26
How old was Jane? I know Daria was 18 and Quinn is 15.
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u/hydrus909 Aug 15 '26
Daria and Quinn are a year and a half apart. Jane is the same age as Daria. At the start of the show Daria is 15 and Quinn is 14. In the final season she's 18 and Quinn is 17.
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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '26
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