I'm getting this really awful feeling that, whether there is a separate rapist or not, the Take Back the Night ladies are faking some of what's going on in order to inflame tension and help their crusade against the Greek system.

I'm afraid you're right, and this might be the thing that makes me kick a hole in my tv. They didn't hire Sean Hannity on as a creative consultant this season, did they?

I would think that was somewhat in line with VM's sensibilities, but not in a Hannity way. In Neptune, nobody is innocent. Everyone is corrupt. No cow is sacred (hi, P-C).

• The Good Boyfriend took our protagonist when he thought she was his sister

• The girl with the worst reputation in town had never willingly had sex

• The dead girl had been cheating on her boyfriend with his own father--who turned out to be her murderer

• The people's candidate (at the high school) was actually a self-interested narc

• The boy who was introduced to us as an emotionally neglected woobie, and revealed to be a molestation victim turned out to be a cold hearted killer

• The good father/mistreated and one of the people in town you should most trust violated his lover's privacy in a big way

• The class virgin was knocked up

• Murderers get acquited

• The cops are all bumbling and on the take

• The good and honorable guy hired a hitman to kill his sister's killer

• The religious people are nuts

• The baseball hero is a gambling addict

• Doctors are faking diagnoses to get their rich patients out of finals

Nobody in Neptune, including Veronica, is particularly good.

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I think it would be deliciously twisted and perfect for the morally grey universe of noir. Bad things being done with good intentions.

Or, what he said, only longer.

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I'm getting this really awful feeling that, whether there is a separate rapist or not, the Take Back the Night ladies are faking some of what's going on in order to inflame tension and help their crusade against the Greek system.

What Cindy said.

Except ... the girls are raped. I don't see the Take Back the Night girls participating in that, and other than colluding in some way to shave the girls's heads, I don't see what they could be faking.

Unless the girls turn out *not* to have been raped at all, but only had their heads shaved to make it appear they'd been raped. That I could see. Fucked up as it would be.

Do we have proof that the girls from last season were, in fact, raped? Rape kits, medical exams, etc.? Anything I'm not remembering?

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I don't see the Take Back the Night girls participating in that, and other than colluding in some way to shave the girls's heads, I don't see what they could be faking.

Well, I think it's very possible that some of these more public victims (like the rally girl) may not have actually been raped.

Unless the girls turn out *not* to have been raped at all, but only had their heads shaved to make it appear they'd been raped. That I could see. Fucked up as it would be.

Right.

I'm not sure whether they're involved in anything that's actually happened to people like Dawn, Stacy, and Parker, who all seem like fairly decent people unconnected to Take Back the Night. Like I said, I don't know whether TBTN is directly involved with the actual rapes or they're just using them to their advantage.

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To me, it would be hopelessly politicized. If it were a sympathizer to the cause, it might be different, but to have the TBTN group involved would be like introducing a character who was a real, life welfare queen. It plays into an agenda that's closer to the Sean Hannity/Rush Limbaugh/Ann Coulter style of blaming the victim than the noirish perspective that assumes evil lurking in the hearts of all.

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I think the victim(s?) last year were legit. I think Parker was truly raped. I think the rapist shaved their heads.

I have no reason to believe the TBTN women are all going to end up on the up and up, because no one in Neptune ever does. I don't know how, but I expect some of them will have something that sucked, somewhere along the line, and probably in service of what they saw as the greater good (and that greater good probably involves taking down the Greeks).

Remember the story last year, where the NHS teacher Veronica was defending actually did seduce a student? Remember even that wasn't pure victimhood, because the girl's friend actually faked up charges against the teacher (who really was guilty) in order to bring him down? I wouldn't be surprised by a scenario along those lines.

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It plays into an agenda that's closer to the Sean Hannity/Rush Limbaugh/Ann Coulter

Not that I know anything about Rob's political views, but the show's never struck me as ultraconservative in that way.

blaming the victim than the noirish perspective that assumes evil lurking in the hearts of all.

I do understand how it could be seen that way, though, which is why I hope it doesn't turn out that all the rapes are fake. If TBTN has actually been orchestrating actual rapes to further their agenda, however...that's just sick.

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I have no reason to believe the TBTN women are all going to end up on the up and up, because no one in Neptune ever does. I don't know how, but I expect some of them will have something that sucked, somewhere along the line, and probably in service of what they saw as the greater good (and that greater good probably involves taking down the Greeks).

This. I think I'ma let Cindy analyze the show for me.

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If TBTN has actually been orchestrating actual rapes to further their agenda, however...that's just sick.

I can't imagine it being anything this blatant. I don't know what it will be, but they've come off too self-righteous to be completely righteous.

Plus, Take Back the Night Rallies in the day are DUM.

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Might I point out that I invoked Tawana Brawley last week? t /preens

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