May December: Analyzing A Shocking True Story & Problematic Trope

[shangri__la]

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The Take examines how sixth grade teacher Mary Kay Letourneau's grooming and abuse of her student inspired the Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore film May December.

They also dive into the harmful "male student has an "affair" with the hot teacher" trope in society and media, and how the trope puts the blame on the victim.

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Comments

[januarysix]

In high school my English teacher who was fucking nuts was carrying on an affair with one of her teenage students. When he turned 18 she divorced her husband and married her victim. I always wonder what happened to them. I hope her poor victim was eventually able to escape her.

[lurkurheartout]

there is that tiktok couple that the girl was 19 and started dating the 25 year old coach from her high school after she graduated. She made videos online about how she wanted to hit up the coach from her high school. they ended up getting married and used some vile hashtag like "coach scored" the whole thing was huge ick. Everything got exposed when she made some off the wall post about lasers or some shit caused the fires in Hawaii

[ty]

Does this link work for you?

https://tammy.ai/e/lKRkF5HYzdbPt?type=basic

An AI summary of the video with timestamps

[wwgrogudo]

Just re the movie - I missed Carol in the theatre and have only seen like 2 other Todd Haynes' films so I'm seeing this in the theatre for sure.

It will be a challenging watch re the subject matter.

[floatinglately]

if anyone here is interested in a novel about this kind of case, i remember really liking barry lyga’s “boy toy.” the title is sort of deliberately provocative and the book, while easy to read stylistically because it’s YA, can be tough going emotionally because it’s clear the narrator has not fully processed the extent of his victimization and the text deals a lot with the beliefs he’s internalized about himself as a result, but i found it ultimately quite sensitive and moving, and there’s a line near the end that has stayed with me for years

[bitchsdangerous]

Reading your comment made me realize I still think of what happened to me as my fault. It’s been almost 20yrs since. I guess I don’t really let myself think on it too much. When I was divorcing my abuser my own lawyer told me, “Well, you married him.” and my family guilted me heavily for leaving him.

I really can’t see the situation as anything other than my fault cause I allowed it (it began when I was underage and he absolutely was a predator), but if I think of it in terms of my daughter, I would never allow her to feel or make her feel like it was her fault. Hmmm. 🤔 Another thing to unpack with my therapist.

[floatinglately]

i’m so sorry that happened to you, i’m so glad you found the strength to leave him (my father is a piece of shit and so through my mom i’ve witnessed what a nightmare divorcing an abuser can be), & i hope you’re able to continue moving further away from whatever is left of the past ❤️

[bitchsdangerous]

Thank you 🙏🏼

[scriptedending]

I thought this movie was so good! If you're interested in it, I'd recommend watching it before you watch this video, because it shows some pivotal stuff from the film that I think hits harder if you're seeing it in the film first. But the video is a concise look at the subject overall.

At the film's Q&A, Samy Burch was asked what made her think of this subject, and she talked about how the Mary Kay Letourneau trial was unavoidable even as a kid, and she was right! On TV, at the grocery store checkout stand, I saw so much coverage of it, and the salaciousness of its tone was confusing to me as a youth. The film does a great of reframing these kinds of stories.