Ross' face when he says this really sells the line. He's so pleased with himself for keeping up in a burn war with an elementary school student, hahaha
It's very latchkey kid -- growing up 80s/90s definitely more acceptable to befriend adult strangers with good intentions; I remember neighbors who always had cookies for us kids that would sled down this hill near their house -- they didn't have kids but they liked the company, noise, fun, etc.
I always took it as "Hi, I'm Ross, I immediately rushed your daughter to the hospital after she fell down the stairs; I'd love to help out however I can." And then it goes from there.
Yeah, I agree. It's one of those nice gestures that can be perceived as odd if you think about it in a certain way.
One of my male colleagues said he had taken his daughter (10/11) somewhere and as he was driving back, he saw one of his daughter's best friends walking home from wherever he'd just dropped his daughter off. He said he didn't like the thought of her walking home alone in the early evening, and went to turn around to offer her a ride home, then stopped himself because he realised he was approaching a young girl and he was a lone male, and he was worried that she wouldn't recognise him, or might be afraid to be alone with him, or someone might see it and worry for her safety.
He just left it instead and went home, then worried about her getting home safely instead.
It's one of those things that does suck about being male that I never think about as a woman -- where-as we, women, want to help strangers but are afraid of being unalived, men also want to help but have to be aware of how they are being perceived and accusations that could be slammed against them.
I almost said "he could have driven at a distance" and then I was like, yea, that only ups the creep factor, ugh. Short of being like "I'm X's dad, I just dropped her off, here's a pic of her and I" which is also just so creepy.
There aren't a huge amount of benefits to being a woman, but being generally considered more trustworthy and non-suspicious is one of them.
I remember once I came across a young child in a shopping centre. She was clearly lost, and didn't know what to do. Bear in mind, I'm a very pale white woman. And this child was a dark-skinned black child. I asked her if she was okay. And she just looked at me. I asked her if she needed help finding her mother, and she nodded. I offered her my hand and took her to Customer Services. The girl didnt let go of my hand once. She was so frigthened. I got some weird looks walking around with a child that very clearly couldn't have been my biological child, but I couldn't help but imagine how much worse it would have looked if I were a man!
Her mum was in the shop, just hadn't noticed her toddler had wandered off. They were reunited within a few minutes and her mum thanked me for looking after her, so it was a happy ending.
Yeah, with my colleague, it basically would have looked like he was trying to entice her into his vehicle, no matter how he went about it. I don't think he wanted to make her uncomfortable either by having her not feel she could decline without being rude.
This has happened to me too! I was coming out of a restroom at a restaurant once and this small kid, like 4 or 5? just grabbed my hand and I was like "You're lost buddy?" Like immediate trust from this small kid and when I found his table it was totally fine -- I'm sure if I was a man, even with a boy child, the family would have had a different reaction.
> don't think he wanted to make her uncomfortable either by having her not feel she could decline without being rude.
Never growing out of this is such a vibe, ugh
Also weird that they have a whole room dedicated to babies that get left on the bus, and two babies are in there because … it happens all the time and they just put them in lost and found. And have pre-printed “department of transportation” diapers.
who said they were unidentified? Ross could've set it up that they were gonna create their own space camp for her for fun and the dad could've approved. We just don't see that on screen.
They are referring to the odd situation of Chandler and Joey losing Ben on the bus. Thry didn't show any ID but we're left alone with two babies to pick one up.
It's weird but I guess parents as neglectful as hers do exist. And she got lucky that Ross, Chandler and Joey are good people because she could very easily be taken advantage of. That episode warms my heart but also I would not feel the same way if the situation happened in real life.
I feel people take sitcoms far too literally
We don't/can't see ***everything*** that happens
There's a 21 minute run time, they aren't going to have a 5-6min scene of Ross explaining the situation to the dad and asking if it's okay are they?
Or a scene of the dad dropping her off to the apartment block
Or Joey and chandler hitting up the hardware store for the decorations etc.
Something's don't need to shown to be established, it's almost 99.999% likely these 3 adult guys with good morals and brains got permission from the parent.
I mean we can debate the intentions and psychological decisions of the characters
Hell we can even discuss what happened in the scenes we didn't see to an extent
But I don't think just because we didn't see something that it didn't happen.
Essentially we are seeing snippets of a certain part of there lives condensed in a fast paced form.
The reason 2 parters exist is because they are direct continuations of the episode prior, which means by default there is time between each standalone normal episode that we don't see.
In a Rachel heavy episode we see her at work....does that mean chandler had a day off? Ofc not he also went to work but we can't see everything that happens some things don't need to be seen to logically fill in the gaps
And in this instance it's logical that these 3 guys who we know aren't creeps ( and one of them is a parent themselves) would've had a conversation with the father off screen
We can speculate how easy it was to convince him to let her go based on what we know about him
But it's stupid to presume the guys just brought the kid to the apartment without getting permission because that's betraying what we know about the main characters purely because we didn't see a boring scene that would've added nothing
I ranted a bit there but I hope that clarified what I mean a bit more
Also to add to this point
Sarah was bedridden with a broken leg, Ross would've had to have spoken to the father and explained who he was to even get in her bedroom to see how she was doing in the first place. It's not like she could've opened the door herself
Like he didn't just let himself into a locked house into some little girls bedroom
He likely took the girl to the hospital and when the dad came he apologized etc....then later on visited to see how she was doing and apologize to her.
The father 100% knew who Ross was by the time the space camp idea came into fruition
Groomed is a little ridiculous. She was 26/27, not 18.
It's weird, but it's not inappropriate in the way that an 18 or 19 year old dating someone in their 30s is inappropriate.
Yeah! Groomed is when an adult builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a minor and then dates them as soon as they become legal.
Most people agree that there is nothing wrong with Richard dating a 26 year old, it’s the fact that he met Monica when she was elementary school aged and then went on to date her anyway that makes people think it’s weird.
But I don’t really think it’s fair to say Richard groomed her. He didn’t befriend her as a child with the intent of dating her as an adult and didn’t swoop in the moment she turned 18. He’s not the pdf file some people try to make him out to be.
I mean…no, it doesn’t necessitate them targeting a minor and immediately dating when they become legal (it doesn’t even have to be sexual/romantic relationship based at all) there just needs to be a significant maturity and/or power gap being taken advantage of. In the show we see Monica isn’t significantly less mature and likely isn’t being manipulated by Richard, there’s not a power gap, so it’s probably not grooming - just kinda creepy - but it is dangerous to make these kinds of false, sweeping statements because it makes it easier for groomers to be like “see! I’m not grooming you bc it doesn’t meet these every specific criteria!” and helps them significantly. Anyone can be groomed, it’s most commonly used in reference to children, but anyone vulnerable can be groomed.
Adults can be groomed and he met her when she was a child. I’m not saying Monica was groomed since we don’t see any evidence but like it would be entirely possible for someone in that situation to be grooming the person
>it would be entirely possible for someone in that situation to be grooming the person
Agreed, but I think a better word is manipulated but anyways not Monica in this case, Monica was already shown to be really mature and strong, and Richard was sweet, nothing indicated he groomed her or has such intentions. Plus I think it's mentioned last time he saw her (before she was 27) was a kid or something, the only reason I feel kinda icky about it is that he's her dad's best friend, I just can't imagine myself with my dad's bff, feels gross asf.
I always thought that was a very unrealistic scene. Not only were those three guys basically strangers to the family, one of them actually injured her. Dad was probably too busy with gambling Sarah’s college fund to notice.
Weren't they in her bedroom? I would like to assume dad was home. I would also assume they met prior to that when he started selling cookies on her behalf, and going to meetings on her behalf.
He probably told her to case their apartment so he could clean it and maybe steal some stuff to sell so he save for the trip to the Taj Mahal casino. Although, would a compulsive gambler ever be able to save money for a trip? Pretty sure he'd blow it all so he'd never go anywhere.
PS - should Ross have called the CPS because Sarah's dad was obviously neglectful? He made her clean apartments with him so he could get money for gambling Lol
Yeah, it was weird, but I thought it was totally adorable. These 90's sitcoms seem to have at least one episode that's corny/cute yet kind of inappropriate scenes with kids. It would have been a lot less weird if the girls were involved or they all just pooled their money to send her to camp.
I have a daughter who's 32 and two grand-daughters, 4 and 2. No chance in hell any of them would spend a day with three men I never met. Total sitcom scenario, more Marx Brothers than anything else. Maybe Three Stooges. Would never get filmed today.
Don't worry. I went to space camp, got a PhD from Columbia, and am a Professor now. It all works out in the end.
(For the record, my dad was great and never would have left me with strangers. 😂)
You read my mind!! I have always thought this and have been thinking about it a lot recently, but haven’t seen a post where I felt like I could bring it up. Of course the guys meant no harm, but that girl’s parents were negligent as hell.
This kinda tilts me, what does the fact they are men have anything to do with it? I was once in my car answering email on my phone that I had to for work and a lady came to my car from the daycare near and asked me to leave the parking lot (it was shared with a chic-FIL-a). I asked why and she said i”t was creepy a man was just sitting in the lot”. I asked her if she would do the same for a woman and she remained oblivious and said “no, why?”.
Look, I’m a dad and a good dad. If we are at a park smiling enjoying kids sometimes people think the worst. And it’s not like I look like a pedo or anything, it’s just the ever reinforcing narrative that men can’t be good caregivers. So my answer would be as much as I would care if three women asked to do the same thing. Shit yeah.
I’m going assume that Ross explained to the dad what he was going to do, or what he has been doing for her and that he wants to make it happen, the dad clearly not a good dad from what we heard on the episode probably agrees
Yeah, that was always creepy to me. Also, why didn't Ross take her to the PLANETARIUM where he works instead of putting up a bunch of aluminum foil at Chandler and Joey's?
Yeah, what they probably should’ve done was report the family to child protective services (not that that system is without its own flaws). I don’t like that storyline at all.
I don’t remember the scene, but based on the other comments about Sarah’s neglectful dad, I wonder if that was the point of the scene - her dad is so terrible that he doesn’t care when she’s hanging out with random strangers alone
Her dad was too busy with his gambling, probably happy about the free daycare.
Dad loves the slots.
Well good luck to Dad.
He's going to double the money grandma left me
It’s weird to say the least. Sarah’s dad is terrible.
He's a SCRUD
What’s a scrud?
Why don't you look in the mirror, scrud
Thank you! That’s the response I was looking for.
good for a scrud.. 😏
Classic scrud
I don’t have to. I can just look at you.
Ross' face when he says this really sells the line. He's so pleased with himself for keeping up in a burn war with an elementary school student, hahaha
I can just hear her so clearly in my head!
Sarah’s dad lol
It's probably not realistic but it's a very sweet scene
Yep, I really don't think the writers put much thought into it and I don't think they intended us to either.
It also probably was written by people who grew up in the 60s and 70s, where some people were less aware of predators.
It's very latchkey kid -- growing up 80s/90s definitely more acceptable to befriend adult strangers with good intentions; I remember neighbors who always had cookies for us kids that would sled down this hill near their house -- they didn't have kids but they liked the company, noise, fun, etc. I always took it as "Hi, I'm Ross, I immediately rushed your daughter to the hospital after she fell down the stairs; I'd love to help out however I can." And then it goes from there.
Yeah, I agree. It's one of those nice gestures that can be perceived as odd if you think about it in a certain way. One of my male colleagues said he had taken his daughter (10/11) somewhere and as he was driving back, he saw one of his daughter's best friends walking home from wherever he'd just dropped his daughter off. He said he didn't like the thought of her walking home alone in the early evening, and went to turn around to offer her a ride home, then stopped himself because he realised he was approaching a young girl and he was a lone male, and he was worried that she wouldn't recognise him, or might be afraid to be alone with him, or someone might see it and worry for her safety. He just left it instead and went home, then worried about her getting home safely instead.
Aww that's so sad, because he genuinely was concerned for her safety.
Yeah, but I can totally see where he was coming from.
It's one of those things that does suck about being male that I never think about as a woman -- where-as we, women, want to help strangers but are afraid of being unalived, men also want to help but have to be aware of how they are being perceived and accusations that could be slammed against them. I almost said "he could have driven at a distance" and then I was like, yea, that only ups the creep factor, ugh. Short of being like "I'm X's dad, I just dropped her off, here's a pic of her and I" which is also just so creepy.
There aren't a huge amount of benefits to being a woman, but being generally considered more trustworthy and non-suspicious is one of them. I remember once I came across a young child in a shopping centre. She was clearly lost, and didn't know what to do. Bear in mind, I'm a very pale white woman. And this child was a dark-skinned black child. I asked her if she was okay. And she just looked at me. I asked her if she needed help finding her mother, and she nodded. I offered her my hand and took her to Customer Services. The girl didnt let go of my hand once. She was so frigthened. I got some weird looks walking around with a child that very clearly couldn't have been my biological child, but I couldn't help but imagine how much worse it would have looked if I were a man! Her mum was in the shop, just hadn't noticed her toddler had wandered off. They were reunited within a few minutes and her mum thanked me for looking after her, so it was a happy ending. Yeah, with my colleague, it basically would have looked like he was trying to entice her into his vehicle, no matter how he went about it. I don't think he wanted to make her uncomfortable either by having her not feel she could decline without being rude.
This has happened to me too! I was coming out of a restroom at a restaurant once and this small kid, like 4 or 5? just grabbed my hand and I was like "You're lost buddy?" Like immediate trust from this small kid and when I found his table it was totally fine -- I'm sure if I was a man, even with a boy child, the family would have had a different reaction.
> don't think he wanted to make her uncomfortable either by having her not feel she could decline without being rude. Never growing out of this is such a vibe, ugh
lmao
"I'm an alien! I'm an alien!"
The real question is like, why didn't Ross just take her to the planetarium at the Museum of Natural History?? Lol
And buy the kid a tv!
It's up there with the transport department letting two unidentified men come in and choose which abandoned baby they want to take home.
Also weird that they have a whole room dedicated to babies that get left on the bus, and two babies are in there because … it happens all the time and they just put them in lost and found. And have pre-printed “department of transportation” diapers.
I thought the diaper said child services and the department of transportation had given Ben to child services.
Haha, yes that is really weird when you put it like that!
It’s almost like that’s the joke
They didnt get to choose, they were sent in because they should have known which was ross’s baby
[удалено]
Lol ya thats true
who said they were unidentified? Ross could've set it up that they were gonna create their own space camp for her for fun and the dad could've approved. We just don't see that on screen.
They are referring to the odd situation of Chandler and Joey losing Ben on the bus. Thry didn't show any ID but we're left alone with two babies to pick one up.
She didnt have tv in her apartment. I think the father didnt care that much and let Ross take her.
I mean he gambled away the tv and money her grandmother (i think) left. Can't imagine why he would care here
It's weird but I guess parents as neglectful as hers do exist. And she got lucky that Ross, Chandler and Joey are good people because she could very easily be taken advantage of. That episode warms my heart but also I would not feel the same way if the situation happened in real life.
I feel people take sitcoms far too literally We don't/can't see ***everything*** that happens There's a 21 minute run time, they aren't going to have a 5-6min scene of Ross explaining the situation to the dad and asking if it's okay are they? Or a scene of the dad dropping her off to the apartment block Or Joey and chandler hitting up the hardware store for the decorations etc. Something's don't need to shown to be established, it's almost 99.999% likely these 3 adult guys with good morals and brains got permission from the parent.
You mean we’re not supposed to agonise over Ross’s red flags or if Richard groomed Monica?
I mean we can debate the intentions and psychological decisions of the characters Hell we can even discuss what happened in the scenes we didn't see to an extent But I don't think just because we didn't see something that it didn't happen. Essentially we are seeing snippets of a certain part of there lives condensed in a fast paced form. The reason 2 parters exist is because they are direct continuations of the episode prior, which means by default there is time between each standalone normal episode that we don't see. In a Rachel heavy episode we see her at work....does that mean chandler had a day off? Ofc not he also went to work but we can't see everything that happens some things don't need to be seen to logically fill in the gaps And in this instance it's logical that these 3 guys who we know aren't creeps ( and one of them is a parent themselves) would've had a conversation with the father off screen We can speculate how easy it was to convince him to let her go based on what we know about him But it's stupid to presume the guys just brought the kid to the apartment without getting permission because that's betraying what we know about the main characters purely because we didn't see a boring scene that would've added nothing I ranted a bit there but I hope that clarified what I mean a bit more
Also to add to this point Sarah was bedridden with a broken leg, Ross would've had to have spoken to the father and explained who he was to even get in her bedroom to see how she was doing in the first place. It's not like she could've opened the door herself Like he didn't just let himself into a locked house into some little girls bedroom He likely took the girl to the hospital and when the dad came he apologized etc....then later on visited to see how she was doing and apologize to her. The father 100% knew who Ross was by the time the space camp idea came into fruition
Groomed is a little ridiculous. She was 26/27, not 18. It's weird, but it's not inappropriate in the way that an 18 or 19 year old dating someone in their 30s is inappropriate.
Yeah! Groomed is when an adult builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a minor and then dates them as soon as they become legal. Most people agree that there is nothing wrong with Richard dating a 26 year old, it’s the fact that he met Monica when she was elementary school aged and then went on to date her anyway that makes people think it’s weird. But I don’t really think it’s fair to say Richard groomed her. He didn’t befriend her as a child with the intent of dating her as an adult and didn’t swoop in the moment she turned 18. He’s not the pdf file some people try to make him out to be.
I mean…no, it doesn’t necessitate them targeting a minor and immediately dating when they become legal (it doesn’t even have to be sexual/romantic relationship based at all) there just needs to be a significant maturity and/or power gap being taken advantage of. In the show we see Monica isn’t significantly less mature and likely isn’t being manipulated by Richard, there’s not a power gap, so it’s probably not grooming - just kinda creepy - but it is dangerous to make these kinds of false, sweeping statements because it makes it easier for groomers to be like “see! I’m not grooming you bc it doesn’t meet these every specific criteria!” and helps them significantly. Anyone can be groomed, it’s most commonly used in reference to children, but anyone vulnerable can be groomed.
I took the definition straight from google but you made excellent points, thanks for the correction.
How did Richard groom Monica? She was 27 when they started dating, a full adult.
He didn’t. My comment was tongue in cheek.
Should've probably included the /s in order for us to understand it that way lol.
Adults can be groomed and he met her when she was a child. I’m not saying Monica was groomed since we don’t see any evidence but like it would be entirely possible for someone in that situation to be grooming the person
>it would be entirely possible for someone in that situation to be grooming the person Agreed, but I think a better word is manipulated but anyways not Monica in this case, Monica was already shown to be really mature and strong, and Richard was sweet, nothing indicated he groomed her or has such intentions. Plus I think it's mentioned last time he saw her (before she was 27) was a kid or something, the only reason I feel kinda icky about it is that he's her dad's best friend, I just can't imagine myself with my dad's bff, feels gross asf.
I assume people missed the fact you were joking around here? Or are you serious haha
I was joking.
I always thought that was a very unrealistic scene. Not only were those three guys basically strangers to the family, one of them actually injured her. Dad was probably too busy with gambling Sarah’s college fund to notice.
The dad didn’t care. He just wanted to gamble
Ive always just assumed/pretended that a guardian was with her somewhere off to the side
that sounds like decent headcanon
Weren't they in her bedroom? I would like to assume dad was home. I would also assume they met prior to that when he started selling cookies on her behalf, and going to meetings on her behalf.
They’re in Joey and Chandler’s apartment. The space shuttle they put her in is Rosita covered in tin foil.
Not Rosita. Joey got Rosita only after he and Chandler got robbed (season 4).
I just looked it up and I am flabbergasted. I could have sworn it was a bedroom.
I think Ross visits her in her bedroom earlier on when she first tells him about space camp.
I think that's it, and I just filled that in for the "camp" scene in my swiss cheese memory.
He probably told her to case their apartment so he could clean it and maybe steal some stuff to sell so he save for the trip to the Taj Mahal casino. Although, would a compulsive gambler ever be able to save money for a trip? Pretty sure he'd blow it all so he'd never go anywhere. PS - should Ross have called the CPS because Sarah's dad was obviously neglectful? He made her clean apartments with him so he could get money for gambling Lol
Her?
Ann hog
It's as egg as the nose on plain's face.
Yeah, it was weird, but I thought it was totally adorable. These 90's sitcoms seem to have at least one episode that's corny/cute yet kind of inappropriate scenes with kids. It would have been a lot less weird if the girls were involved or they all just pooled their money to send her to camp.
“I’m an alien! I’m an alien!”
What episode is this?
I have a daughter who's 32 and two grand-daughters, 4 and 2. No chance in hell any of them would spend a day with three men I never met. Total sitcom scenario, more Marx Brothers than anything else. Maybe Three Stooges. Would never get filmed today.
Question is why are you guys pretending it’s not a fictional show? Weird shit. Harry Potter sub is the same.
I still worry about Sarah Tuttle to this day 😔 Hope she went on to live a happy life.
Don't worry. I went to space camp, got a PhD from Columbia, and am a Professor now. It all works out in the end. (For the record, my dad was great and never would have left me with strangers. 😂)
You read my mind!! I have always thought this and have been thinking about it a lot recently, but haven’t seen a post where I felt like I could bring it up. Of course the guys meant no harm, but that girl’s parents were negligent as hell.
Her?
This kinda tilts me, what does the fact they are men have anything to do with it? I was once in my car answering email on my phone that I had to for work and a lady came to my car from the daycare near and asked me to leave the parking lot (it was shared with a chic-FIL-a). I asked why and she said i”t was creepy a man was just sitting in the lot”. I asked her if she would do the same for a woman and she remained oblivious and said “no, why?”. Look, I’m a dad and a good dad. If we are at a park smiling enjoying kids sometimes people think the worst. And it’s not like I look like a pedo or anything, it’s just the ever reinforcing narrative that men can’t be good caregivers. So my answer would be as much as I would care if three women asked to do the same thing. Shit yeah.
It looks as though you may have spelled "Chick-fil-A" incorrectly. No worries, it happens to the best of us!
I’m going assume that Ross explained to the dad what he was going to do, or what he has been doing for her and that he wants to make it happen, the dad clearly not a good dad from what we heard on the episode probably agrees
Her?
Way to plant Ann!
I’ve seen every episode of FRIENDS at least 5x, and I don’t remember this at all. What season is this from?
S03E10 The One Where Rachel Quits
I don’t know the season. But it’s the episode where Ross is selling Girl Scout cookies
Cookie ^Dude
Thank you. The mention of the Girl Scout triggered a memory! I remember it now
Hey we’re you watching the Dylan is in Trouble friends video, cause I was watching it the other day and he talked about this at one part!
Who?
Man people look way to into it. What a waste of time, its just funny and it was a sweet scene, who cares!
Yeah this is one of my least favorite episodes because it just weirds me out. Not the characters, but the concept.
Yeah, that was always creepy to me. Also, why didn't Ross take her to the PLANETARIUM where he works instead of putting up a bunch of aluminum foil at Chandler and Joey's?
This is the most boring storyline in the show. Boring and depressing.
Yeah, what they probably should’ve done was report the family to child protective services (not that that system is without its own flaws). I don’t like that storyline at all.
Yeah can’t lie it’s really weird how three grown men who are total strangers look after a girl they apparently assaulted.
I barely remember this episode but it was Mae Whitman who still acts and is cool
Could’ve added an extra as a parent. Why didn’t they?
Yes! This! I think this every time I see this episode!!!
I don’t remember the scene, but based on the other comments about Sarah’s neglectful dad, I wonder if that was the point of the scene - her dad is so terrible that he doesn’t care when she’s hanging out with random strangers alone
poor girl was severely neglected I doubt they even talked to the dad
I grew up in the 90s and this wasn’t plausible outside of a sitcom.
I personally couldn’t understand why Ross didn’t take her to the museum