Frasier Online

does anyone think it's kind of strange and inappropriate that he had a sexual relationship with his piano teacher? i actually have nothing against large age differences in otherwise happy relationships, it's just that he said he was only 17 when he left (how old was he when it started?) and they said the woman was middle-aged at the time (older enough that when he went to visit her, he thought her elderly mother was her!). i was in high school at that age, and i know my parents would have been outraged if they learned that an adult in my life was rubbing up on me or started a relationship with me. but i guess an older woman with a younger man can seem less creepy than an older man with a younger woman? even if it's the same.

i'm not up in arms about it or anything, i just watched the episode for the first time in ages and was curious about it, so i thought i'd mention it for the sake of conversation here!

i feel like if this happened to someone in real life, it'd inevitably have an effect on their romantic relationships in the future. i know this wasn't meant to be significant for frasier as i don't think it's ever even mentioned again, but do you imagine that this could be a factor in his terrible ability to have a lasting relationship with a woman?

I imagine it would have been Frasier doing the seducing - even at age 17! Our hero hits on just about every eligible female he meets so I'm sure he was just developing his skills at an early age! And what better way to learn than with a mature woman.

I hate that episode not because of some moral reason but because I found it exceptionally boring for one thing and not particularly interesting. On the other hand I have absolutely no problem with it "morally". At age 17 one is hardly a child, even 17 minus a couple of years. I don't see how this could have an impact on the lengths of his (sexual) relationships given that he's the one that left the woman and apparently felt remorse for it, hence the book. If anything it would have made him strive to have lasting relationships. Otherwise the limit of 18 imposed by our culture is quite arbitrary, if you follow the dictates of nature then you are fit to have sexual relations as soon as you hit puberty, IE normally much earlier than 17. So no problem there. I tend to think that it's our society that creates distorted repressed and sometimes obsessed individuals by making sexual relations a crime until long after they are able to do it. It would be like saying to your kid. Yeah, your legs are in perfect working order but we have decided that it was immoral for you to walk until you waited for five years In a wheelchair... Society is a conglomerate of behaviors, mostly stupid and arbitrary and based on old superstitions, only slowly revised.

heartofmotion wrote:I imagine it would have been Frasier doing the seducing - even at age 17! Our hero hits on just about every eligible female he meets so I'm sure he was just developing his skills at an early age! And what better way to learn than with a mature woman.

And I've always thought that she had seduced him! Leaning over the piano so that her blouse would fall open... I think she did it on purpose . Plus, I can't imagine Frasier at 17 being at all able to say two coherent sentences in front of an attractive woman, especially an authoritative one .

I wouldn't say a relationship like that is inappropriate really, but it does make me uncomfortable to think about it, the same way as I never want to know that my parents had sex . I guess it's mostly the fact that, when I try to put myself in the piano teacher's position, I always end up thinking that it's pointless to have sex with a teenager. I'm 27, and I've taught high school English, so I know what it's like to teach a bunch of hormone-ridden 17-year-olds, and I'd definitely pick someone my age over any of them, no matter how good-looking. I might change my mind in the future, but now I really don't see the point of sleeping with an inexperienced, clumsy teen, no matter how lonely I was.
Though it wasn't just sex with them, they had an actual relationship. I understand that Frasier was pretty mature for his age, but I'd still feel more like a babysitter than a girlfriend in such a relationship.

yea i thought she had come onto him, something about rubbing against him as she leaned in front of him!

anyway, i don't think my opinion of their relationship is arbitrary or stupid. it's not that a teenager's body isn't capable of having sex or some superstition against them having sex, it's a matter of emotional and mental maturity of young people vs adults. at least if two young teens explored their sexuality together they'd be on more even ground. that's why a middle aged person who pursues a physical relationship with a young teen is often viewed as a predator. i personally think the relationship would've come off differently had it been a middle aged man and 17 year old girl.

Perhaps there was a bit of an 'Oedipus' complex going on at the time?

frasier floyd wrote:yea i thought she had come onto him, something about rubbing against him as she leaned in front of him!

anyway, i don't think my opinion of their relationship is arbitrary or stupid. it's not that a teenager's body isn't capable of having sex or some superstition against them having sex, it's a matter of emotional and mental maturity of young people vs adults. at least if two young teens explored their sexuality together they'd be on more even ground. that's why a middle aged person who pursues a physical relationship with a young teen is often viewed as a predator. i personally think the relationship would've come off differently had it been a middle aged man and 17 year old girl.

I don't know, older men marrying girls young enough to be their daughters, nay their grand-daughters happens every day and people rarely make that big of a fuss over it, if any. Are you sure that there isn't a bit of gender discrimination going on here?

I agree with Patrick regarding the episode being boring. It's one of those that I rarely watch.