When Hollywood took on child molestation: Diff'rent Strokes episode from 1983 - "The Bicycle Man" - detailed portrayal of a child molester scheming and grooming children ( pizzagate )

submitted by Psalm100

A 1983 two-part episode of the sitcom "Diff'rent Strokes" is about child molestation. It's clear from both a message delivered by Conrad Bain, who played the father in the series, and the content of the show itself, that it was intended as a "public service" to educate people on child molestation.

While the show is educational in a sense, it can't be forgotten that Hollywood protects star pedophiles and many child stars have been abused and exploited. So, the motive for this show being done have to be suspect.

In the episode, the character played by Gary Coleman, Arnold Drummond, and a friend of his, are groomed by a child molester, played by actor Gordon Jump, who gives them ice cream and pizza to lure them in, and then wine. The grooming experiences are presented in a lot of detail, and seem to accurately portray how a molester would use twisted logic and deception to gradually draw children in. It's disturbing to watch.

I was trying to think of some of the social context for why this show would be made, and perhaps it was due to high-profile cases of child abductions and murders like those of Adam Walsh, Johnny Gosch, and the Atlanta child murders in the prior year or two. By doing such a show, Hollywood be putting itself in the "crusader" role.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYpVGaL81VQ

eucalyptus_spearmint

Sad bit of trivia (not that there's anything "trivial" about it) regarding this episode....actor Todd Bridges who co-starred as Arnold's big brother Willis begged to be written out of the episode as much as possible. He later revealed it was due to the fact that he had been previously molested and the subject matter was giving him flashbacks of the abuse.

The documentary "An Open Secret" regarding pedophiles operating in Hollywood is a must see for anyone concerned with this topic.

Psalm100

I didn't know that. Thanks for the information. Did he ever reveal what the molester's relationship was to him?

I've seen at least parts of "An Open Secret" so far. It was either most or all of it. Agreed that it's a must see.

eucalyptus_spearmint

Yes he did. I warn you, he quickly yet graphically describes the sexual abuse: http://www.starpulse.com/todd-bridges-talks-graphically-to-oprah-about-child-molestation-1847942818.html

It made me so sad and angry to read. He says he feels it ruined his life and he struggles with what happened to this day.

The man was a publicist by the name of Ronald. No last name is given but you can probably find out if you dig.

Psalm100

So even as he filmed that show, he'd been abused by someone in the entertainment industry, and perhaps even people connected with the show knew that. And many of the t.v. executives responsible for the show would have known how common the abuse of child stars was.

eucalyptus_spearmint

Abuse occurred around 3 times beginning when he was 11 and ending when he was 12. The man appeared at his home (he was a family friend in addition to Todd's publicist) and Todd said that he had buried the pain of the abuse and been suffering to the point that for some reason when the man appeared in his living room he "snapped" and lunged at him in the presence of his mother. (GO TODD!) His mother pulled him off the man. But his mother said she also realized in that instant what had happened to her son because she herself had been sexually abused as a child. She threatened the man with a knife and told him to leave the house, then called Todd's father....who sadly did not believe that this person molested Todd.

It seems that the refusal of his dad to believe his story was the final nail in the coffin of Todd's childhood. He turned to drugs and crime and had brushes with the law for years until he got his life together. He's now been clean for 17 years and has a family of his own but still struggles with emotional pain. He went on to say that for the most part his experience with the show Diff'rent Strokes was very positive and the man who played the father on the show was more of a father to him than his real father (sad!) But that particular episode was a huge struggle because at the time he had not gone public with being molested. Molestation victims struggle with shame and guilt (even more particularly when they are male) which often prevents them from making an outcry to someone.

Sometimes reading this shit makes me think of the song "The Wall" by Pink Floyd with the lyrics changed. "HEY! PEDOS! LEAVE THOSE KIDS ALONE!"

Vindicator

Great, great thread everyone. I've been hoping to see a Pedowood megathread listing all of the posts we've had that are related to Hollywood child rape and pedo normalization -- this should definitely be included. Not only the original post, but the comment contributions were terrific. Keep it up! Compare and contrast was highly engaging.

MattHelm

It was a public service to child molesters it showed them how to do it without getting caught.

holaymackal

I'm surprised nobody mentioned the alleged dog-whistling in this episode. There's a scene where the pedo is wearing one of those pedo-design rings around the 10 minute mark, you can somewhat see it.

Laskar

Okay, I forced myself to watch the whole thing and could only conclude that the scriptwriter is an obvious pedo.

Laskar

@5:08 Colman to the pedo, responding to the pedo saying "you scratch my back I'll scratch yours" : "you keep coming up with these presents you can scratch me all over".

I couldn't stand hear anything else after that.

Laskar

"ice cream and pizza"

l23r

When I heard that bit I wondered whether it was code, or whether it was just used because kids like pizza. You don't see kids going crazy over things like chicken wings or nachos like they do over pizza, even though all of those foods are group / party kinda foods.

possiblepizza

So that's what willis was talkin' about!

mrohm

This was pretty common in the 80s. We called them "Very Special Episodes," and most sitcoms had some, relating to child abuse, drugs, safe sex, homelessness, etc. It was common in some cartoons, too, like He Man and GI Joe. Those days are long gone.

Afterschool Specials covered similar ground.

They're now considered laughable and dated. They kind of WERE but they're much better than the degeneracy now.

l23r

I think they stopped using them because they realized they didn't work. Kinda like how DARE often gets kids curious about drugs they otherwise wouldn't have known, or when they smoke weed and nothing bad happens they think everything they were told about them - like Crack is Wack - is a lie.

VIrginiaPerson

I would not say they didn't work. I was taken out of school around the time social services started visiting my house regularly (and doing nothing). I was isolated from normal sources of healthy influence. Very Special Episodes and Public Service Announcements helped me to understand that the behavior of the adults around me was wrong. I am a law abiding citizen today; a non-drinker who has never used drugs. I contribute to society and take care of my family. I attribute this in large part to heavy TV watching and book reading as a child.

123_456

Oh, yeah. I remember they had some Spiderman comics about some serious topics. One was about drugs, and another about guns.

mrohm

Yup, Spidey did a lot of those sorts of things. Green Arrow did too, and Lantern.

Psalm100

I agree with you on both points, but also think that despite the show doing a public service by educating people on pedophiles, we can't know from that what the motives were behind its making, and given Hollywood's track record, especially on its protection of pedophiles, we should assume that the motive wasn't innocent, but calculated. It's like the situation with other people and groups who seek to help and defend children, like Jimmy Savile, Jerry Sandusky, and ICMEC and NCMEC. There's no reason to just assume the motives are good.

rooting4redpillers

Good post. Amazing how TV has changed in the last several decades. And appalling, how contemporary sitcom writers/actors, and standup comedians, are completely comfortable working blatantly obvious pedophilia jokes into shows, on an almost regular basis. Treating the subject as an offhand rimshot. Child rape innuendo as ordinary comedy fodder, and the audience laughs and laughs.

I was looking to quote specific examples of this, and ran across this multi-person article/conversation, presenting various points of view - regarding controversial/questionable content, presentation, studio audience participation, etc. - in 1980s sitcoms. Focusing primarily on Diff'rent Strokes , The Bicycle Man episode. (I gave up trying to find those examples I was looking for in the first place. I'm sure most of us, here, already know what I'm talking about with that, anyway.)

A “very special” Diff’rent Strokes that’s terrifying for all the wrong reasons | By Erik Adams, Donna Bowman, Phil Dyess-Nugent, Genevieve Koski, Ryan McGee, David Sims, and Todd VanDerWerff | A.V. Club website, TV Roundtable | Aug 21, 2013

Introductory paragraph: Welcome to the TV Roundtable, where some of TV Club’s writers tackle episodes that deal with a central theme. This is the seventh of eight installments to focus on “controversial episodes.” Diff’rent Strokes, “The Bicycle Man” (season five, episodes 16 and 17; originally aired 2/5/1983 and 2/12/1983)

Notice, this is the seventh of eight installments. I'll save looking at their other articles for another day.

ArthurEdens

I wonder if this was made as part of a plea deal for secret charges against someone connected to the show. I remember this episode as a kid and it made me steer clear from creepos

jstrotha0975

I remember seeing this as a kid and it was in the news. It was a very uncomfortable show to watch. I was maybe 8 years old. The episode made the news.

Takeitslow

Oddly enough 2 of the child actors from that show came out with abuse claims. Several them had the usual child actor drug and mental health problems. I guess boy and girl love isn't so loving huh?

Jobew1

yeah i'm old enough (sadly) to remember that episode as a re run in the mid 80's. as a kid, it was weird to watch especially as the molester was a hilarious character from another childhood favorite show to watch in reruns- wkrp in cincinatti ('big guy' arthur carlson). as messed up as it was, at least i recall the show trying to put in a message like kids should be aware and try and avoid the type of situation. tho i don't watch many kid centric sitcoms now, i don't think hollywood even puts any morals in their shows anymore.

Psalm100

Worse than not putting an morals in shows anymore, they put Satanic ones.

I think I saw a post here on the new show The Mick. I watched a couple of episodes and it uses the very tactics used by the child molester in the Diff'rent Strokes episode. In one of the shows I saw, two thirteen year-old boys drink and attempt to have a threesome with a teen girl. This is all portrayed outrageous only in an entertainment sense, but realistic and morally "neutral" in a morality sense. And the show is one just nothing more than pedophilia and sociopathy. Hollywood is now the child molester.

Jobew1

so true. in the old days (including the 1980's) there were, i think, christian groups that tried to keep things in check a little. i don't think there's any org of any clout that even tries anymore

Psalm100

The YouTube video of the show I linked to calls it the "creepiest" show in sitcom history. It may be, but since then, shows like Family Guy and The Mick have come along that present just the sort of things the molester did in this episode. I watched a couple of episodes of The Mick recently, and a couple of 13-year-olds in the show were made to go to a huge party with mostly adults and they naturally drank - right before the two boys were going to both be with a girl a little bit older. The molester also rationalized clearly concerning behavior, just as the entertainment industry does today and certainly The Mick's defenders do to their critics. Just about every tactic employed by the molester shown in this show is now employed by the entertainment industry.

Laskar

And look at Bill Nye's show: anything goes sex wise. From https://voat.co/v/pizzagate/1818215

Bill Nye, an entertainer posing as a scientist (though he will not ever debate a real scientist) has defended planned parent hood's sale of organs, and any sort of sex perversion as being normal, has now come out of mothballs to promote an even sicker agenda.

Source: Bill Nye's logic: "Rape, murder and pedophilia should be legal because 'You can't tell people what to do!' ": http://www.naturalnews.com/051593_Bill_Nye_abortion_Planned_Parenthood.html#

He is a staunch defender of "Climate Change" and is afraid of facing anyone who is a real scientist: "Why does debate scare Bill Nye?" @2:09: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ic74cuKkoekYouTube

He has a new show on Netflix called "Bill Nye Saves the World".

Here is a video about a vanilla ice cream being persuaded to participate in a multi sex orgy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46h-LfNWPn8YouTube

And here is one which really pushes "anything goes". In this song, where the lyrics say, "sexuality is a spectrum, everybody is on it", there are the following lines:

[sex] "with a sad clown skyping in the moonlight" "damn Skippy, home slice sing it with me all night" "sex how you want it's your goddamn right"**

Here is the source: the captioned video: "My Sex Junk--Rachel Bloom--Bill Nye Saves the World": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wllc5gSc-N8YouTube

DerivaUK

Netflix is Soros.

Laskar

About the Mick, (from https://voat.co/v/pizzagate/1810224): :)

Let's have a closer look at another attempt by CIA west to normalize the depravity of child abuse, and transgender to the masses in the guise of "entertainment".

Fox's show, "The Mick" is about a transgender child. He is debased by saying things like: 'the dress 'breezes on my vagina' " – a disgusting attempt at sexualized humor involving a child.

Not just to titillate the pedos, but there is egregious violence: "Another scene shows the boy celebrate after a man’s eye is impaled in front of him by a woman’s high-heeled shoe. As blood is shooting on the boy’s face and clothes, he exclaims, “cool!” " Source: https://vicimedia.wordpress.com/tag/comedy/

The pictures in this source (above) speak for themselves about the depravity.

Kaitlin Olson, a "star" of the show says she is excited to be in a comedy children can watch. Here's her Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaitlin_Olson Promotions abound: https://www.bustle.com/articles/193465-why-kaitlin-olsons-the-mick-will-be-your-new-go-to-comedy

The show is pushed as "Olsen's show" but this video shows more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pp5hfdyjWc4YouTubeYouTube

The online promotion sounds like something James Alefantis would write: #KidsAreDicks

Apparently back in January,** it was Fox's top comedy launch** since New Girl. Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/tv-ratings-mick-is-foxs-top-comedy-launch-new-girl-961534

There is a petition to demand the cancellation of the show here: https://actright.com/petition/285

While YouTube videos are demonetized and even removed, this sick garbage is considered a comedy for children.

equineluvr

I remember that episode. It was odd. I remember the actors coming across as uncomfortable, which then made ME uncomfortable. Secondary to that, the ep seemed to drag. Also, it wasn't funny, and I was tuning in for some laughs.

BTW, OP, Hollyweird is the film industry. DIfferent Strokes was a TV show.

ArthurEdens

They shoot film and tv on the same backlots

Gorillion

Hollywood is Film and TV.

Psalm100

Well, I understand that often times when people say Hollywood, they do mean only the film industry. In reference to the Oscars, for instance.

But it's also used more broadly to mean the American popular entertainment industry, in which so many of the same people, from the stars on down, work in the different forms of entertainment and share the same general lifestyles, values and social networks.

Diff'rent Strokes was indeed filmed in Hollywood, too:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diff%27rent_Strokes