Lessons from the '80s

Last night I watched "Adventures in Babysitting" at a party. I didn't see it when it originally came out, but I might as well have, because it contained just about everything I learned from TV and movies in the '80s. To wit:

1. Punching someone in the face is a perfect solution to any problem. When someone says something really terrible about a woman, you're supposed to punch him in the face. Or if he's threatening someone, and there seems to no way out -- one punch and problem solved! The great thing about punches to the face is that the guy immediately falls into deep unconsciousness. And you know that, given a reasonable amount of time, he'll get up again, no permanent damage done, and will never bother you or say such terrible things again. He knows he has been defeated.

I actually tried this once. In eighth grade I had a friend named Nathan whom I couldn't stand. I was a passive and overly polite kid, so I tended to attract the kind of people who got on everyone else's nerves. They got on mine too, of course, but I was too nice/timid to tell them to go away.

So Nathan was always annoying me, and I secretly resolved to punch him in the face next time he did. Sure enough, the next day, he was being a jerk, and I punched. But it was a light, ineffectual little punch that just glanced off his chin and didn't hurt him at all. He was more like "Uh, what was that?" I tried to pass it off as a little joke. He seemed to accept that.

2. Cities are horrific, lawless wastelands filled with gangs, hookers, homeless schizophrenics, and gangs of homeless hooker schizophrenics. Suburbs are the the place for normal, safe life, in which you biggest worry is acne. As soon as you cross the border into a city, you will immediately be attacked by screaming lunatics and street gangs that, by the way, happen to be very multicultural. That was another interesting part about the '80s: Each street gang had a good mix of white people, Latinos and black folk. I understand that it was due to the hiring quotas mandated by the affirmative action laws of the time.

3. Black people are always scary at first, but usually turn out to be super cool. If you're going to have a character who is just some guy, you'd make him white, of course! If you're going to make him black, he needs to start out with some level of menace to him. That menace is usually contradicted by him doing something awesome to help you out.

Granted, in "Adventures in Babysitting," there is one black guy chasing our heroes around the hellscape of Chicago who's pretty mean. But even he's really more of a middle-management guy, taking orders from the truly evil person, a white dude.

Every other black person scares our heroes at first, but later becomes awesome. One is a car thief that inadvertedly gets our heroes in trouble. But he always wants to help, and in the end he gets the chance by (spoiler alert) punching the evil white dude in the face.

The other prominent black guy is a blues musician -- our heroes wander onto his stage and are frightened of him and the crowd (all black people). But the bluesman says "you don't leave here until you play the blues," and of course they do so. And the crowd quickly turns from hard-eyed disdain to launching an overwhelming ovation. That's a great thing about performing in the '80s -- all you have to do is be on a stage and try really hard and the crowd will explode with joy. It doesn't matter if you're white as all hell and can't sing (this was the founding principle of The House of Blues, by the way).

4. When you raise your voice in a fancy place, every other patron immediately stops talking and all music stops on a dime. At one point, our heroes barge into a fancy French restaurant to confront Elizabeth Shue's two-timing boyfriend. As soon as things get heated, everyone else in the restaurant suddenly stops talking and stares at them like toddlers watching Elmo. And the violinist in the corner had to cut himself short at the exact same time, so as to not drown out the show. It's really out of consideration -- fancy people LOVE gawping at confrontations. Of course, no restaurant employee intervenes -- hey buddy, down in front! We're trying to watch two kids fighting here! Anyway, the scene ends with (spoiler alert) actually not a punch in the face, but a kick in the butt that pushes the mean guy onto a table. Problem solved. Next scene.

5. Quicksand is everywhere. OK, this wasn't in "Adventures in Babysitting." But it is a very prominent lesson I learned by watching TV in the '80s. I don't know if it was mainly old reruns or what, but somewhere I got the impression that falling into quicksand is a very common occurrence, and it's a good idea to lay out a contingency plan now. I know that after you fall in you have to stay still -- the more that you move, the faster you will sink. You have to hope you can grab onto someone's arm ... but uh-oh, you might pull them in too! Great! Now what?!?! Wait, there's a long vine over here that we can use to pull ourselves out! And it's a vine strong enough to withstand the downward pressure of an entire human being's weight plus the suction of quicksand! Phew!