Teenage Betty Cooper gave a controversial performance on Riverdale this week. (Photo: CW)

In what’s being called “the most cringe-worthy event of your life,” the television show Riverdale featured a teenage stripping scene that no one is happy about.

This week’s episode from the CW adaptation of Archie’s Comics, which launched in the 1950s, features 21-year-old actress Lili Reinhart, who plays 16-year-old Betty Cooper (the blonde counterpart to Archie’s brunette girlfriend, Veronica Lodge), stripping down to black, lacy undergarments and performing a sexy, burlesque dance on a stripper pole. A group of middle-aged folks — including her boyfriend’s father and her own mother — sit in the audience.

Social media reacted.

BETTY COOPER DID NOT JUST STRIP EWEWEWEWEWEWEWEWEW — lu (@bocasbaudelaire) December 7, 2017

Hold on Betty Cooper just did a strip tease to Mad World — O Christmas G (@GeorgieAnders) December 8, 2017

Betty Cooper's strip dance was beyond cringe #Riverdale — BawbyRose (@BawbDevine) December 8, 2017

#riverdale aren’t they supposed to be 16? Why is Betty dancing in a pole… pic.twitter.com/tJVXdc9nsn — mali (@MKhamkhay) December 7, 2017

last time i checked betty cooper was a minor. so can someone tell my why this show decided to put in a scene of a minor stripping in a strip club full of grown men, and thought it was a good idea? pic.twitter.com/gQl3CKT6rM — laq,, 13 (@8Oswheeler) December 8, 2017

did betty cooper just do a strip tease in front of her boyfriend's father and her own mother #Riverdale — Suburban Mom (@Suzzi_Kafer) December 7, 2017

Cosmopolitan wrote of the scene, “There’s something unsettling about seeing a high school student do what Betty did at a business that’s probably serving alcohol to underage kids,” and Entertainment Weekly prefaced its recap with, “AND NOW WE’VE MADE IT TO THE MOST CRINGEWORTHY EVENT OF YOUR LIFE.”

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The scene is reminiscent of a 2007 episode in the first season of Gossip Girl in which high schooler Blair Waldorf, played by then 21-year-old actress Leighton Meester, reeling from her breakup with Nate Archibald, hits a nightclub, drinks champagne, and strips on a stage. Scandalous 10 years ago; unimaginable in a #MeToo world where seemingly every day, men are accused of sexual misconduct.

“No matter the context, a scene involving an underage girl sexualized on a stage does nothing to further the cultural conversation about consent,” parenting expert Sharon Silver, creator of Proactive Parenting, tells Yahoo Lifestyle. “That said, the public reaction is a gift — it forces us to examine ourselves and literally strip away the depth of systemic sexism.”

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