I'd say you could make a case for rape. She willfully said NO when he first pressed her- considering that she is a young girl away from home and in a foreign company, and an employee of his neighbor. She felt helpless and the fact she had to cover up a unintentional slip-up didn't help matters. He returned and pressed her again- she may have felt some guilt about receiving a favor from him- but she still told him no again. It was fear on several level that resulted in her giving in. Remember, she is far away from home and loved ones- what would happen to her if her employer kicked her out? And Pete, aware of her fears, took advantage of the situation.

It's odd to me that nobody has addressed the actions of the young au pair, who seems conflicted twixt the outer mores of social propriety, and her own,building, lust for Pete's character.[She's German, not Swedish, we must remember].
The fact that she fails to kiss him, signals to me, not that she doesn't WANT TO, but rather her innate sense that this will "fling wide the door" to consummation of what she, herself, really wants[but is afraid to express].
I grew up in the 60's, and so I also witnessed every campaign from bra-burning, to [so-called]"Equal Rights" demonstrations, to the high-pitched yowls of "No means NO!", to the pervasive and often poisonous strains of castrating men to a state of full emasculation.
My "sense" of this scene is that viewers have all too easily cried "RAPE!", without analyzing to the tull, the seeming reserve of the character in question.
Pete Campbell is not [yet] an inveterate womanizer.He is simply young and relentless. [And,sorry to say it, occasionally stupid, and reckless, by default.]
It almost seems as if his own weaknesses pull at the heart-strings and sister-weaknesses, of those with whom he connects.
Yes, he IS slimy, opportunistic, overly-zealous and too proud, but that (to the mind of this viewer) is where the adjectives halt.
A kind of "Ted Kennedy" he might have been; A Ted Bundy, he is NOT.

It's odd to me that nobody has addressed the actions of the young au pair, who seems conflicted twixt the outer mores of social propriety, and her own,building, lust for Pete's character.[She's German, not Swedish, we must remember].
The fact that she fails to kiss him, signals to me, not that she doesn't WANT TO, but rather her innate sense that this will "fling wide the door" to consummation of what she, herself, really wants[but is afraid to express].
I grew up in the 60's, and so I also witnessed every campaign from bra-burning, to [so-called]"Equal Rights" demonstrations, to the high-pitched yowls of "No means NO!", to the pervasive and often poisonous strains of castrating men to a state of full emasculation.
My "sense" of this scene is that viewers have all too easily cried "RAPE!", without analyzing to the tull, the seeming reserve of the character in question.
Pete Campbell is not [yet] an inveterate womanizer.He is simply young and relentless. [And,sorry to say it, occasionally stupid, and reckless, by default.]
It almost seems as if his own weaknesses pull at the heart-strings and sister-weaknesses, of those with whom he connects.
Yes, he IS slimy, opportunistic, overly-zealous and too proud, but that (to the mind of this viewer) is where the adjectives halt.
A kind of "Ted Kennedy" he might have been; A Ted Bundy, he is NOT.