I’m watching the first episode of The 80s: The decade that made us (Narrated by Rob Lowe, I DVR'ed both this and the 90s one last week) on NatGeo, and we’re talking about Jane Fonda and fitness, how after breaking her foot again she could no longer do ballet to keep fit and her stepmom introduced her to an aerobics class “Jane Fonda decides to take on a new cause: bringing equal opportunity exercise to the masses.”

Fonda: “Women were not supposed to sweat, there were no exercise classes of any kind. You can go to a gym and stand on something with a band around your butt that made you wiggle like this. That was about it.

"with so few gyms catering to women, Fonda decides to build her own”

A couple of interesting tidbits about VCRs too (how she markets with them ties into this)

Cost of a VCR in 1981 equivalent to $3500 USD today.

Then there was the whole issue regarding the legality of recording stuff off of TV (which I vaguely remember reading about). The Supreme Court rules VCR legal in 1984.

In 1981 2% of households own VCR and 50% of tapes available a hardcore pornography