Sunday, April 17, 2011
Sex is bad, violence is O.K.?
Having studied sex and violence in Buffy for the past week, I have realized that violence, in any form of media, seems to be accepted while sex is deemed too graphic to show to the masses. I'm not talking about showing a bunch of sex on t.v., but since the two are so closely related, should we accept one and admonish the other? I do not see any social motivation for why violence in media has increased in recent years, while sexual content in media has been suppressed. I believe that if filmmakers, photographers, and producers should be able to express themselves to the fullest of their ability, and if doing so includes more sexual content than normal, they should not be censored. That being said, this gets back to the issue of exposure of "extreme" media and its affect on children. Those who believe that violence in media affects children would most certainly also be against sex in the media. Yet, one continues to have an increasing role in the mainstream while the other sits without exposure.
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It's odd that in a lot if other countries, the opposite is true. I went on a trip to Costa Rica over last winter break with the Cornell Wind Ensemble where we performed concerts and donated instruments around the country. One of the nights we had home stays in groups at middle school students homes. The next morning, while we were having breakfast with his family, he was channel surfing and went right through a porn channel... on basic cable. And i'm not talking about 1am Cinemax porn, it showed everything. The kid and his family were completely unfazed by it, they were just surfing through channels. I almost choked on my papaya and melon
ReplyDeleteI think sex is becoming more prevalent in television as well as violence. If you watch a show like "Nip Tuck," you'll definitely see what I'm talking about. I think Buffy doesn't show too much explicit sex in general because that would take away too much from what it wanted to focus on. The sex is not the main purpose of Buffy, but that sex and relationships exist in spite of the violent world that they live in.
ReplyDeleteBuffy is P.G-ed most likely because it was originally shown on WB, a "family friendly" channel as well as being a show targeted towards a younger population.
ReplyDeleteWith that said, the mass media is def. becoming more sexually liberated. consider music videos back in the 70s (ie. Madonna) they were considered really out there at that time, but looking back at it now, it looks rather tame. who knows? maybe your kids would look back at True Blood/Nip-Tuck one day and think its nothing.
I've also noticed the phenomenon that Nick brought up. In other countries, sex isn't as taboo as it is in the US. For instance, Hong Kong is currently screening Sex and Zen: Extreme Ecstasy 3D in cinemas. Everybody is accepting it as humorous entertainment and I don't think there is much controversy over it as a perversion.
ReplyDeleteIt does not make sense. Sex is natural, something that most people (hopefully) will all experience. Violence, while useful when we were cavemen, has very little utility in our developed society unless your psycho, defending yourself, or at war. We are genetically made to have sex but are not equipped with fangs and claws.
ReplyDeleteSex and violence are very natural things. Sex for reproduction and violence for basically everything else. violence provides food, security, living space and anything else you desire (this of course is speaking from an early form of human's point of view.) But i agree that Americans have decided to accept on and shun the other. every time i watch the news or look at cnn.com there is at least one article or segment about violence. people are attracted to violence which is why it has become so prevalent in our society. the strange thing is that...well...people are also very attracted to sex. yes we also embrace sex as a society since every big budget film has some smokin hot actress dressed in basically nothing running around everywhere. Americans are still very much excited about sex, yet the extent of our fascination with both violence and sex is not equal. we do not go to the extreme with sex AKA put hardcore porn on tv. etc. yet we do go to the extreme with violence. there are shows in trutv that show robberies and fist fights where people are actually getting killed or severely injured. for some reason we have decided that violence is more acceptable than sex.
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