"The rating system is not an end all be all thing."
Absolutely, and I want to explain why I referenced it; Being on a movie site is not the reason but it was a great opening for my example.
I refer to these rating systems because they come about through votes and committees and the influences of perhaps hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of people.
These ratings show us a statistical average of the moral views from a pretty decently sized population sample.
That moral view shows us our society is more accepting of "public" violence than "public" sexuality. Just look at television, the cop shows now feature pretty blatant and disturbingly realistic gore, usually a corpse, and the only element that's tamed down seems to be the blood.
With televised sexuality, one of the only realistic options is simply to have the characters talk about it.
G.I. Joe was a popular cartoon when I was a kid, and it showed a watered-down form of "clean" violence but it was still violence and conflict. They tried to show Joes and Cobras always parachuting out of planes getting shot down, and no one ever died, but a child can't even fully comprehend what's going on and can't fully appreciate it without first understanding war and death... something which can happen early, especially if there's an actual war happening in the world.
Can you FATHOM a child's cartoon with watered-down, "clean" sex? I'm going to match G.I. Joe as close as I can -- This would require orgies, group sex, but nothing truly explicit being shown.
Can you FATHOM that? Probably not.
Voila, there you go. Violence is considered more acceptable than sexuality when it comes to entertainment for children.
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actionkamen (23176)
6 years ago
I think mouth to mouth sexual kissing is the cleanest depiction of sexual content in kids movies.
And yes, violence is considered more acceptable than sexuality when it comes to entertainment for children. I never said otherwise. Maybe you mistook me for the previous poster (samoanjoes)?
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Frogarama (12942)
6 years ago
No, I was just expanding on my point about why I referenced ratings, and when the GI Joe example hit my mind, I had to post it.
I actually wasn't completely sure what your stance was, but I was mostly just giving a more focused iteration of my argument.
I didn't mean to be redundant, but thanks for reading and responding!
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actionkamen (23176)
6 years ago
Yeah, it's a complex situation and a not very logical one. Parents usually decided these things in a whim and not put much thought about it.
Sex and violence in movies... hmm... I still have to decide in a one by one basis. Generally I'd rather have my kid see violence in movies than sexual content. However, I'd rather have my kid see a real uncensored sexual act in a video than a real uncensored decapitation video.
I was quite traumatized myself after I watched a decapitation video of soldiers and other victims in what looked like the Middle East.
Way, way less gory than any slasher movie. But it's real people and real blood. Can't sleep for a few nights after. Even now I'm shivering while typing this.
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Frogarama (12942)
6 years ago
On Saturday a friend was watching a video of a small deer-like African animal trapped between a pack of hyenas and a hippo.
It was traumatizing too... Especially to think of how it happens every day.
I'll never forget a video of zebras in Africa crossing a river, I saw it so long ago I can't even recall. Many died from alligators, but there was one zebra that I guess lost his/her only child. The zebra went back to the edge of the river waiting, hoping.
Another one came up and provided physical comfort, then compelled the first to give up waiting.
It still fucks me up. I'm crying right now.
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