4 ms·

You just said: Kids can handle unrealistic violence fine but unrealistic sexuality is a problem. That makes no sense. None at all. Either your kids can distin

by moe 15y ago

You just said: Kids can handle unrealistic violence fine but unrealistic sexuality is a problem. That makes no sense. None at all. Either your kids can distinguish reality from fiction. Or they can't. Right?

tedunangst 15y ago
I think "I can single handedly kill all the bad guys with poor aim" is more easily recognized as fiction than "I get to fuck all the girls because that's what studs like me do". Action movie directors responsible for the former are (I hope) at least kind of in on the joke, but I have my doubts as to how much sexual fiction is recognized as realistic or not by the author. As a culture, we generally criticize real life violence. The message is fairly clear (ok in fiction, not ok in reality). However, sex is celebrated in real life, meaning it's a lot less black and white deciding what's ok.
- moe 15y ago
  I think "I can single handedly kill all the bad guys with poor aim" is more easily recognized as fiction than "I get to fuck all the girls because that's what studs like me do". Not sure what else to say other than: Huh? That doesn't remotely make sense to me. We are talking about kids, not about mental retards in the medical sense, are we? As a culture, we generally criticize real life violence. The message is fairly clear (ok in fiction, not ok in reality). However, sex is celebrated in real life, meaning it's a lot less black and white deciding what's ok. Again: Huh? When reading such arguments I can only wonder what kind of kids the author is around, and whether he has lost all memory of his own youth (sorry, not meant as personal attack). Obviously a minor below a certain age should not be exposed to either. However, by the teen years, when boys commonly gain access to both and consume large quantities of both, most seem to handle it really well. Making an artificial distinction there just doesn't make sense to me. If a kid develops behavioral patterns based on "because that's what studs like me do" (either in a sexual or a violent way) then that kid has deeper problems entirely unrelated to the kind of content that he prefers.
  - tedunangst 15y ago
    It's really hard to explain without just restating the same thing. From my soapbox, it appears as if fictional sex is more likely to be portrayed as representative.
lotharbot 15y ago
I apologize if I was insufficiently clear. It has nothing to do with distinguishing reality from fiction. What matters is how the emotional content can affect a child's development. Some fictional violence, even very graphic, simply has no emotional content of note. This means many parents are OK with it. Other forms of fictional violence, as well as most real violence, has possibly traumatic emotional content (even for adults) and therefore parents are cautious about exposing their children to it. Both fictional and real depictions of sexuality can carry emotional content which is likely to be inaccurate or unhealthy, often in very subtle ways. Therefore, parents are cautious about exposing their children to it (even if they have no particular sexual hangups.)
- moe 15y ago
  You keep making that hand-wavy distinction, without any backup or precision. Quote (emphasis mine): You say: Some fictional violence [...] has no emotional content of note You say: Both fictional and real depictions of sexuality can carry emotional content I'll assume you're trying to make the point that fictional sex is worse than fictional violence. I further assume you don't really know why (hence your imprecise wording) but have this diffuse belly-feeling that this is how it must be, because that has always been your belly-feeling.
  - tedunangst 15y ago
    Belly feeling is needlessly puerile.
    - moe 15y ago
      Sorry, I didn't mean to attack him personally but tried to point out the reasons that I suspect behind this kind of lazy arguing. These "belly-opinions" are very widespread, a more verbose description would have been: "I can't give exact reasons for my opinion but it feels like that's what my parents|peer-group|church|society|... would agree with". I felt that the verbose version would have been even less polite.. but oh well.
- king_jester 15y ago
philwelch 15y ago
Sexuality is such a taboo in American culture that kids don't know what realistic sexuality is. In some cultures, parents talk frankly and openly to their kids about it, and teach them how to respect and listen to their partners and protect themselves from unwanted pregnancy and STI's. American parents uncomfortably change the subject whenever they ask where babies come from.

by moe 15y ago

tedunangst 15y ago

I think "I can single handedly kill all the bad guys with poor aim" is more easily recognized as fiction than "I get to fuck all the girls because that's what studs like me do". Action movie directors responsible for the former are (I hope) at least kind of in on the joke, but I have my doubts as to how much sexual fiction is recognized as realistic or not by the author. As a culture, we generally criticize real life violence. The message is fairly clear (ok in fiction, not ok in reality). However, sex is celebrated in real life, meaning it's a lot less black and white deciding what's ok.

moe 15y ago
I think "I can single handedly kill all the bad guys with poor aim" is more easily recognized as fiction than "I get to fuck all the girls because that's what studs like me do". Not sure what else to say other than: Huh? That doesn't remotely make sense to me. We are talking about kids, not about mental retards in the medical sense, are we? As a culture, we generally criticize real life violence. The message is fairly clear (ok in fiction, not ok in reality). However, sex is celebrated in real life, meaning it's a lot less black and white deciding what's ok. Again: Huh? When reading such arguments I can only wonder what kind of kids the author is around, and whether he has lost all memory of his own youth (sorry, not meant as personal attack). Obviously a minor below a certain age should not be exposed to either. However, by the teen years, when boys commonly gain access to both and consume large quantities of both, most seem to handle it really well. Making an artificial distinction there just doesn't make sense to me. If a kid develops behavioral patterns based on "because that's what studs like me do" (either in a sexual or a violent way) then that kid has deeper problems entirely unrelated to the kind of content that he prefers.
- tedunangst 15y ago
  It's really hard to explain without just restating the same thing. From my soapbox, it appears as if fictional sex is more likely to be portrayed as representative.

lotharbot 15y ago

I apologize if I was insufficiently clear. It has nothing to do with distinguishing reality from fiction. What matters is how the emotional content can affect a child's development. Some fictional violence, even very graphic, simply has no emotional content of note. This means many parents are OK with it. Other forms of fictional violence, as well as most real violence, has possibly traumatic emotional content (even for adults) and therefore parents are cautious about exposing their children to it. Both fictional and real depictions of sexuality can carry emotional content which is likely to be inaccurate or unhealthy, often in very subtle ways. Therefore, parents are cautious about exposing their children to it (even if they have no particular sexual hangups.)

moe 15y ago
You keep making that hand-wavy distinction, without any backup or precision. Quote (emphasis mine): You say: Some fictional violence [...] has no emotional content of note You say: Both fictional and real depictions of sexuality can carry emotional content I'll assume you're trying to make the point that fictional sex is worse than fictional violence. I further assume you don't really know why (hence your imprecise wording) but have this diffuse belly-feeling that this is how it must be, because that has always been your belly-feeling.
- tedunangst 15y ago
  Belly feeling is needlessly puerile.
  - moe 15y ago
    Sorry, I didn't mean to attack him personally but tried to point out the reasons that I suspect behind this kind of lazy arguing. These "belly-opinions" are very widespread, a more verbose description would have been: "I can't give exact reasons for my opinion but it feels like that's what my parents|peer-group|church|society|... would agree with". I felt that the verbose version would have been even less polite.. but oh well.
king_jester 15y ago

philwelch 15y ago

Sexuality is such a taboo in American culture that kids don't know what realistic sexuality is. In some cultures, parents talk frankly and openly to their kids about it, and teach them how to respect and listen to their partners and protect themselves from unwanted pregnancy and STI's. American parents uncomfortably change the subject whenever they ask where babies come from.