DROSEblogger

How should gay men be portrayed in television?

dar28 — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 03:08:20 +0000

Mr. Lucas is a firm believer that gay porn gives more freedom to gay men. He says, “Rather than being oppressive, gay pornography validates homosexuality and creates community.” I see how he can say this because most pornography is heterosexual and the majority of society is heterosexual. As Lucas says, “People are just presumed to be straight.” I agree with that statement. The general mindset of today’s society is that gays are kept quiet and it is not acceptable to be openly gay. That is obviously slowly changing with the times, but the keyword is slowly. Mr. Lucas says that he is helping the gay community by producing gay pornography. If heterosexual people can watch heterosexual porn, then why can’t gay people watch gay porn? Lucas talks a lot about the logistics and politics of gay porn as well. He discusses the roles of being on top or on bottom during sex. The same concepts apply to heterosexual intercourse. The one on top is more in control of the sex. He/she is more aggressive while the one on bottom is more passive. Mr. Lucas then starts to talk about how gay men are portrayed in today’s media. He mentions the television show Will and Grace and talks about how gay men in television shows are “either sick with AIDS, mentally ill, schidzophrenic, abused by society, confused, a clown, or an absurd stereotype.” What I would like to ask Mr. Lucas is: How would you rather a gay man be portrayed in the media? He talks about how sexy it is to see two men engaging in hot sex. This cannot be shown on basic cable shows. At least the subject is there, it’s not like there are on gay men in the media.

Children are exposed to pornography. What can we do though?

dar28 — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 02:40:23 +0000

Peter Stock wrote self-explicable article entitled The Harmful Effects On Children Of Exposure To Pornography. He argues that being exposed to pornography causes children to act in a deviant sexual manner. The issue is becoming an increasing problem due to the rapid increase of pornography on television and the internet. Pornography is spreading into video games and over the phone as well. The latest fashions have been changing to more revealing styles. Though they are not completely revealing, today’s seductive clothing styles show a lot more skin than they used to. Children seeing this are more likely to accept it and want to see more leading them to pornography.

However, while Stock points out many good reasons why children are negatively affected by pornography, I disagree with some of his thoughts. He purposely points out that, “For the purposes of this paper children are defined, as per section 163.1 of the Criminal Code of Canada, as persons under the age of eighteen.” While this legal definition has its reasons, I do not believe that mature sixteen and seventeen-year-olds should be suppressed by the government. Children are growing up and maturing much faster these days. Also, Stock points out many studies that were performed which prove different aspects of how pornography negatively affects people. However, these studies were done as early as 1984 and as late as 1995. These studies are not very current and they also do not primarily focus on children. The legal age to buy pornography is eighteen. The fact that the younger public is exposed to pornography cannot be helped; no system is perfect.

The amount of pornography children are exposed to is growing.

dar28 — Mon, 17 Apr 2006 18:49:52 +0000

Children are being exposed to pornography more and more as the years go by. I have been waiting for this discussion topic to come up all semester because when I think of the term cyberporn; I think of internet porn and its viewers. As a child, friends of mine and me included were exposed to many pornographic websites. Internet filters were not as advanced back then, after all this was about ten years ago. In this congressional hearing it was stated that there are approximately 100,000 running pornographic websites today. Internet filters may be improving; however the number of pornographic sites is rapidly rising. Also, pornographic pop-up ads have been recently filling up all over people’s home computers making it very easy to be exposed to children. Senator Blanche Lincoln said that this issue “hit home” for her as she has two sons. Growing up, I was exposed to a lot of pornography over the internet. There were numerous commonly known AOL chat rooms that were set up for the basis of trading pornographic pictures and videos. Sen. Lincoln mentioned how easy it is for a child to see a pornographic magazine on the top shelf of a rack at a local convenience store and having that ease at their fingertips over the internet. We must realize how the internet is revolutionizing the society we live in though. If grocery shopping can be made easy by ordering food over the internet, why can’t pornography as well?

What’s in a word anyways?

dar28 — Sat, 15 Apr 2006 03:52:15 +0000

When discussing obscenity and censorship issues, profanity definitely fits into the issue. Censoring the human body in a pornographic manner is done to prevent young people from seeing it and to please the general public as a whole. Society, generally speaking, is against young people growing up looking at pornography and hearing profane language. I argued earlier about certain censors on what the public defines as pornography; however I do agree with society’s censorship on profanity. Working as a camp counselor for three years with kids ages five, nine, and eleven; it is unbelievable the regular language they use. Profanity is everywhere in today’s world, especially in the music young kids listen to. The radio bleeps out many curses in the songs they play and basic cable channels cut out inappropriate scenes and language from their movies. As a college student, a lot of the TV I watch is after 11pm and that is considered a safe time to play music and movies without the same amount of censorship. So I am very content with the “safe-time” rules. I find it unnecessary to expose children to profanity because I firmly believe that what you learn growing up will dictate how you are later on in life. The last thing this world needs is the current child generation to grow up corrupting society more than it already is.

You can’t put a price on art.

dar28 — Mon, 10 Apr 2006 02:23:44 +0000

To completely put an end to obscenity is not feasible. When discussing other illegal things such as drugs are different than stopping obscenities. Obscenity is created by the human body. People can paint obscene pictures, take pictures of obscene things with cameras, etc. So how can you stop obscenity? The government cannot ban the sale of cameras, paint accessories, and video recorders. To limit the amount of obscenity the government can only put restrictions on where and who can buy/sell obscene material. The actions that the government is taking toward this are not being done correctly. As I discussed earlier, trying to remove any obscene material from libraries such as Jon Stewart’s book is wrong. Old books and paintings from hundreds of years ago contained a lot of nudity and obscenity but they are not banned because of the history they provide. However today’s books are the history books for the future. When can these magazines and books come out of hiding and no longer be considered obscenity, but rather history?

Obscenity is a difficult word to accurately define. It falls under more of an opinion. To one group of people, a certain material may be considered obscene, while that same piece of material may be considered art to another group of people. Some argue that Michelangelo’s “David” is considered obscene because of its artistic detail of the penis. Yes, the penis is a sexual organ however it is only part of the human body. The David is clearly a piece of artwork and for materials like that to be considered obscene is not right. All I can say is that the government’s influence on censoring obscene material is getting carried away as the years go by, and this subject is very current. The laws will only get stricter as the years go by, and I personally think they are too strict right now.

Easy on the censorship Big Brother.

dar28 — Mon, 10 Apr 2006 01:51:34 +0000

The concept of obscenity directly challenges today’s laws and people’s rights. To not allow certain books to circulate in libraries due to their content is wrong. The law states that you must be over the age of eighteen to purchase pornographic material. The first technicality here is that you do not purchase items from libraries but you borrow these items. Also, libraries have different sections containing different types of material. For example, there is a section for children’s books, adult books, encyclopedias, etc. In my hometown library there is a monitored audio/visual section where someone sits at a desk and supervises the area where CD’s and videos are held. I am not suggesting an area should be set up for pornographic material; however I am saying that books with nudity in them can be held in different locations and supervised by a clerk. I do not think that Jon Stewart’s book which portrayed naked Supreme Court Justices should be banned from libraries. It exemplifies his freedom of speech first amendment right. This also relates to the point Dr. Halavais made about anti-war motives being considered treason. Anti-war does not mean you are anti-America. Firm religious believers will argue the commandment “Thou shall not kill.” Would you then say that being pro-war is being a good American but a bad Christian, or Jew? My point is that censorship on obscenity is getting too extreme. For those of you who watch the show Family Guy, there was an episode about censorship and the government getting too carried away with it. They were censoring everyday activities such as going to the bathroom. Forty years ago when our parents were growing up these laws on obscenity did not really matter. Laws like these were barely followed because how strict they are today is stupid. Children, adults, men and women all over the country have rights that should not be as oppressed as they are becoming.

Men and women all over the world deserve their right to pleasure.

dar28 — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 03:48:09 +0000

Dr. Kellogg promotes a lot of arguments that I would like to address. First, his thought on pleasure and masturbation. For the objective of giving circumcisions to be lessening the amount of times a man will masturbate in his life is wrong. The myths that Dr. Kellogg believed in such as masturbation causing stupidity and blindness are ridiculous to begin with. He also used tactics against new-born females to try and prevent them from feeling any pleasure in life. He drops a small amount of acid on their clitoris to try and kill any sensation. These are sick thoughts. He even goes as far as removing some clitorises from certain new-born females. I think this honestly goes as pushing the rights of the baby. The Supreme Court decided that once a baby is in its third trimester of pre-birth they are human enough for it to be considered murder if they were to be aborted. To relate this to Lecture 23 and its religious perspective, women are born with a clitoris as a sexual organ. For the clitoris to be removed at birth, it would be taking away the right and the opportunity for that woman to experience pleasure the way all other women do. As Dr. Halavais said, some people would be quick to call Dr. Kellogg a “quack.” I would say that calling him a quack would be an understatement because his morals and intentions are sick and wrong.

Cyberporn isn’t cheating…’Cause it’s your computer!

dar28 — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 03:27:45 +0000

Is it cheating if you are caught hitting on somebody else without even knowing that person? Say your girlfriend catches you flirting with another girl in public. Your girlfriend would say you are cheating on her. However, if you are flirting with a girl over the internet and you have never met her before, is it justified to be considered cheating? My opinion is yes; it is absolutely cheating. With cyberporn it is not always just talking to someone else sexually, but it can also involve trading naked pictures, exchanging phone numbers, etc. For that not to be considered cheating is ridiculous. It is a very pathetic and immature way of cheating at that. If you need to cheat on your beloved other and you result to cyberporn, the relationship must have had serious problems.

I want to make a point about technology and its role in cyberporn. In the past, I have made references to technology and its role in pornography and the porn industry. Now I would like to point out how there are new inventions in cyberporn to help enhance the experience. These inventions can help the people involved to have more of a physical experience while watching something on the screen. It is amazing how young the cyberporn era is and how quickly it is revolutionizing. Changes are being made to the cyberporn activity and most of them are improving the concept. Soon enough cyberporn will grow to an even larger-accepted population.

SpongeBob is just a sponge.

dar28 — Mon, 27 Mar 2006 04:42:05 +0000

Many
accusations have been made towards fictitious characters such as SpongeBob
Squarepants, Bert and Ernie from “Sesame
Street,” and Tinkie Winkie from “The Teletubbies”
saying that they influence children to become gay. I am not an avid watcher of any of these
shows, but I have seen at least an episode from all three. SpongeBob, when the show first came out, was
said to be a very intelligent cartoon that even many adults watch. It was not until some homophobic scapegoat
started the rumor that SpongeBob himself was gay and was beginning to morph
children into gays. Scientific studies
have proven that many homosexuals were born to eventually become gay. SpongeBob is just a cartoon who has a male
best friend. This is similar to Bert and
Ernie. These are two puppets that most
of this class grew up watching on “Sesame
Street.” And
not everyone on this blogger is gay. My
baby cousins have been watching the Teletubbies since they were born and my
family often talks about this subject. They
still watch the show, because like me, my family finds it ludicrous that a
puppet that doesn’t even speak English can influence young children to be gay. I wouldn’t go as far as saying that television
does not influence people, because it does.
However, to go as far as saying that cartoons and puppets are conspiring
to spread homosexuality is preposterous.

Porn affects behavior? Oh please.

dar28 — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 22:50:08 +0000

In my last entry, I touched upon the subject of how pornography would affect someone when I talked about Brian McCutchen. Dr. Halavais said as a COM major, you learn how there is communication between a video and it’s viewer. There is a degree of sublimity in videos meaning that if you see someone raping a girl in a film, you are more likely to rape someone. I do not believe in that. Pornographic videos do not encourage rape. It is very similar to the claim that children who play violent video games are more likely to grow up to be a criminal. I played a lot of video games when I was younger, Doom, Duke Nukem 3D, etc. All of these games are very violent and I have never even thought about gang violence or murder as moral activity.

I’m sure there are many psychological studies performed that claim that at young ages many people who are exposed to certain things behave a certain way later in life. However, pornography cannot be to blame for rape. Rape is a very violent act that is usually not found in commercial pornographic videos. To say that watching sex on tape would cause rape does not make sense because in a sense, one has nothing to do with the other. Yes, sex is involved in rape but they are two very different things.