Violence or Sex ?

[strawberry]

Which do you think is the greater evil? Utah banned Zach and Miri Make a Porno while Saw 5 is playing freely; as we all know Saw 5 has a lot of creative deaths and gore while I sincerely doubt that the Zach and Miri Make a Porno movie will show sex unlike a real porno. Which do you think is the greater evil?

I would have to say I think I find sex the greater of evils. There is just something about me which leads me to come to that conclusion. I don't mind violence at all. I don't think I have any problem with porno movies but I would be more inclined to watch a movie in front of my parents that shows violence instead of four people having sex at the same time. But well I suppose if anyone could watch four people having sex at the same time in front of their parents... well, wouldn't they have issues? lol. Violence is just violence while I think sex is of a more personal nature and more thought involved.

[Samael]

Think about it, we've been.. people in general have been brought up around violence all there lives so it is a 'ok' thing to watch, but imagine a world where we weren't brought up around violence but movies with a lot of sex in them or acutal 'pornographic' films. Showin in theaters, and broadcasted on bill boards and TV commericals and the such. It would be ok while violence wouldn't.

So really I can't say either.. People are all brought up around violence thats why its more ok, if it was the other way around then sex would be ok. :: shrugs ::

[Lady Thorn]

As Samael says, it depends on with what you have been brought up. I know some people who come from... rather stricter religious backgrounds than I, who have a great issue with watching on-screen violence, simply because they never really came across it at a young age. Their parents never let them.

Personally, it is my belief that violence is the worse of the two. Our culture is heavily sensitized to it, but it is still violence, and being sensitized will, if not encourage us to commit it (since I have issues with that belief) then certainly devalue its impact in news and real life. If we stop finding war and street violence and such as much a shock and issue in daily life, then as a culture we may become apathetic towards dealing with them, which is not the way we want to go. Violence, in any context, is undesirable.

Sex, however, if anything is not publicised enough. It still holds a great cultural (and of course religious... where isn't religion to blame, after all?) stigma, and so is not so much a presence as it should be. I'm not saying that sex should be devalued as violence has in the media, but a lot of problems can stem from a lack of knowledge, and so if sex were to gain a heavier media presence, especially in a real and not pornographic context, it might help to raise youth awareness of the issues related. As an atheist and generally annoyingly-opinionated person, I have no issue with people having sex or whatever, and so no issue with "more sex on tv means more people will do it in real life", and as long as it is portrayed in the media along with its associated problems and issues, it will never be so great a problem as violence. Its stigma rises from archaic taboos that really should not persist to the modern day. We need, as a culture, to grow up and be more free about natural processes.

Violence has no upsides... sex is not always bad.

Thus ends my prevarication from my archaeology essay, heh heh.

[The Janitor]

Well.... When I first read the title of this thread I thought "Both?" I'm not so sure as to which is the greater evil. I'm a bit of a prude. Yet... Well.... I'd better keep that part to myself. Capable of violence on a scale that is unimaginable to all who know me. Yet I never make it the first option unless given a good reason... Maybe it's all the brainwashing...