I just saw a picture of Madonna and Britney Spears KISSING in public in a really sexual way. Is this what we want our daughters to imitate? If my girl is going to kiss somebody (regardless of gender), I hope she is never so obnoxious about it.
It just looked slutty, and I was disgusted by the way the entertainment news called it "sexy".
posted
I haven't seen it, but it sounds okay to me .
BTW, I think Britney Spears decided no to be a role model like 2 years ago, and Modonna never was one .
I think that if Britney kissed Justin Timberlake (or some other man) on stage you wouldn't think twice about it.
But anyway, I'm willing to bet my life that they both did it to get the exact response that they got from Jenny: to be shocked enough to talk about them.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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Er, no, it would bother me if two known lovers were making out on stage. And of course they did it for the publicity.
I'm just troubled by the lewdness that some people find necessary to be popular.
And I'm also disturbed, because I DID find it sexy.
But I guess what bothers me is that this is an event watched by kids - and kids look to adults to show them what it means to be a grown-up. I know that certain behavior standards are expected of me as a teacher, because kids look to me to learn what grownup women are like, and how they act. I also see many of my young female students adoring Britney Spears and wanting to be like her - she's young, pretty, popular, and sings catchy songs. She's Barbie, only with more overt sexuality.
It's confusing. And it's confusing to me, too. I want to be pretty and popular. I think people like Britney Spears and Madonna challenge us to think about the role sexuality plays in our lives. Why is it that it seems we want our celebrities to be over-the-top sexy when more satisfaction in Real Life is gained through our jobs, our friendships, our family life, and our hobbies? And what do we expect of our young people who are trying very hard to figure out what it means to grow up?
I'm not trying to sentimentalize here. I'm just earnestly curious. After all, my chosen profession requires me to influence the young. I'm very interested in learning about the societal expectations on my kids and what role I play. (That's the personal stake)
Posts: 3141 | Registered: Apr 2000
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I will have my cake and eat it too. I found the pic to be sexy (even zoomed the pic to make sure) and I will hide it from my kids. But I agree that teens do not need to see their idols making out in this fashion in public.
Posts: 1870 | Registered: Mar 2003
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From Bill Maher: So Britney and Christina were on stage performing "Like a Virgin" in white clothes and Madonna came out dressed all in black. I know I wasn't the only one in the audience who thought at first, "Wow, Johnny Cash really is looking bad."
Posts: 2848 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Somehow I don't see publicly kissing as the first step down the path to hell. I'm not sure what tortured logic people would have to engage in to get to a point where they could justify needing to hide, um, KISSING, but I'm pretty sure that it's not logic borne of this world. I mean, teens kissing in public because they saw Britney Spears doing it! Good lord! Call the pope!
posted
My problem is this: kissing to provoke a crowd response transforms yet another type of intimacy into public statement and entertainment. I don't want to use a slippery slope argument -- especially since I'd be hard-pressed to explain WHY two people kissing for public outcry is somehow more problematic than two people bump-and-grinding on stage for the same purpose -- but it's not a trend I'd like to see continue.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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When I saw that picture of Dominick Monohan and Vigo Mortensen touching tongues... Well, let's just say it didn't squick me.
And it was done for the same reasons ("Wait 'til they ge a load o' this!").
Same sex smoochies will always be an attention-getter. I've seen girls in bars do it to get male attention. *shrug* Of course, there weren't kids watching...
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote: Is this what we want our daughters to imitate?
If your daughters are hot and over 18, then yes, I say go for it!
In all seriousness, I agree with Tom. If Madonna and Spears were actually lovers then I think it is cool that they kissed on stage.
But obviously the kiss was just a cheap marketing ploy. Like the Micheal Jackson-Lisa Marie kiss, or the Tipper-Robot kiss.
Posts: 4116 | Registered: Apr 2002
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I dunno, storm. I already have to deal with my boys trying to lick each other all over in the bathtub, so I guess it can't get much worse. "That's how kitties take a bath, isn't it?" "Yeah, but they lick themselves ."
(pause)
"People don't get clean that way, so don't even think about it!"
*smirk*
Funny thing is, I'm really okay with the gay thing. It just seems to cheapen the whole romance thing. And it's sort of a hassel to explain these things to kids in a way that won't get them beat up in school, or have a teacher call child protective services on us. Because Robert WILL say the darnedest things.
For me, it boils down to inconvenience. Like trying to get Robert not to shout, "Hey! that guy sounds just like Apu on the Simpsons!" when he happens to hear a fellow with a marked Near-Eastern accent. It's not bad, per se, just embarrassing in that the other person might take offense.
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
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posted
I would have found the kiss sexier if I had more respect for the women as singers. I loved Madonna when I was growing up (as did my mother), because I had never heard or seen anything like her. For one thing, she is an incredibly talented dancer. And I think that her songs and videos were innovative and provocative. However, she has long since crossed the line into cheap exhibitionism. Britney Spears is a talented dancer, but she has a mediocre voice. I also have a real problem with the video where she is dressed up like a schoolgirl and singing about not being innocent – I find it very distasteful to sexualize little girls. Christina Aguilera has by far the best voice of the 3, but I have no desire to listen to any of her songs because of my aversion for the way she presents herself.
I wouldn’t be upset if my son or my daughter had found that kiss sexy, but I would be sad. I hope that they are attracted to other things than just flesh and aggressive showing off. I think that Leonard Cohen is extremely sexy because he writes the most brilliant and beautiful songs and I get chills when I hear him sing them. Dolly Parton is certainly a flashy dresser and has never been afraid to show cleavage, but she has a spectacular voice and has written over 3,000 songs. She may be a superstar, but she’s an artist first and that is what makes her fabulous.
I just hope that young girls don’t think that the only way for them to be sexy is to emulate Madonna or Britney Spears or Christina Aguilera.
Posts: 3037 | Registered: Jan 2002
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Mrs. M, we are talking about an offshoot of rock and roll, and as such, sexuality has been built into the performance for the last 50 years. As Tom kind of hinted, kissing is about at the bottom of the list of sexual naughtiness. I have yet to hear anyone state a good reason why we, the audience, should be shocked at a simple kiss on stage beyond that it's 'in bad taste'. Why? Why is it in bad taste? Because kissing should only be done between husband and wife in private? Was the kissing onstage any worse than the kissing being done in theater or on television?
However, I am 99% sure that there is an element besides the sexual that the board is missing, and that is the political and social. I think they kissed as a way to tell people that being gay or bi, and expressing those feelings, is o.k.. Think about it, what is the struggle that most gay people are engaging in? Acceptance, isn't it? To not have to stay in the closet? I would think that one step along that road would be to exhibit 'gay' behaviors on national t.v..
I seriously find you guys remarks amusing. It reminds me of some of the comments I've heard that people made about Elvis and his pelvic thrusting.
Olivet, I loved your last post. Made me laugh. Let me ask you, though, is it really a big deal to explain to your kids about kissing? Have they really never seen kissing before the other night on tv? As far as that goes, if society were normal, wouldn't they have already seen women kissing each other before somewhere?
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Ya'll are totally missing what was happening there!
Madonna's a dementor!
In a desperate attempt to regain youth and popularity, she attempted (in public!) to suck the souls out of teen divas Britney and Christina. Not only to eliminate the competition, but to ingest their youth and popularity (notice I didn't say talent).
Guess it didn't work!
Posts: 874 | Registered: Oct 1999
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"I think they kissed as a way to tell people that being gay or bi, and expressing those feelings, is o.k.."
I don't think that at all. I think they were going for the Twinks of the world.(hee hee) For whatever reason, many men find it the ultimate turn-on to watch two women kiss(and more). I think it was a tease, a publicity ploy, and done for shock value, not to make people more comfortable with homosexuality.
I think the only thing(generally) that turns guys on more than two women kissing is the idea of twins. My little boy loves this one female singer. He is SEVEN. I watched his reaction when he found out she has a twin sister. His face just became, I don't know, transfixed.
Please don't be offended, guys-who-don't-like-the-idea-of-women-kissing-women-or-twins. There are a lot who do. Ask the porn industry.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
I really don't have a problem with the kids seeing people kissing. They've come in on the hubby and me doing more than that and we handled it with equanimity.
I think it's probably a knee-jerk reation on my part. I know my folks would have freaked, I guess, and I feel like somehow I'm not a good parent if I don't disapprove.
BTW, we don't have cable, and we were out on a 34 mile bike ride at the time, so we didn't see it.
Truth is, it doesn't matter what kids are exposed to, as long as the parents manage to get across to them the things that are truly important. Like understanding that it is important to behave responsibly (don't drive impaired, takes steps to protect yourself and your partner physically and emotionally when you choose to have sex, etc.)
*scampers off to put Queer as Folk in her Netfilx queue*
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Olivet, I would disagree with that. I think it is definitely worth a kids while to avoid seeing many a thing. If they do see things that I would prefer they didn't, then I hope my teaching "of what's really important" might save them from the worst of the consequences.
But I, unlike many here, am not of the "it's all good" crowd.
Posts: 554 | Registered: Nov 2000
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I'm not either. As I said, we don't have cable or anything. BECAUSE we want to be able to monitor what they are exposed to. Once we bougt them a Tom and Jerry cartoon dvd, and they started fighting a lot more. We felt so stupid! I mean, DUH. Why didn't we see that one coming?
The thing is, eventually they are going to see it all. They won't be my little kiddies forever. They'll be around all kinds of stuff-- the real life stuff, not he TV stuff-- soon enough.
My job as a parent is not to shelter them from the world their whole lives, but to make them as ready as possible for the nasty shocks they will face, and the tricky choices they will have to make.
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"My job as a parent is not to shelter them from the world their whole lives, but to make them as ready as possible for the nasty shocks they will face, and the tricky choices they will have to make."
Well said, because they will face the hard stuff. But I also agree that I would rather not force these things on them, just to get them hardened up. It is amazing how many people feel the need to do that. Why? Just don't let them watch tv unless it is a station you approve of. No MTV, no reality shows. Unfortunately, we ban the news in our house. At least until they are older.
Maybe the kiss was about Britney Spears deciding, publicly, to go for the gold, and ditch the role model image for good.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
Funny you should mention america's second favorite cat and mouse team Olivet...
I think I've figured out what bugs me about it (I don't like my son to watch it). Tom and Jerry are, often times, best friends. Then something comes along causing a disagreement, and they procede with trying to kill each other. It can be a woman, or a job, but their only solution is violence.
At least Bugs and Roadrunner were attacked in the first place (hence the notorious phrase "Of course you know, this means war!"), and were never friends of their antagonist. Bugs might be guilty of a little "use of overwhelming force", but someone was trying to eat him, or move him out of his home, or something.
But Tom and Jerry, best friends, keep doing their best to beat on the ones they love, and that's just sick. Posts: 1843 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
Duh. Thanks, Eslaine. Now I get why I never like the kids to watch it, either. That makes sense.
It's weird how we can still manage to justify watching other kinds of violence, though, isn't it? It is always just a matter of degree. But, as a group, we make a much bigger deal of two women kissing.
I think Mr. Moore had some insight into our society and violence. If you haven't seen it yet, pick up Bowling for Columbine, and yeah, not everyone agrees. But I think he's on the right track....
Posts: 1843 | Registered: Aug 2003
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quote:However, I am 99% sure that there is an element besides the sexual that the board is missing, and that is the political and social. I think they kissed as a way to tell people that being gay or bi, and expressing those feelings, is o.k.. Think about it, what is the struggle that most gay people are engaging in? Acceptance, isn't it? To not have to stay in the closet? I would think that one step along that road would be to exhibit 'gay' behaviors on national t.v..
I seriously find you guys remarks amusing. It reminds me of some of the comments I've heard that people made about Elvis and his pelvic thrusting.
I think it's more than a bit . . . smug of you to assume that the motives of other people here are other than what they say they are, and to strike the pose of the enlightened one who sees what people are really threatened by. You find everyone so amusing . . . how nice for you that you're so insightful.
I didn't see the incident because I don't watch TV. I'm not particularly bothered by homosexuality—lord knows enough of my friends who are actors and Disney employees are openly gay for me to have gotten over any "otherness" there. However, from the facts that have been presented, I tend to agree with Elizabeth's judgment that this was not even remotely about telling people it's OK to be gay, but rather this was intended to be sexually titillating to heterosexual men.
And I do find it in poor taste when heterosexual couples are very blatant in their public displays of affection. It may be that I'm wrong to feel this way; hey, maybe I'm just too uptight. I don't want to stare, but I resent feeling like I'd better look away from this one spot now, because I don't want to stare. And I can't help but feel that for these people, it's not about their love for each other, but about showing off their demonstrativeness. Then again, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe in a truly elightened society, people suck face whenever they want to and nobody thinks anything about it. That's a valid debate, and I think the intended issue in this thread: how publicly should erotic attention be displayed?
But, other than a passing comment, you haven't taken up this topic; you have simply accused other posters here of being closet homophobes.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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I think it's more than a bit . . . smug of you to assume that the motives of other people here are other than what they say they are, and to strike the pose of the enlightened one who sees what people are really threatened by. You find everyone so amusing . . . how nice for you that you're so insightful.
I'll go ahead and respond to this just to make sure we're on the same page.
I pulled out the whole gay, agitprop angle because it's one that hadn't been discussed yet. I certainly thing is an aspect to this whole affair.
I'm suprised that people are shocked by anything on stage in this day and age. As I've said a couple times, kissing on stage is really just so trivial compared to a lot of the rest of the in your face attitude that rock and roll type stuff takes (and has always taken), that I'm suprised people are shocked by it.
I understand that some people might wish Madonna, etcetera, would appear in conservative outfits with shows that weren't sexual in the slightest, but this has never been the case with them. Why the suprise now?
quote: However, from the facts that have been presented, I tend to agree with Elizabeth's judgment that this was not even remotely about telling people it's OK to be gay, but rather this was intended to be sexually titillating to heterosexual men.
Possibly. Given that much of Madonna, Aquillera's, and Spears visual 'image' is sexual, I am again curious why, if this were so, this would suprise or shock anyone. And if they are out to titillate, so what?
I still say that it is possible that there is a conscious social and political element to their act of kissing, and even if it was not planned by them consciously and they were not aware of it (which I seriously doubt), it is definitely there. Therefore
quote:
And I do find it in poor taste when heterosexual couples are very blatant in their public displays of affection.
even if this is so to some people, it helps to acclimate people to the fact that gay people exist and it is within their rights to express affection.
quote: It may be that I'm wrong to feel this way; hey, maybe I'm just too uptight. I don't want to stare, but I resent feeling like I'd better look away from this one spot now, because I don't want to stare. And I can't help but feel that for these people, it's not about their love for each other, but about showing off their demonstrativeness. Then again, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe in a truly elightened society, people suck face whenever they want to and nobody thinks anything about it. That's a valid debate, and I think the intended issue in this thread: how publicly should erotic attention be displayed?
I think that definitely might be an issue. I still believe that the social ramifications of their kiss is another.
quote: But, other than a passing comment, you haven't taken up this topic; you have simply accused other posters here of being closet homophobes.
As you noted, I haven't, but I'll take the hit by saying that I have to wonder whether this discussion wouldn't be different if the kiss were between a man and a woman. Consider, for instance, whatsisname's kiss of Halle Berry at the academy awards. Did this discussion come up then? No. Not a bit. In fact, I believe there were posters who said something like 'what a great piece of drama'.
You want to believe the discussion is all about the public nature of 'erotic attention'--a phrase I am not comfortable with, by the way. Why not romantic affections?--but isn't it certainly possible that just because you aren't homophobic and phrase your reactions to this incident in that regard, that others might be to some degree, and this is why their kiss is generating this thread rather than any of the other thousand screen kisses that this forum has ever seen on screen or stage? I mean, I hope you can understand my skepticism when you say that this isn't about homosexuality to anyone when, to my knowledge, no comment has *ever* been made about heterosexual couples kissing in the three years that I've been on this board.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
I'm not familiar with the Halle Berry "incident." Whom did she kiss? Was it a "tongue-touching" kiss?
I would tend to disagree with your classification of such a kiss as "romantic affetions" rather than "erotic attention." To me, romantic affections include holding hands, hugging, and quick kisses. Where to draw the line? I suppose you could say that there is no line, that any attempt to draw one is an artificial distinction. I tend to think there is a line somewhere, and it has to do with how casual an act is, and how much of one's attention it takes, how suggestive it is of overt sex as opposed to simple affection, and even how long it takes. I see full intercourse as being clearly on one side of this line, and brief displays of affection as being clearly on the other side. And I see "making out" as being on the erotic side of this line. A grayer area would be grabbing someone's butt or something like that, though again I tend to see this as overtly sexual.
Should the overtly sexual be closeted away? I can think of good arguments on both sides, and all I can say is that it strikes me as a little bit tacky, maybe even inconsiderate, when it's too much in my face. I can't help but see it as a rhetorical act (here comes the old English major in me: all acts are rhetorical) that is intended to show off how "hot" or how "cool" the participants are, and not really being about their love at all.
And let me just add how much I love debating with you! Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
I really appreciate that last statement. I know what a ham-fisted writer I am.
The context that I am approaching this from is that everyone has their comfort zone of what is icky and not-icky. That's fine and normal. As a matter of fact, my comfort zone is such that I look at two men kissing as a little on the icky side. To me, this doesn't mean that I'm homophobic, it's more of a brocolli tastes icky to me and I'd rather have ice cream kind of thing. I think this is part of where I was coming from with my comments about 'the kiss'. When I say that two women kissing might be a problem for some of the people on this thread, I say this in the sense that two men kissing would be a 'problem' for me. So, I don't think anyone is bad or anything for finding two women kissing icky. Turn the channel. In general, I have to say that people kissing doesn't bother me in the slightest. I wish I had someone now that made me burn with desire so much that I wanted to kiss them.
You approach a public kiss (and I'm not talking about the stuff on stage), I think, in terms of that it must be for public viewing, but as someone who has engaged in a few public kisses, let me tell you that sometimes the public is the only place that you have to kiss someone. Sometimes when the mood strikes you, you are in public. You're in your own world with your lover. The rest of the world around you dissolves. You kiss. How can that be wrong? How can children or young people be corrupted by this? I am really, seriously, honestly baffled.
My main issue is when people start bringing in 'the children' angle. Gotta protect the children from being 'corrupted' by adult things or they'll turn into junkie communist prostitutes. ( ) I fear this attitude because it works to turn the world grey, in my opinion. It means that all entertainment that could *possibly* be seen by children must be 'wholesome'. Well, wholesome according to who? Not wholesome according to the individual, that's for sure. Wholesome according to the moral guard, that's who. The next step os that wholesome means 'good for you' and not-wholesome is 'bad for you'. Once we reach this step then it becomes a public health issue and society, the moral guard, have carte blanche to step in and protect themselves and us, whether we will or not, from ourselves. It leads to situations like we've seen on this forum of society deciding what families can do with their children, of deciding for parents what is best for their kids, regardless of what the parent thinks. I'm thinking not only of the recent thread that Jeniwren posted, but of the father who gave his child a sip of beer. I'm thinking of that poor comic book store clerk who almost got hauled off to jail for not selling adult comic books to chldren, but for just having adult comic books around kids. It leads to films, art, not being made because they might get an 'X', thus dooming them to third tier releases. So, they don't get made because there's no money in it.
Please understand, I don't begrudge parents wanting their children and young people to be raised in a wholesome environment, of wanting their children to consider themselves holistically rather than as just sexual creatures. To go back to another thread, I remember your post about the eroticism of the routines of your school cheerleaders. I totally respect, and agree with, the idea that young people should be taught without a sexual component. I guess where draw the line is that I don't believe the world should be sanitized to 'protect' them, and I don't think that they should be made to feel ashamed of their naughty bits, either. I totally agree with Olivet that a family, a parent that listens and engages with their child, is adequate moral protection and preperation for anything the world throws at them. School should build on that foundation such that the young person can engage the world on *their* own terms rather than on the patently artificial terms of stage and screen.
Thus, to bring this back around to your last post, I think that the overtly sexual doesn't need to be closeted away since it shouldn't be harmful to most people or children. I should think that a little squickyness every now and then is a small price to pay for everyone being able to be happy as they see fit.
To conclude, I sometimes wonder if the solution to everyone's concerns wouldn't just be to flash a warning before every show that airs on television: 'WARNING--WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO SEE DOES NOT NECESSARILLY CORRESPOND TO REALITY. DO NOT BASE YOUR DECISIONS ON WHAT IS ABOUT TO BE SHOWN AS IT IS SOLELY FOR ENTERTAINMENT AND SHOULD NOT BE TAKEN AS INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO LIVE YOUR LIFE.'
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
While I may have moderately strict personal morals I stick to, I don't think anyone in good conscience could call me a prude, you know, without getting laughed off the board. And this kind thing to me stinks like rotten fish. I have two objections. One is big picture, and one is much smaller picture.
The big picture objection is this: There's not a snowball's chance in hell that kiss was in the least bit intimate or simply a sign of affection. It had a two-fold purpose - to shock the audience, and to give them (both male and female) a cheap thrill. But the cheap thrill wasn't by any means an altruistic motive, either. Sex is a gimmick. When you use any gimmick, once the initial attraction wears off you have to move to the next level to keep your gimmick fresh and marketable. When sex is your gimmick, you have to continue to move to the next stage, giving your audience titillating little cookies so that they'll keep watching. Ultimately, it goes back to selfishness of the performer: their fame, their status, their hold in the spotlight is at stake. It's an inheritly selfish act all the way around.
Now, while selfishness is so thick on the planet earth you can almost see if from the Hubble, the problem with using sex as a gimmick is that you perpetuate the idea that this society is built entirely upon it. An argument may be that all societies are built on sex, and sadly that had been the case for thousands upon thousands of years. But the problem is, every single one of those societies has failed. Maybe not failed in the traditional sense of falling to a conquering nation, but they failed to be places where people, down to last peasant, felt secure and happy instead of broken and battered and kinda dazed by life.
It seems to me the reason focusing on sex has been a major contribution to unhappiness is that it ceases to become about the propogation of the species, or the intimate sharing of love with a faithful partner. It's about the selfish pursuit of pleasure, getting what you want, and becoming addicted to pleasure while it lasts, regardless of consequences. And then when consequences come, having no real tools to deal with them.
That's why these deified role models are so distasteful to parents. It seems to me that it's not about fearing you kid will turn out gay, or 'not as sexually repressed as you are'. For me, I wouldn't want my kid to grow up thinking it's okay to play with people, to do whatever you want or can for attention, to use sex to get what you want - including power and prestige - and to hell with what those with more delicate sensibilities think. I would want my kids to focus on being kind and thoughtful and interesting. And not work toward what is ultimately the selfish attitude that ends up breaking people's spirits, whether by their own selfish thinking or being the victim of someone else's.
And, the much smaller objection: Most of my favorite musicians are mutts. Stop taking time and attention away from them. Go kiss on the dance floor of a club to get attention if you have to and let Mark Knopfler entertain the masses.
edit: This post also know as, "Everything opposite of what Stormy just said."
posted
And to think that when I read about this in USA Today (unfortunately I don't watch MTV, so the Music Awards didn't attract my attention) I was merely annoyed. Who would've thought this would turn into such a big issue? Yes, it was using sex as a gimmick--I'm fairly certain of that. The world is saturated with that sort of thing, and it's not going to change any time soon.
I'm one of those guys who finds women kissing attractive, on a gut level; I admit it, and part of me wishes now that I had seen the show just for that. As for my annoyance, I equally admit to being "homophobic", in the sense that I don't consider homosexual activities to be morally right. My point is, beyond those two concerns I never gave the incident a thought. I'm surprised anyone did.
Posts: 1041 | Registered: Feb 2002
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""We ran images we otherwise might not have run. But that was war, and war was news. The photo we ran Friday was neither, and I wish I had limited its display to the inside of the Living section," Klibanoff wrote in a response to letters on the opinions page."
From yahoo News:http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=529&ncid=529&e=2&u=/ap/20030901/ap_en_tv/ajc_spears_kiss
Sorry: Edit to mention that Yahoo News thought this piece of non-news about a paper apologizing for printing non-news on the front page was big news.
I am also somewhat sorry for that last sentence.
[ September 01, 2003, 05:15 PM: Message edited by: Elizabeth ]
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
I actually agree with you, Elizabeth. I wouldn't deliberately have my kids watch stuff with sex and violence just to 'toughen them up'. Just in case you didn't get that from my earlier post.
Ralphie said it much better than me, too. It's not just a matter of sexuality, but a matter of respect for others, and respect for acts of intimacy.
When I was in training for my government job, this old guy who was a big wig in MSHO tried to get me to kiss him in front of everyone in the snack bar at lunch time. He wanted me to do it 'as a joke', just to get them talking and , I guess, make him look viril or something. The man ran 14 miles a day, and had even been mentioned in Ripley's Believe it or Not, because he was damned healthy for a guy in his sixties. I liked him and all, and he knew my co-workers and I were all into practical jokes. But I couldn't do it. I just couldn't even consider it.
On the other hand, I was dating a guy in college, and an acquaintance mentioned that she thought we were a cute couple, and jokingly said she'd love to see us kiss. Funny, but I was game for that. I liked the guy. I kissed him a lot, so it didn't seem like a big deal. He wouldn't do it, though. He'd kiss me out in the open, but he couldn't do it knowing someone was watching, maybe getting a thrill out of it.I never really thought about it, but I have come to believe he was probably right. It was private, and all our tingles belonged to us.
As to Tom and Jerry, et al, I think violence is much worse to expose kids to than sexuality, within reason. I'd rather they saw Tom and Jerry than, say, some sex scene. But I'd rather they saw two people kissing passionately than people shooting guns or hitting each other.
Nearly all of us are sexual creatures of one flavor or another, but none of us HAS to be a creature of violence.
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote: Mrs. M, we are talking about an offshoot of rock and roll, and as such, sexuality has been built into the performance for the last 50 years. As Tom kind of hinted, kissing is about at the bottom of the list of sexual naughtiness.
Stormy, I think you missed my point. I know that sexuality is built into rock and roll and I have no problem with that. Never have. I don't see where you got that from my post. I just wish that the musicality of the performers was equal to their sexuality. Also, sexuality is subjective and I don't find look-at-me! look-at-me! posturing especially attractive.
quote:I think they kissed as a way to tell people that being gay or bi, and expressing those feelings, is o.k.. Think about it, what is the struggle that most gay people are engaging in? Acceptance, isn't it? To not have to stay in the closet? I would think that one step along that road would be to exhibit 'gay' behaviors on national t.v..
I don't think that's why they did it at all and I don't think they struck any blows for gay rights. First of all, none of these women are gay. Madonna was bisexual in the past, but she is currently married to a hetereosexual man and I have no idea if Britney Spears or Christina Aguilera are bisexual. I think they were all looking for attention because their careers are waning.
As for gay people being themselves on national t.v., consider Ian McKellan attending the Oscars with his (very hot) boyfriend. They didn't neck for the cameras, but sat holding hands like all the other couples there. That is a step on the road to acceptance for homosexuals, not the VMA stunt.
Posts: 3037 | Registered: Jan 2002
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