posted
Well, I must admit to including some explicit breathing in my novel-in-progress. But it was necessary to the plot.
Posts: 1517 | Registered: Jul 2003
|
posted
WARNING: The following post contains extensive rambling. Feel free to ignore.
quote:We're talking about fiction for crying out loud!
Fiction has murder, treachery, war, pain, suffering, seduction . . . and sex. And more. Any of these can be gratuitous or essential, tasteful or offensive, and appropriate or inappropriate for children.
So why the hangup about sex?
Sex is something that happens in real life, just as do all those other things, but it something that is generally kept as a private matter. It is not usually something that is seen out in the open.
Murder, war, and crime are all things we can see just about any day of the week, if not in person, at least on the 6 o'clock news. Profanity...well, go to an elementary school and just see how long you can go without hearing it. The physical act of sex is not something that is often seen in public. Even if the subject comes up for discussion, it isn't acted out.
I agree that attitudes towards sex and things sexual probably needs to change. Unfortunately, it is a topic that seems to be treated in extremes. Either it is a big, sometimes dirty? secret that nobody talks about, or it discussed in a profane, derrogatory manner. IMO, neither is very helpful or healthy.
I agree that sex in literature can be experienced differently than when it is seen in a movie for exactly the reason Christine mentioned. However, not everyone is comfortable envisioning themselves in that sort of situation.
Something else that has been lightly touched on...
Fantasy and sci-fi are imaginative genres and as such, I think there is an idea that exists that imaginative equals childish (not the right word but it'll have to do for now). The idea that fantacising is for the young and that grown-up things are more serious. Because of that stigma, speculative fiction is seen as being "safe" for all ages to read.
I don't think that is the right attitude, but it could be one reason why there is not more x-rated content in the genre -- the idea that spec-fic can deal with adult topics and still be safe for younger readers as long as it doesn't deal with sex.
[This message has been edited by Robyn_Hood (edited May 17, 2005).]
posted
Also, it's really hard to write sex scenes well. There's so much description involved, and you have to be really skilled if you don't want ot to sound too boring, or too hard core.
I tried doing it i a story once, and people said that because they weren't expecting it, it really threw off the rhythm of the story.
posted
The comparison of sex and violence is interesting. Which would you rather have in real life, and which would you rather just read about? I'd prefer real sex and fictional violence. I don't really think this is prudery!
I also prefer not to live in interesting times -- but I do like to read about them.
posted
Christine, your second source on the decline in age of puberty actually argues against it. If you scroll down a bit, it states that the first samples that established the age at 17 were taken from orphanages and other places where the girls had poor nutrition and medical care. So the article makes the argument that the decrease is not as significant as it appears, due to abnormally high ages that were taken as a normal starting point.
However, you did make a good point that the age of marriage has risen quite a bit in the last century.
On a different note, based on your comments on what you are looking for in a sex scene, I'm not certain that Hyperion will be a good one for you. I've not read it since that one time in Jr. High, so I really can't remember if the sex scenes actually belonged in the story or not. I just remember that they were there. I also remember that it was a neat science fiction story, and I've been meaning to re-read it to see if that part was as good as I remember. I just haven't gotten around to it yet.
posted
If I wanted to read erotica, I would purchase it. I become annoyed when I purchase a putative spec-fiction novel and find out that I have actually purchased erotica -- which I won't read. And now I've wasted $7 or something. I put the author who smutties-up thier non-erotica story in the same class as the guy who puts a decal on the rear window of thier truck that shows Calvin urinating on the Chevy logo. In other words, no matter how funny your bumper sticker or how exciting/adult/real your graphic sex scene, it is lame to assume that everyone else doesn't mind seeing it or having it pop up in the "sci-fi" novel they're reading.
Posts: 77 | Registered: Apr 2005
|
posted
I read a really good series by Elizabeth Haydon, which had a sex scene fairly close to the beginning of book one. It was very tastefully done, I thought. In most instances, I just flip ahead when I get to a sex scene. Not this one, though. Some authors can pull it off (pull it all off), some can't.
Posts: 270 | Registered: Jan 2005
|
quote:In other words, no matter how funny your bumper sticker or how exciting/adult/real your graphic sex scene, it is lame to assume that everyone else doesn't mind seeing it or having it pop up in the "sci-fi" novel they're reading.
Why?
Seriously. There are many things I can put in my novel and inevitably someone will take offense to just about everything. If you show a sample of writing to enough people they'll pinpoint a problem with nearly every sentence. Some people don't think beautiful female scientists are believable. Some people don't think depressed characters are sympathetic. Some people don't think that the single ability to predict the future is not enough of a speculative element to classify it as speculative fiction. (Just got that one today, actually.) Some people won't like a character's decision to kill or commit suicide. Some people will not like cussing. Some people will not like the theme, the plot, or the twist at the end. Some people will see it coming, no matter how well done.
Will none of these provoke your wrath at having wasted $7? Is anything that you don't like in a book "lame" of the author to have dared put there? Then why take such offense at one aspect of fiction, one aspect of life, that you'd rather not see? Do you even care if the rest of the book is well done or are you so offended that you don't bother to find out?
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited May 17, 2005).]
posted
I just have to throw in my two-cents worth, here. I applaud Christine for bringing this subject up, even though she's taking heat for it.
[rant] I can understand people who object to all sex scenes based on their moral beliefs. Those aren't the people I'm ranting about. I just can't understand why some people think violence is OK but sex is not.
I cannot for the life of me understand why we, as a society, get so incredibly tense and overwrought over the topic of sex. Moral issues aside, sex is simply a fact of life. It is a bodily function. It is an enjoyable activity. It has a deep impact on our emotions, our social relationships, and our mental well-being.
My objections come with graphic violence. Now, if you want to look at something that has gotten out of control in our society, the amount of gratuitous violence on our TVs, our movies, in our literature. The acceptable notion of murder for titilation, the graphic description of blood spewing, gut-spattering violence makes me want to hurl. I watch very little TV and am pretty selective with my movies for this reason.
I deal with graphic violence in books by "bleeping" over the section that describes it. It doesn't add to the story. In some cases (Terry Goodkind, Robert Jordan), it causes me to lose interest in the author all together.
I get really frustrated when I continually see how deeply violence has been accepted and ingrained into our culture when the topic of sex and the naturally resulting exploration of emotional ties and character development it creates is treated like ebola.
And I get doubly frustrated when I see how out-of-whack the "sexy woman" versus "sexy man" ratio is. The entertainment industry has thought nothing of smothering us with women-as-sexual-objects for decades, in movies and in literature. But portraying a satisfactory "everyone is having a rollicking good time including the woman" sex scene is considered scandalous. It is difficult to observe the "woman as object/victim" standard that is so common today without thinking that the real problem some people have is in seeing women portrayed as equals who are personally powerful and enjoying their bodies.
posted
I just took a glance at the bookshelf near my computer. The novels are The Silk Code, Perdido Street Staton, The Pillars of the Earth, Night Over Water, Ringworld, Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, The Sea Wolf, and To Kill a Mockingbirg.
I like all of these novels. Except The Silk Code, that stinks.
They all contain violence and most contain sex.
The Sea Wolf and To Kill a Mocking Bird keep it at a distance, but sex drives the plots of both of these masterpieces.
Ringworld and Perdido Street Station both have strange sex (old man with young woman and human man with insect woman), but the sex scenes are definitely there.
Night Over Water has a wonderful sex scene where a British aristocrat loses her virginity in her berth aboard the Pan American Clipper.
The Pillars of the Earth, Snow Crash, and The Diamond Age all have rape scenes. I don't enjoy reading rape scenes, but in these stories the rapes are essential to the plots. besides, they are no more shocking than the violent deaths depicted in almost all of these books.
Which leads me to The Silk Code. It's a poorly written "thriller" about Amish terrorists. The action scenes in this dog are so awful I can't get through them. I can't wait for the violence to end, not because it is brutal to the characters but because it is brutal to the reader!
A poorly written sex scene can kill a story. But so can a pooly written violence scene, or any other kind of scene.
posted
Elan - Bravo! Well said! But we must account for the double standard in our writing if we want to appeal to an American audience.
Lanius - If I wanted to read children's stories I would purchase them. Which leads me to my own personal double standard:
I'm not squeamish about any topic a writer might choose to explore, but I would hate for the guys I drink beer with to discover that I've read The Golden Compass.
posted
This thread. What a jumbled thing it is. Here is the original question:
"So why no explicit sex in adult scifi and fantasy novels? Why does the wind have to blow and then it's the next morning? What about sex makes us not want to show it explicitly?"
QUESTION 1 The guesses have been:
1. SF/F is mostly a YA/Teen audience and sex just isn't included (much) in fiction targeted for that group. 2. Lots of people here don't like sex. 3. Some authors don't care to depict it: it's not important to them so why write it?
Mostly marketing answers. But the fact is that there is quite a bit of sex to be found in SF/F if you go to the right places. More on that later.
QUESTION 2 As to why the wind blows and then it's the next morning. Well, I think it has something to do with air pressure and the heating effects of the sun.
QUESTION 3 Why don't we want to? A lot of people here have said:
1. It's silly 2. They don't like it in fiction 3. It's too special to write about 4. It degrades society to depict it 5. It's boring
AN OBSERVATION OR THREE Christine is a rabble rouser <grin>. But that's a good thing because it makes me think. And I think this quote by Dwight Swain is so perfect for this situation that I must share it.
"The thing Character wants, the danger that threatens fulfillment of this desire, and the decision he makes, determine what specific readers will enjoy the story. One likes sex and violence, another tenderness and love, another the competitive striving for success, another intellecutal stimulation. Relatively few college professors are Tarzan fans--and even fewer sharecroppers succumb to Finnegans Wake. The trick, for the writer, is merely to pinpoint audience taste...then to refrain from attempting to inflict his copy on the wrong people" (Techniques of the Selling Writer p137)
The answer to Christine's question, as so many have pointed out, is that there are plenty of places to find and submit stories with the kind of sex scenes you want. Even in SF/F. The genre is big enough to accomodate all sorts of stories in it.
The issue is that the market IS INDEED younger. So your audience for it exists, but it will be smaller.
Does the general audience want more sex with the science? More tender moanings between wizards? I haven't a clue. I'm sure some do and some don't. I don't. I know that I don't want my daughters reading tons of steamy sex. Not because sex is bad, boring, or silly. It's none of those to me. Well, sometimes silly in the best sense. But because (for numerous reasons) I want them to wait to rev that marvelous engine up.
But that's my opinion, my ethic. Is sex good, is depicting it good, is not depecting it bad? Unless we want to turn this into a debate on the ethics of depicting sex, then the question is simply focused on the author. What do you have in your heart to write (tender sex)? What moves you (tender love focused away from sex)? Then write it, Christine, and the trick is...
Or was this REALLY a pure market question? If so, we've gone about it all wrong.
[This message has been edited by johnbrown (edited May 18, 2005).]
posted
My 2 cents worth is that sex does one of two things. It either arouses the reader and plays havoc with the emotional tone they need to finish the story ... or it bores them.
If they are twelve and a little bit naive it may do the former while it derails your effort to hold their interest in the more mundane aspects of a good tale. Otherwise their eyes glaze over and they wonder how anyone could possibly write something so boring.
As an example of what I'm talking about I would recommend any serious (and of legal age) writer take the time to go through Miller's Tropic of Cancer and Nin's Incest with a green pencil. These two books are often touted as being the best sexually explicit early 20th century novels but frankly they are not worth reading unless you want to see how NOT to write. I would have added Jong's Fear of Flying but I've not been able to wade through it though I've been trying for some months.
I glanced through my 30 year old copy of Novak's Textbook of Gynecology while I was writing this reply. Though it is still as dull as dirt it is much better prose than any sexually explicit fiction I've ever read.
[This message has been edited by keldon02 (edited May 18, 2005).]
quote:...we must account for the double standard in our writing if we want to appeal to an American audience.
All I know is that I AM the American audience, and as a consumer, I'm sick and tired of the rehashed drek they keep shoveling at me. I long desperately for NEW ideas, new approaches, new plots and interesting, complex, authentic characters.
I submit that, as writers, it is our time and our task to set new standards for American audiences - heck, for audiences world-wide.
We'll never set new standards - better standards - unless we follow our professional intuition.
I do not plan to live in fear of what a publisher or an audience might "accept", nor will I write to a lower standard just in case some unidentified Who out there in Whoville might object to some spice in his entertainment pablum.
If I feel a scene is powerful, relevant to the development of the characters, and well-written, I would write it in without batting an eye.
Christine, what you described at the beginning of this thread sounds like a marketing niche to me. Yes, it will limit some of your readers, but your genre and your style will do the the same thing. If you notice a lack of credible and well written sex in the sci-fi market, I say "Go for it!"
Oh... and be sure to save a copy for me to read.
[This message has been edited by Elan (edited May 18, 2005).]
posted
Why don't we move on to child-rearing philosophies, politics, and religion why were at this?
The reason I think that graphic sex scenes don't belong in your average Sci-Fi story, while other potentially offensive stuff stays in, is because sex is different than all those things. MANY people think sex is something special (beyond a mere natural act), and something that requires a certain discipline (e.g. avoiding premarital or extramarital sex). They don't want to be exposed to smuttied-up versions of it (granted Christine had queried about tasteful depictions) or have their children exposed to ideas about sex that are harmful. Most depictions of sex in stories I've come across fail to give full context -- emotional consequences, unexpected procreation, and the fact that people who are so incredibly wanton, sexy, or smooth only exist in movies and books, etc.
I agree with Christine that a disservice is done when sex is treated as something dirty and unspeakable. Healthy, trusting sexual relations with a spouse are good and important. But I don't think the problem Christine brought up is solved by including graphic depictions of it in novels for anyone of any taste to stumble across.
As for violence in Sci-Fi, it generally depicts good defeating evil, which is a good and honorable theme. Now, graphic and ceaseless violence (see the seemingly endless and more-than-frequent fight scenes in RA Salvatore's Dark Elf books), are just about equally as lame -- I think. Sex in literature is usually not about good conquering evil, but about assuaging physical urges.
[This message has been edited by Lanius (edited May 18, 2005).]
quote:As for violence in Sci-Fi, it generally depicts good defeating evil, which is a good and honorable theme.
Picking an obvious nit, I believe typical sci-fi devotes more words to evil committing violence than good. Usually good only gets to be violent in a few short scenes. Those are usually concentrated near the end of the story, and the acts are usually performed in self-defense.
posted
By gum, johnbrown has a point! We have strayed from Christine's original question.
quote:So why no explicit sex in adult scifi and fantasy novels? Why does the wind have to blow and then it's the next morning? What about sex makes us not want to show it explicitly?
I think the answer is that there is sex in adult sci-fi. The sex may not qualify as "steamy," and it may be absent from the pulpy Star Wars and Star Trek stories which spew from our bookstores like oil from a derrick, but it is there.
As to sex in adult fantasy I cannot comment. I'm not much of a fantasy reader, but it seems obvious that sex and adult fantasy must be, by definition, inseparable.
[This message has been edited by Doc Brown (edited May 18, 2005).]
posted
There has been a question asked over and over: Why is sex frowned on, its better than violence?
This is not so much a moral answer as it is a practical one:
I have done family counseling for years. I have watched the absolute hell uncontrolled sex does to families. Marriages ripped apart, children abandoned, abortion, rape, incest, molestation and on and on. Sex without control is violence ask any rape victim, abandoned spouse, or abused child. The emotional damage caused by someone being used sexually is heart rending- most people do not want to be used sexually and then abandoned. Sexual pleasure is a good thing, but it is something that has to be used with discipline- otherwise you end up with 40 year old men having sex with 13 year olds, and many other perversities.
Complete meaningless sex between people very rarely works in the real world. Hearts get broken, people get stalked, and occasionally people get killed over it. Imagine coming home from work and catching your spouse with your mom. You won't be talking about American's being prudes- your going to be pissed that you were betrayed. imagine your 15 year old daughter having sex with a 24 year meth dealer- again you are not going to be happy.
In fiction the characters come together have sex and then move on everyone is happy. In real life this is not usually the case. But people believe they can do this. They think they screw around without consequence- why becuase our media puts trillions of dollars into saying they can.
back to writing:
Well written sex scenes can be done without out pornographic details and you know exactly what has happened how it happened without being spoon fed every tiny squirt, grunt, thrust, and fart of the act itself.
posted
Actually I must say that Christine knew what a firestorm this topic could start. So I commend her for bringing this thing out into the open fo discussion.
posted
I have one more question, if you wkill bear with me for a bit while I make my way to it...
Most of the stuff I write has nothing to do with sex. I'm not even tempted to put in a sex scene because that's just not what the story is about. Even in my recent novel, which has a significant romance subplot, it turned out that the sex didn't happen until so far after the climax of the main plot that to put it in would have served no other purpose than to show off my skill (or lack thereof) at writing sex scenes.
I do like the idea of appealing to a wider audience (as wide as you can get if you limit yourself to scifi/fantasy) There are many important things I feel I have to say through my writing, and trying to get Americans to develop a healthy sexual attitutde is really a very very small part of that.
So here's the question. Let's say I want to write a short story or two, or maybe one novel, that has explicit sex in it? In all, this should only account for a small portion of what i write in my lifetime.
Can I sell a few pieces with explicit sex and still have my work marketable to a wider audience or would I be reduced to hiding under a pseudonym?
posted
SOrry about the simul-post JB...I have a few things to say about your post, though.
"In fiction the characters come together have sex and then move on everyone is happy."
I think this summed up your problems, because prior to that all you did was make me feel sorry for you for only ever seeing the worst parts of sex.
There are two extremes when it comes to sex. There are prudes who don't want to talk about it, think about it, and I have to wonder if they really enjoy having it, even in marriage. It saddens me that society has created these people, I think through fear. I think we are so afraid that our children wil have sex badly or wrongly that instead of being open and honest with them we scare them into prudishness as adults (sometimes after a brief rebellion that can end badly).
Then there are the despicable users of sex, the ones who came out of the sexual revolution and took from it the idea that sex didn't have to have meaning anymore. Women's lib is great, now you can have sex with them, even knock them up, and have no responsibility! (OF course, there are women who are just as bad, but that one's easy.) There are those who don't understand the emotional connections that sex creates and hurt their partners, even their married partners, through infidelity.
Child molestors are in a category of their own. I' mnot even sure if that has anything to do with sex. Never having experienced it personally, I'll just say that I'm glad that is the case and leave it there. I certainly don't see how reading about sex in a book will create this problem. If I understand my psychology correctly, this usually happens by abused children who have gronw up to a new generation that may fall into the same trap and create a viscious cycle.
Now that we've gotten through all that....
"In fiction the characters come together have sex and then move on everyone is happy."
This disgusts me when I have the ocassion to read it. It usually happens in the romance genre in which the man (the womn, of course, is pure) has had multiple sex partners in the past (he must be experienced and have a big...well, you know ). I've often seen the man break up with one or more of these mistresses (that's what they call them in the historical novels...I should have coughed before historical, I think) and they'rea always ok with it. He just pays them off. Things like that make me want to hurl the book across the room.
I tried to write a paradoy of a romance novel once that began with such a scene, except this time the woman reacted how she should have reacted, but then I remembered that I suck at writing humor and anyway, I didn't think it was funny.
Did I have a point? Oh yeah....Sex doesn't always mean the dark side of sex. I've read it done beautifully, even in wedlock (although this is more rare), in which the two had a real emotional connection that made them stronger if they stayed together or hurt them if they broke apart.
So what I'm saying is, despise badly written exlicit sex, despise the ones that are false, or out and out lies, despise the ones that are pornographic rather than emotional. Isn't there room to separate out the two types and treat them separately?
In mainstream fiction you would be able to include sex in some storiesw and not in others. No one really cares that some of Stephen King's books have sex scenes while most do not.
A genre writer can live or die by the presence of sex scenes, or lack thereof. If you plan to be a sci-fi writer, you might consider a pseudo for you sexy stories.
posted
My feeling on sex-scenes is the same as anything else; if it's important it should be there.
Here's an example. I recently read a SF story in which it was really important to the plot that the Heroine felt a deep connection to the Lieutenant while they were having sex. (the mileau had different morals and regarded sex as recreational) In her mind they hadn't simply had sex, they had made love. But the author didn't show us this pivotal scene. I really resented it.
And I'm one of those people who tend to laugh at sex scenes because they seem so absurd. Not sex, mind you, (I'm a healthy adult woman and I enjoy it) but the writing about sex rarely captures the sensations the way leaving up to my imagination would.
Christine, I would actually love to see some good examples of it, if you wouldn't mind posting a list.
Earlier I mentioned Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty and said that it verged on soft-core porn. What I didn't say was that it was vital to the plot, and that it is also the only example of sex scenes that aroused me in the same way that a really good battle scene will make my heart race, or a death scene will make me weep.
In regards to the new question about marketing. Anne Rice published the stories originally under a pseudonym, and after she became well-established claimed them as her own. I suspect that's the route most agents would advise. And really, by the time you need to worry about it, you'll likely have an agent to advise you.
Absolutely! I believe there is the place for sex in novels.
One of the most beautiful scenes I have ever read was a sex scene. Between an elderly man and an elderly woman who were dating for the first time years after their spouses had died. It was somewhat detailed but elegant. The tender touches and fears of the two were really brought out. And rather than being something that most people would have thought gross or distasteful it was wonderful. It was about living and deciding to overcome the world. Reaching out and mingling two souls- it was not about great orgasms or flashy hollywood sex. It was real. The woman believed she was too old and ugly and the man built her up. The man thought she would think him weak and inferior to her dead husband, but she made him feel like a hero.
I do not remember the title but it was a story written in the last four or five years by Ray Bradbury. yes the master still writes just not very often- and oddly enough not publically.
JB Skaggs
[This message has been edited by JBSkaggs (edited May 18, 2005).]
quote:Sex doesn't always mean the dark side of sex.
I think this underlines the point I was trying to make earlier. We never get to SEE the beautiful side of sex in the media. Never. We never get to see the power it has to build and cement relationships, the power of monogomy, to explore the invisible bonds that are created.
THIS is what is lacking in entertainment today.... positive role modeling for how sex can enhance our lives rather than tear them apart and destroy them.
I find it ironic that we rarely see healthy sex scenes in movies where both adults are enjoying themselves and creating a deeper bond as a couple, and when we do it's considered too "explicit" - yet scenes where sex is used as a weapon to hurt and manipulate people are considered perfectly acceptable.
As a society we seem to tolerate violence and appear to be frightened of exploring healthy sexual behavior.
posted
We _should_ tolerate fictional violence. It's so much better than the real kind!
It's sort of like the claims that some SF is teenage power fantasy. Suppose it is. Would you want teenagers to have real power, instead? (Thanks to John Barnes for pointing this out.)
Americans buy more pornography (both hardcore and softcore) than any other country in the world. No other country even comes close. America is also the world's largerst producer of pornography, in all its media forms and flavors. No other country even comes close.
And yet, we are also the same country that still takes an almost Puritanical viewpoint about sex. America is considered to be one of the most religious countries (Christianity, anyway).
Does anyone else find these statistics at odds with America's presumed piety? I'm not taking sides, by the way. But it sure says a lot about our country. I leave it to you to decide what that says, though.
posted
That's interseting, HSO, but I would have guessed it, if you'd asked.
We have a long and proud history of fighting our natural impulses in this country. I'm not saying that it's all bad. Certainly, if you feel the impulse to cheat on your partner you should fight that, and maybe try to figure out what's wrong with your relationship that makes you want to stray.
The problem is the people whoa re talking. The only people who are talking are the exremists, it seems.
I love this show that's on late nights on Oxygen: "Talk Sex with Sue." She's Canadian. There's no way you could have a mature, unbiased, non-judgemental, and informative show about real sex issues aired out of the US. I recommend it to any adult, hands down. In fact, I'd let a mature and curious teenager watch it to give them a better source for answers than the X-rated videos and locker room talk that's all they can normally get information from. Watch it with your husband/wife and see if you don't learn a thing or two. It's just a call-in show, you won't actually watch people having sex (although sometimes she gets out her dolls).
After that show on Oxygen they have some rather unsavory American erotica.
Hmmmm....
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited May 18, 2005).]
posted
Ahhhh...The Sunday Night Sex Show! I enjoy some of Sue's stories about sexual health and education from thirty odd years ago. At least we're moving forward in some respects.
(Sorry for adding to the tangent, but I really do enjoy Sue )
posted
Did you know that 87.2% of statistics are made up on the spot?
Do you mean per capita, HSO? If not: I think America buys more of just about everything than any other country on Earth, because our economy is so huge.
There's also the fact that by American standards, European TV has some pretty hot stuff . . . why pay for the Playboy Channel when you can get it on regular TV?
It's possible that the average American really does spend more time perusing porno than the average European. I don't know.
posted
Really it isn't just sex that Americans seem to have the double standard for.
I was amazed the last time I was visiting family in the States. We were watching T.V. and flipped past The Osbournes. I was surprised at all the bleeps. I had only caught part of one episode before that on Canadian T.V. and everything just flowed freely from the Oz. No Bleeps, no blurring the mouth; just a warning after each commercial break that the show contained coarse language and was not suitable for all audiences.
Also, The Sopranos. As far as I know (and I'm probably wrong), in the US it was only available on HBO. In Canada, it aired, uncensored, on network T.V.
As an outsider looking in, it seems there are a few things that have public and private standards that are quite different. But then again, there's alot that I don't get about Americans. No matter how simillar we might be, there are some distinct cultural differences between the US and Canada.
posted
Well, I went ahead and read "Hyperion." Turned out my husband had it on our shelf and never read it. The book itself wasn't bad; I might even read the sequels, but now I understand how Beth can think that sex scenes are boring. I didn't say so before, but that comment made me wonder if she wasn't actually an android rather than a human.
The weird thing is, they were story relevant. I wouldn't say they should be removed or that they were just there for the sake of sex. It's just that they were only there because they were story relevant and did not go above and beyond the scope of the story to make them truly emotional or impactful.
Printer-friendly view of this topic
