Sex or Violence?
 

Sex and Violence are the two biggest sensitivity issues when it comes to the media. Everybody is worried about what we expose our children to, and it's a topic that interests me, because the way I see it, society has it backwards.

More people are worried about exposing children to sex than they are worried about exposing kids to violence. I think this is completely wrong. The most that a kid watching some sex will do is get horny, beat off, and call it a day. Exposing a kid to violence won't make him go out and kill people like that lunatic Jack Thompson seems to think, but if the kid is young enough, it will more than likely disturb him at the very least.

I don't know, both are pretty sensitive issues that don't really affect me, but I'm curious as to what the rest of you think.

They could formulate a plan to rape little Suzy from down the street. Which would lead to sexual violence...but there isn't a place for that on the poll. :(

So I guess I'm neutral on the subject.

Ah, good point. But would it be worse for them to be sexually violent or excessively physically violent?

I think that exposing a child to sex is probably going to be the worst option here though. Violence will disturb a child but I think an erroneous exposure to sex would be more damaging to a child's mental state than an exposure to media violence.

Well, the thing is all about the parenting style. Under perfect conditions, introdution to sex would be worse as it could trigger hormone driven behavior. However, in majority of households, where both parents work full time jobs and the primary care giver is the television... def violence.

It really depends on how old the children are when they are exposed to stuff like this... and probably how intelligent they are in terms of exerting self controls and have a sense of what's realistic and what's not.

Let's say we have a 7 year-old boy, if you show him explicit images of sexual intercourse, I don't think he has enough knowledge to know exactly what the couples are engaging, the kid may have awareness that breasts and genitals are taboos, and may say "ewwww..." and walk off, but there's no driving force for him to try this out.

Violence on the other hand, could be more dangerous if the kid's exposed too much of it, again, you need to count in the fact of self control and integrity that separates reality from virtual environment. Since slapping, beating up others are much easier than taking off your pants and find a partner to have sex with, along with the additional factor of imitating coolness such as beating another kid into a bloody pulp followed by a smirk, and walking away under the sunset, a kid will tend to copy these more often.

Either a child is too young to have any clue about sex alltogether or it is old enough to have a decent education on the topic. Either way, I can't see how accidentally being exposed to sex on the TV would be harmful to a kid with proper parenting.

Sex leads to Violence. So...

O RLY? Would you like to explain that?

I would say that violence is worse than sex just by comparing America and Europe. Europe's TV supposedly has more sex and less violence than America's TV. (From what I hear from people who have been to Europe.) America freaks out over Janet Jackson's boob, but shows autopsies on dead bodies on shows like CSI and such during prime time programming.

If you look at the amount of murders, shootings, etc in Europe compared to America...America has a lot more!

Granted, there are other factors that effect this, but television is not only a good influence on kids, it's also their babysitter.

Exactly.

The same could be said for violence.

Violence would be a lot harder to explain to a child though, as sex is something that occurs naturally that almost every person will encounter in their lifetime; violence is not.

What would you say to little Johnny when a man punches a woman several times before knocking her out? Verses the man making out with her and feeling her up when she's scantily clad?

Why would violence be harder to explain to a child? In fact, the reprecussions of violence are made PLAINLY OBVIOUS. People die, get maimed, and are otherwised changed for the worse. Those who are violent are dealt with - whether dying themselves as a result of their actions or being incarcerated or something along those lines. Violent people are characterized as 'bad people.'

Whereas, most of the time when you see sex on TV, the reprecussions of such activity aren't made obvious to a child. It's just something that people do and it feels good. Very rarely are things like STDs, unwed pregnancy, and other situations that can arise from having sex even mentioned.

So when you tell me that somehow seeing violence on TV is worse than sex, I'm going to have to tell you to get that dumb shit off your mind. Watching someone get their ass beat doesn't make me wanna beat someone's ass. However, seeing a sex scene gave me many a mini-hard on during my formative years.

At the end of the day, neither are real constructive things to be showing young children.

Using Europe as an example, compared to the United States, there is comparatively a lot more sex on television there. The difference is that it isn't generally regarded with distaste or even outrage. Many European countries take a more casual approach to sex and sexuality. And there aren't any startling adverse effects as a result of this. There aren't astounding numbers of STDs, there aren't tons of teenage pregnancies. There isn't an abundance of sexual abuse or rape.

In fact, ALL of these things are far more common in the United States, despite our stigmata towards the "oversexualization" of television and movies.

It all really depends on how a child is educated about things when they are exposed to it initially. Neglecting parental duties can be (but is not always) asking for trouble. I personally wouldn't mind my child being exposed to sexuality, as long as they were properly educated in regards to how to keep themselves safe and make smart decisions when it comes to them partaking in sexual activities.

I personally feel violence on television can be more jilting to a child, just because injury is something they've been far more likely to have experienced in some form or another. I don't have much more explanation for it than that, aside from my personal opinion that watching people injured or killed can just be a little more traumatizing -- and sometimes it's hard to explain to children that it's "not real." Quite often, the violence they see on TV is indeed real, which opens up a whole set of problems.

I don't know if I agree with the notion that overexposure to violence through various forms of media is going to in turn make children violent. However, I can't argue with it being emotionally disturbing to some degree. I personally would find a 5-year-old NOT being upset by the sight of someone getting their head blown off quite disturbing.

Sex is something that can be confusing and weird, but not unexplainable to a child. And it's not an issue unless the parents make it out to be a big deal.

It all depends on the parental upbringing and the child themselves. Sex leads to violence so I voted Sex.

Violence is so obviously wrong... it should be easy to teach kids that - at least I think it should 'cause I'm looking at myself as an example. I used to live in Europe and I remember my teacher brining in Halloween to watch in Grade 4.

Sex on the other hand provokes stronger emotions that may be harder to control than just cheer anger....

But bleh... just my opinion

Many people here have already said it, but I'll repeat it: Europe pretty much proves that exposure to sex isn't harmful. While America is really anal about stopping scenes of sex, Europe is the opposite and is really anal about scenes of violence. Fact is, Europe has a lot less trouble, in general, than we do, so that would mean violence is obviously "worse".

Still, in my opinion, I'd say "neither". If parents do their job, neither sex nor violence should have a negative effect on a child. As such, I didn't vote, because I think good parenting should be the focus, not censorship. Censorship is worse than sex and violence put together, in the long run.

Sex or violence? I'll take both, shaken not stirred.

I really don't see what the big deal is with either. My parents were more preoccupied with making sure that I wasn't over exposed to sex on television moreso than violence. In my family (where there are 4 boys) "violent" behavior is not uncommon. However, I don't think the media was to blame in the slightest. Even before ninja turtles and the Karate kid, my brothers and I were making swords out of sticks and strutting around like medieval warriors bent on destruction. In many ways, it's only natural for little boys to want to feel powerful and they do so by wearing capes, hitting things, jumping from high places, and going everywhere by running at full speed. In many ways I don't think that this is something that boys should ever grow out of. They should want to feel powerful and dangerous, only in a positive way. If guys went out of their way to be men more often, you wouldn't hear women complain saying, "where have all the real men gone?"

On the other hand, sex was more of an iffy thing. I think my parents shielded it from me at a young age because I was the type who'd get an idea and get experiemental. Parents these days are so ready to drop a lawsuit that two 4 year olds can't get away with playing doctor and sneaking a peek at each others respective equipment. Over exposure to an idea and the emotions associated with sex at an early age can lead to some crazy behavior. I think it takes a level of emotional maturity to understand sex that is probably case specific to each child. Parents should take extra care in talking to their kids about sex, and not leave it up to the tv.

EDIT: Just for the record, Night Phoenix is a damn genius.

Violence as sex will always be a part of life sometimes bad but on the whole good as that keeps us going, violence doesn't keep us going

it wouldn't be harder..the other guy is right.my little bro. plays Mortal Kombat,and he's only 5....we ALL know what they do as fatalities in M.K,and he know not to go around killing people...it's just about what you teach a kid...if he can't play a game,it's because of sex,or he's scared of it....so like I said,Night Phoenix is right about that part..

It's strange how in America, we're used to seeing such blatent violence and explosions, and no one exactly has a problem with it. But watching the full frontal in Titanic caused my mom to bitch back in the day.

I think it's just the awkwardness that results from watching nudity with your family. I've seen a MAJOR difference in European films and when I stayed in Europe for a while. The entire society is just so much more accepting about sex, and it isn't boiled down to drunken parties like it is in the states for teenagers, or crazy dorm parties. In Europe it's like sex anytime, anywhere, free love. I love that, but I can't imagine that here.

When you think about it, most of us have grown up with more violence than sex. We always wanted to be the traditional ass-kickers... The Terminator, Rambo, all of those heroes are the badasses. We're Americans, we're gung-ho, it's just who we are. We don't go too far into the existential dramas, we want explosions.

In the end, violence isn't a very good thing for anyone. Sure, younger kids shouldn't be exposed to sex either, but sex isn't REALLY a BAD thing. It's just something that should happen later in their lives. Violence is something that should never happen at all.

And like you said it isn't THAT bad, exposing kids to violence doesn't turn them into mass murderers.

actually,...now I think that sex is worse....now a days,people aren't effected by violence as much(I mean goin out and killing people 'n stuff...or just being bad...)but how many teens do you see goin out havin sex,don't now what they're doin,and "WHOOPS!!! sorry mom!I got a son/daughter!!!" you guys catch my point?...


so they're both bad,but if anything,(can't believe I'm sayin this)sex needs to go down just a tad bit...otherwise we'll need to pay more taxes to teens who were stupid(no offense to anyone...)...right?..

That would be more of a problem of not using contraceptives and bad parenting, if I'm not mistaken, rather than the exposure of sex. Hiding the sex would make people more curious and probably have the opposite effect, whereas teaching about the negatives would help teach the usage of preventative measures and counter that curiosity (at least for a bit).

But I won't get into that too much. I found out a while back that the PP was vicious...

Hang on, sex leads to violence?

http://img243.imageshack.us/img243/7310/whaakf9zl3.jpg

I would have to agree with Night on this. Though at one time or another they would have to be exposed to it in some way. It would be up to the parents on how to go about with this. Since both are a reality in life that they will have to eventually confront.

I was born into a "violence is better then sex" kind of family. I watched Braveheart when I was 7, Aliens when I was 11, that kind of thing. And the funny part is, every time I would watch Braveheart (up until I was 12 or so) dad would always fast-forward the nudity. The violence never bothered him, and eventually, it stopped bothering me.

I won't say violence is worse then sex, nor will I say sex is worse then violence. Because I simply do not know. All I know are my experiences. And those experiences tell me I turned out ok. We all have our issues and I don't think it's my place to state whether or not people exposed to sex have more issues then I.

Parents need to stop and take a breath and realize what values they are teaching their children. Who cares which one is worse, they're both bad in their own ways.

*shrug* just my two cents.

This just leaves me baffled.
We are talking consentual sex, right?
Not rapes and such...

I would have to say that violence is more of a byproduct of sex than the other way around.

dumb question.

violence involves pain, humiliation, people getting hurt.

Sex (most of it) involves two people giving each other pleasure and it is an expression of emotions such as care and affection.

seriously, how can there be a question of which is worse for children???

Sex leads to children born out of wedlock, which is the leading cause of poverty in the United States, which in turn is a primary cause of crime and violence because impoverished people lack the education to work in the legitimate sector so they do things like sell drugs, rob people, and shoot people in order to get money to support the kids they have out of wedlock because they have sex.

It all goes back to sex.

To be strict, both sex and violence have their own sets of negative influences.

Thus I think it is wrong to focus on suppressing one versus the other. Either you suppress both or don't.

The best example I can think of, and I hate to acknowledge this, is Japan. There, both sex and violence are given a relatively free reign in media as long as it is within certain bounds of Japanese taste. The society overall is not that much worse off for doing so, since they understand there are set boundaries between public and private lives. Their crime rate is incredibly low. Sexual deviants can do whatever the hell they want so long as they don't try to make it known to the world. So there is a very distinct level-thing going on in Japan where in the public sphere, it's all relatively tame, while underground is full of extreme things. They have an outlet for those tendencies. And so long as it doesn't come to harm, it's fine.

That's what lacking in places like Europe where outlets of violence are suppressed thus leading to such exorbitant displays of crime going on, such as in France right now with the youth violence and in the USA where abstinence only education is leading to more sex. There needs to be safe outlets for both things or we'll continually recoil constantly with each instances of school shooting or date rape.

Isn't Japan the place where there's always stories of middle school girls sleeping with 50 year old men in order to buy fashion accessories usually comes from? I could also swear reading that Japan has one of the lowest rates of reporting sexual crimes (such as rapes) to incidents in the Westernized world due to their large amount of social stigma towards the victims of such crimes?

Well, I never claimed Japan was progressive. The overarching model they run on is "anything goes, so long as you keep quiet about it, and everyone else will be none the wiser". That's what you get when with a shame-based society.

I have no base to determine whether or not it is better than censorship.

Of the two, which do the majority of posters here not only partake in, but enjoy?

Granted, the poll asks about children, and for them both can be potentially dangerous. But still...

Definitely going to go with the unnatural act here.

Look at it this way, lets say you have two kids infront a TV screen, a boy and a girl. Neither of which have ever seen a TV none the less watch one. Let's say you have to teach them something about life with one of only two 5 minute videos in hand. One video is of a guy being beating to death with a baseball bat. The other is of two people having sexual intercourse then achieving orgasm. Which video would you rather show your kids? I'd pick the second one, sooner or later they'll have to learn about sex anyway. Violence? I think they can live without that.

You people fail to recognize the simple fact that the consequences of wanton violence are plainly clear to everyone. People die, get maimed, and severely hurt.

However, the consequences of sex are not presented in the same way. It's simply something that is pleasurable. But what entertainment featuring sex in a provocative way fails to show the fact that STDs exist and that childbirth out of wedlock is the single largest contributor to poverty.

While neither is preferable to show to young children, it is completely arguable that sex is just as bad, if not worse than violence.

QFT

A child would experience more trauma, I think, from seeing violence at an early age. However, I also think the effects would be shorter lasting than those of seeing sex at the same age. As Night Phoenix pointed out, "the consequences of wanton violence are plainly clear to everyone," while the effects of wanton sex are not quite so obvious. Exposure to sex on TV might actually be a little beneficial, if it was shown in a more realistic light. I might be more apt to turn on my bloody TV then, too. :P

Maybe I can shed some light on the whole "sex leads to violence" thing:

Sex is the one thing that pretty much every lifeform on the planet has in common. It's the one drive through which we can relate to every other animal. Without it, there is no LIFE on EARTH. Well, certainly no multi-cellular life, anyway. Sex = life.

Violence is the exact opposite. It's death, it's destruction, it's pain, it's suffering. It's also the other necessary component of life, since nothing can live without death. And, if nothing was alive, there'd be no pain, and nothing could die.

Bullshit argument, if you ask me.

Generally, I also believe it depends on how old the kid is when exposing them to these ideals. If they're an infant, it'll do little to them. You can easily change their behaviors as they develop into a toddler learning how to read.

But if it's an adolescent whose greatest times of joy and fun are birthday parties and amusement parks, then they're more likely to adapt and take in these ideals as mere play things. "Oh, it looked so easy when the guy on TV stabbed the man with that knife." What's to stop a child from mimicking such actions when it seems so easily done by actors and reality TV?

Arguably though, I think violence would have a greater effect of influence than sex. I also agree that the majority of society has it backwards in thinking that demonstrating sexual acts is worse than influencing violent behavior. If I had to pick and choose for a child I may have in the future, I'd let him/her induge his/her time into sexual activities than to watch him/her throw knives at a bullseye. At least he/she'll learn the dangers of misuse of sexual acts. (HIV, etc.). I don't have any kids yet, and I may not. So I really can't make too big of a point. But theoretically, this is how I believe it to be should I be the one observing and making decisions.

Violence and sex are kind of ingrained in human nature. Sure, violence in movies is always overblown and super-fantasized, but violence is kind of inherent in human nature. I would even go so far as to argue that on some levels it is necessary.

Fist fights are sort of inevitable, I think, and really, I don't see any problem with a little scuffle, a little bare-knuckle or a bar fight. It's when someone goes beyond that and starts pulling weapons that shit gets out of hand.

Sex is something that's also a base function of human nature, or nature period, but is misrepresented in movies. I think the difference between America and Europe is the way in which sex is presented in the media, which has a large impact on the way in which it is regarded by society.