Bad Language on TV, Forums etc.

[Duende]

Milo

 

If I don't reply I am off to 'beddybys' so 'just sayin' (homage to Murph)

 

In regards to blood and guts; our previous curate, from our local church, believed that modern day British parents had it all wrong being so protective of their children witnessing sex scenes, yet fine about them playing violent games on Play stations and X boxes and watching violent films. Sex he argued at least was creative LOL

 

Matt

[charlie brown]

Actually the Puritans who came to the US weren't anti-sex at all. In fact, in ways far less "up tight" than most Anglophone North Americans today.

 

On the other hand, I think that "our" history shows more of an intentional hypocrisy on a lot of things where "we" have a higher standard of "excellence," but then relatively easily settle for "less."

 

Also I think North American Anglophones have a very diverse culture and courtesy encourages language and media that may bring a response from part of the culture.

 

I will admit that although I am pretty "libertarian" in ways, in 1975 I was very, very surprised in the Netherlands to see a souvenir shop with pornographic sex film boxes with sex shown on the cover - right next to children's seaside coloring books.

 

All that said, it appears to me the U.S. and Canada as well, has a North American Anglophone culture that developed with the frontier where ladies were valued in general and acting like ladies and gentlemen was expected outside the bedroom or a bordello. Ditto with the urban newly wealthy in the late 19th century.

 

Also, in the U.S. the standard for use of words has changed since President Nixon's office tapes were transcribed and released for publication. U.S. newspapers used words in print that never would have been used outside "men's" magazines of the time, and often not there.

 

Not on television, but in normal conversation I believe many Anglophone North Americans today use much more "crude" language than when I was a teen and 20 person. It lost its impact and now just sounds uneducated.Vids, movies and television show more blood and guts than they used to, both of "news" and in fiction. But that dates back to the 1860s second U.S. Civil War and some photographs of the era.

 

m

 

Exactly! Very sad, too..IMHO. Why bring cultural standards down, by catering to the lowest,

instead of raising them up, for ALL.

 

Had another experience, once...where I was introduced to a strikingly beautiful young Japanese

woman (about 22 years old), who desperately wanted to practice her "English" with me. What came

out of her mouth, can only be described as, "gutter speak"...to be kind. She had learned her

"English" from movies, and the urban youth, she met and hung around with, in Los Angeles. Talk

about a contrast in appearances, and reality! The sad thing was, she didn't really understand

(at first) that what she was saying was unacceptable, as it wasn't...from those she learned from.

I saw her, again, several months later, and she had cleaned up her language, considerably...

and, she actually thanked me, for my taking the time/effort, to show her another way.

 

CB

[milod]

Matt...

 

Yeah, I think the violent games, especially, and increasingly violent movies aren't good for children, even if one wishes a warrior culture. It makes violence very unreal and offers a psychological disconnect.

 

I don't quite agree with the sex "show" for younger kids mostly on grounds of unintended consequences exactly as with "media" violence. E.g., disease and unintended pregnancy.

 

Frankly I think the U.S. in general was far less violent in general mentality when there were more firearms owners and fewer firearms laws - and no video games and far less violent media - than today's restrictive laws but game and media glorification of violence.

 

After a certain point, it's my observation that those trained to the real thing of intense violence tend in their personal life not to be unless in extreme circumstances.

 

m

[sparky scott 29]

Yea, and they we say the rest of the world is under censorship...

[NeoConMan]

I'm not sure where my fellow Americans are seeing all the TV murder and dismemberment.

Simulated for drama - all the time.

And I have problems with that.

 

 

But the real thing?

There are a few sensationalist shows airing that stuff if you look hard enough for it.

 

I've seen countless people who watch action/horror/slasher movies freak out when they see a REAL clip on the news or web.

 

See people get blown into computer generated pieces, but they can't cut up a chicken or bait a fish hook.

 

 

 

Good luck seeing a complete video shot of an airplane hitting the Twin Towers on 9/11.

 

 

More than anything, the USA suffers from a lack of reality.

Pissed off about all the wrong things...

[retrosurfer1959]

Yep you can't show a nude woman on broadcast tv in the USA but you could probably show somebody cut her head off with a chainsaw in animation or using special effects, no real violence or destruction but it's pretty realistic in some shows. Doesn't seem right but guess that's what were comfortable with over here. To be honest though stats show that something like 65% or more of all viewers have cable or satellite so broadcast TV is a pretty minimal part of TV now. I think I have somewhere around 700 channels on my television now.

 

And the old adage is still true even with 700+ channels it's still almost impossible to find anything worth watching. My wife watches some tv and I'll throw a movie on blueray or Apple TV from time to time but I literally go weeks without turning the idiot box on.

[Duende]

Matt...

I don't quite agree with the sex "show" for younger kids mostly on grounds of unintended consequences exactly as with "media" violence. E.g., disease and unintended pregnancy.

 

 

Just so I don't do the previous vicar at St John's a dis-service He wasn't condoning sex scenes and them being shown to the youth, but saying more that he found it odd that parents were often very prudish about their kids seeing a bare breast in a film, or a couple 'doing it,' yet were fine with them watching violence in tv, films and games.

 

Sorry if I seem I am pressing the point but he was such a good man, I would hate to misrepresent him.

 

Matt

[MrNylon]

The language is somewhat ok, but the commercials for the Rx drugs are getting out of control. I really don't think kids should be seeing Viagra etc.... commercials 24 hours a day. A little decency would be nice, but I guess that went out to lunch a while back.

[Murph]

 

I've seen countless people who watch action/horror/slasher movies freak out when they see a REAL clip on the news or web.

 

See people get blown into computer generated pieces, but they can't cut up a chicken or bait a fish hook.

 

 

 

Good luck seeing a complete video shot of an airplane hitting the Twin Towers on 9/11.

 

 

More than anything, the USA suffers from a lack of reality.

Pissed off about all the wrong things...

 

Amen.

 

It's the lack of TASTE that offends me. I don't want "gutter talk" on my T.V., in my music, or in the newspaper. There is a place for it, and it's not around small children. And the Viagra commercials are annoying as well. I'm not for censorship, but without SOME form of it the "stupid" would take over.

[MrNylon]

Amen.

 

It's the lack of TASTE that offends me. I don't want "gutter talk" on my T.V., in my music, or in the newspaper. There is a place for it, and it's not around small children. And the Viagra commercials are annoying as well. I'm not for censorship, but without SOME form of it the "stupid" would take over.

+

[milod]

I think there's a general agreement here about taste, especially in homes with children.

 

As I wrote earlier, North America's Anglophones and probably most other Anglophone nations have a very diverse general culture. Unfortunately it seems that "sex" is more of a point of disagreement than "staged violence."

 

On the other hand, I would suggest that such stuff is far from new. Some of Shakespeare was exceptionally violent. Titus Andronicus was, for example, quite "bloody" and my understanding is that in some cases real animal blood was used on stage in that era as a "prop." Yet beyond suggestions of sexuality, it wasn't portrayed so directly on stage. The Puritans seem to have objected to the portrayals, I'd add, and apparently to the treatment, but not to marital activities per se.

 

The old book "Shakespeare's Bawdy" was great fun to read, although I haven't gotten into it for decades and lack a copy of my own.

 

So I think there's always been something of a dialectic in Anglophone culture on what should and should not be portrayed in entertainment. Shakespeare, again, wrote for a broad audience and some material was rather coarse in its day for the more coarse sort of audience members.

 

I dunno. I think a degree of censorship of sexual themes is almost inevitable in Anglophone society and frankly it's a dialectic that dates back at least some five centuries along with differences in politics and religion.

 

But... yeah, I wish we were much less coarse today. Porn may be fine for adults in certain "styles," but I question that it will be treated as openly as in, for example, the Netherlands. As to where the line might be drawn with certain adverts on TV... I dunno. But some of the leering viagra-type ads are a bit much when kids are around, I think.

 

m

[tartanbeastie]

This is one of those topics which will divide some and join others. I was brought up in Scotland where swearing was as common as rain. Personally i find when cuss words are overused they loose their meaning and also i have to say few words actually offend me. Maybe because i'm quite literal with the meaning of words and after all words are just that.. words.

with tv, radio etc etc i have the firm belief that we all have two options, watch, or switch off. regardless of how many channels or options nobody forces us to watch.

I have to admit that i get tired of the usual blood and guts on tv and the pointless storyline as long as theres a high kill count. However, the way media portrays americans (regardless of the movie or show) as a nation who shoot first before thinking. And i think "kill" is a worse word than "f@ck" lets face it we would all rather f@ck than kill!!!

With the subject of sex and nudity, Its not something that bothers me, theres a time and place for everything and while i dont think it should be on for kids to watch I also dont think that its a subject that should be hidden away. Perhaps if it was discussed or viewed not only as pleasure but something loving, discussed and more open there would be a lot less unwanted pregnancy, health risks etc etc. Sweeping a subject under the rug doesnt fix things and ignorance is a poor excuse.

I prefer to be open and honest and fairly hard to offend but as i said earlier, we all have choices and there is a time and place for everything.

[davidl]

I guess the laws are different in Canada. There is definitely nudity on TV. Just not usually during peak hours.

To give an example, and I'm not exagerrating at all, a few years back I blew up my knee playing softball and spent some time in emergency at the hospital. While sitting in the waiting room with my wife waiting to see a surgeon, she took a look at the TV and was quite surprised to see full nudity soft porn playing. In the hospital. There were children in the waiting room with their parents as well. One parent went to the nurses station to have the channel changed and the nurse said "not my job" and continued about her business.

The parent just went over reached up and changed it himself.

The province of Quebec is much more lax I believe than the rest of Canada. For good or bad? Choose your own camp.

 

Dave

[milod]

Tartan...

 

I think some things happened in the 60s and 70s that often removed human relationships from a lot of things - and to an extent, both sex and violence are included in that.

 

It has been said that the U.S. "second civil war" of the 1860s (I consider the "revolution" of the 1770s as a civil war, myself) was among the last relatively human wars in which many combatants knew people on the other side quite well. Perhaps after that we "Europeans" stopped being quite so civil as we engaged in mass mutual destructions of various sorts.

 

Frankly I'd disagree about people preferring sex to violence since our "lizard brain" includes both as mandatory to survival. Politics and religion both for centuries have made efforts to channel such things with perhaps rather mixed results at times, though - and that's in all cultures.

 

The question to me in ways is "entertainment" in which neither politics nor general "religion" play perhaps as much role as they might in terms of mitigating the more crass portrayals.

 

No, I don't mean "republican" or "democrat" or "Labour vs Conservative" but rather a general sort of "politics" based on general culture most of us here share, at least we native Anglophones. Ditto religion regardless of sect. Somehow "we" on this forum believe there must be a higher general standard without too much of a swing to an opposite pole. I like that.

 

Bottom line is not that "we" should not use crude language and appreciate a degree of sex and violence in our media, but rather the degree of such, and the specific venues, that might be considered "tasteful" for general audiences.

 

Frankly I think "we" as a general society have been voting against what most respondents on this thread claim we prefer. Hence we get what we say we don't particularly care for.

 

Doggone it.

 

m

[TommyK]

Ok I wanna know

 

I'm from the Netherlands and over here you can say just about everything on TV, radio forums etc.

 

In the Netherlands you can say the f* word, s*word, b*word, you can curse etc on radio and TV.

We also have commercials with naked ladies etc..

We don't censor on radio and TV, if I watch VH1 a lot of songs and video's are censured.

 

My sister, who live's in Canada says that dutch TV and Radio is dirty en gross.

 

How is this in other country's like USA?

 

The USA is comparatively conservative. Though, Hollyweird is doing their darnedest to tear down current morals and mores. For crimany sakes we still build public bathrooms here with partitions so one can sit and stink ... or is that **** and think in complete privacy. Standing at a urinal is still, primarily, un-partitioned.

 

The FCC used to have the famous 7 words you can't say on TV. I think it is down to 4. Every fall, it seems, Hollyweird comes up with a new course word they trot out in many of the new prime time shows. Words, here-to-fore, not heard on TV. Some local stations take to bleeping these obscenities provided by the national networks. Larger markets, just let it slide.

[Thundergod]

While not guitar related I think this is a good thread, and there are some good replies.

 

Anyway, down here it's a little of both, in one side you have the govt, trying to ban the use of children on TV commercials and then you have 3 channels owned by the govt with 75% of shows that consist on almost nude, tuned up girls bouncing around and the remaining 25% is govt aligned politicians insulting everyone else who doesn't share their point of view.

[TommyK]

Speaking of children on TV commercials.

 

I've seen a disturbing, to me, series of commercials. Toyota, specifically, where they appear to be marketing their vehicles to the kids. No, not 16 year olds, but 8 and 10 year olds. Since when does anyone consult their children on vehicle purchases?

 

I'm thinking this may be some marketing firm bleed over from cell phone ad campaigns, where the kids are portrayed as the decision makers and the dad just writes the check, which, in fact, may be reality..... but not at my house.

[Versatile]

I am a great enthusiast for stand-up comedy and have noticed a swing away from the overuse of the 'f' word, which had reached the point of excess 2-3 years ago.

It has now become refreshing to hear really intelligent humour using imagination and all the skills of oratory

I think our censors generally do a good job...steering a course between laissez faire and over-protection of the public

But I do think children are exposed to too much explicit imagery too young, whether on the internet or TV

 

V