Sex And Violence In Tv And Movies

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Sex and Violence in TV and Movies It is hard to deny that the portrayal of sex and violence in the American media has grown steadily more graphic in nature as time has passed. In 1934, when cinema was still in the early stages of finding its place in American culture, the Clark Gable romantic-comedy vehicle It Happened One Night was allowed only to imply the act of sexual intercourse in it's closing scene (by way of a gag involving a trumpet). Today, in 2011, it is clear to see that these kind of restrictions have been greatly peeled back. Raunchy scenes depicting nudity and sexual acts can be caught in one's own home, on such popular television shows as True Blood and Desperate Housewives. Though there still exists many restrictions on what one can depict on TV and in movies, many citizens argue that we need more regulations on what can and can not be seen in the theater or one's living room. However, these loosing of the bonds on television and cinema is, in actuality, a liberation of creative freedom that artists in America rightly deserve. That is not to say that sex and violence should always be considered creative expression, but in the battle to protect our morals, it is morally wrong to chain down our nation's artists with restrictions that hold back their ability to channel their creative vision and hold the mirror up to society and life. The primary purpose of the visual arts is to reflect, in one medium or another, our history as a society and the nature of our existence as human beings. This is the duty of filmmakers. As such, a filmmaker can not ignore the status of sexuality and violence as major influences on our world. For a government to step in and hold back an artist from following through with his responsibilities to society is not a protection of values, but a forced and artificial ignorance. The changes in the past century that have led

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