Nine Songs!

Re: How about the GAA and the VECs as moral arbiters!

I think the old saying that "there was no sex in Ireland before the Late Late Shown came onto our screens" sums it up.
Click to expand...

"The Late Late Show was a prime target, especially after the Bishop and the Nightie affair in February 1966. That was the blow-up that occurred when a woman was asked if she could remember what colour night dress she wore on her wedding night. "didn't wear any nightie at all," she giggled.

The idea of the naked woman sent Bishop Thomas Ryan of Clonfert through the proverbial roof.

The Loughrea Town Commissioners, the Mayo County Board of the GAA and the Meath Committee of Vocational Education also denounced the Late Late as "a dirty programme that should be abolished altogether".

Marion :hat
 
Re: How about the GAA and the VECs as moral arbiters!

I place strong emphasis on conventional family values within the nuclear family and lament the moral breakdown of society. I do not nor want to have an "anything goes" type of mentality - being a parent would prevent me even if I wanted to.

Fair enough - you are obviously perfectly entitled to hold whatever views you want and to promulgate them. Just as others are also entitled to hold opposing or alternative views.

Knowing that your ultra-liberal view is commonplace, I find it incredible that a population which was until very recently enslaved by the church ( I never was) is now so broad minded.

Who mentioned enslavement by the church?! In case that was directed at me personally I must say that I never considered myself enslaved by the church (or anybody else for that matter) even if I realised at an early age that I simply did not believe in the religious teachings presented to me and made my own mind up on matters of religion and spirituality.

By the way - I appreciate your compliment in classing me as ultra-liberal. Thanks.

Is it that they were in the closet for all of that time or have they just discarded their moral values with wanton abandon and tried to make up for lost time? Ireland was renowned for its morality - was it all just a veneer?

Don't forget that in recent years some (not all mind) of what passed for morality has itself been proved to have been a veneer hiding some quite immoral shenanigans. Why do you seem to assume that those with (moral) values that don't concur with yours are immoral or prone to wanton abandon (not that I think the latter is necessarily bad myself).
 
Re: How about the GAA and the VECs as moral arbiters!

Nine songs and "hardcore pornography" are not phrases that go together.

Geegee...have you ever seen hardcore pornography? If you think this film is a good example of it then you've led a very, very sheltered life.

The only farce going on here is the idea that anyone could class this film as pornography and worry about it corrupting our youngsters minds. This is 2005 right? I haven't time-warped back 20 years ago have I....?
 
Re: How about the GAA and the VECs as moral arbiters!

Personally, I'd prefer sensible, decent people like John Kelleher the film censor who treats adults like adults.

Interestingly in some interview or other John Kelleher said that in spite of his official title he preferred to be seen as a classifier rather than a censor of films. That makes more sense to me. Classifying content to allow individuals to make informed choices about what may or may not be suitable for themselves and their dependents is fair enough. Censorship is another matter altogether in my view. Within the key constraint that I mentioned earlier (i.e. assuming that no non-consenting parties are harmed directly), why should any individual or group decide what content other grown adults should be allowed access? Why should any individual or group decide that certain content might have a corrupting effect on other grown adults and somehow consider themselves immune from these alleged effects? It just doesn't make sense and is an anachronism in this day and age in any society that values liberty in my opinion. A society that doesn't trust its own adult citizens to their own judgement on such matters is a society that doesn't trust itself full stop.
 
Just as others are also entitled to hold opposing or alternative views.

Not whenever there is rampant social and moral breakdown in society ( an observation not an opinion ).


Who mentioned enslavement by the church?!

I did because your view is so out of synch with the teaching of the churches. Not an issue for you, you point out but it is an issue for the minions who share your views and practice their religion. In my local town, the only traffic jams at the weekends are caused by church attendance. I also know many people whose attendance has lapsed but they still bring up their children to go through the church rituals – baptism, communion, confirmation etc. Why do they bother when they are so ultra liberal in their thinking? The church isn’t so why not give up church altogether?

I am looking at this from a non-religious point of view. If you are,or become, a parent, would you like to think your daughters eighteen-year-old boyfriend had been exposed to hardcore pornography? Or what about your son going around thinking that’s how sexual interaction works?

Generally speaking, I find it bewildering that people have such a sheep-like mentality and go with whatever society deems acceptable rather than making a stand for their own standards.


If you think this film is a good example of it then you've led a very, very sheltered life.

Not a good example of it at all but this is the first step onto a slippery slope. Led a very sheltered life? If someone needs to watch porn to avoid leading a sheltered life they are one unwell individual.

The only farce going on here is the idea that anyone could class this film as pornography and worry about it corrupting our youngsters minds. This is 2005 right? I haven't time-warped back 20 years ago have I....?

Oh right, leave it all to nature and ignore nurture shall we? No one is corruptible any more are they? Of course, they’re just born that way.

Time warp? Oh, so porn being on general release means progress - sorry I forgot.

Censorship is another matter altogether in my view. Within the key constraint that I mentioned earlier (i.e. assuming that no non-consenting parties are harmed directly), why should any individual or group decide what content other grown adults should be allowed access?

The collective harm to society is what matters here. Some people need protecting from themselves and others need protecting from what they might become. Perhaps if some of us were unlucky enough to be victims of a crime perpetrated by someone who has been corrupted we might just realise the implications of poor censorship. Ideally there shouldn’t need to be a censor if the dross wasn’t made in the first place but that really is hypothetical.
 
porn

from pincetons online dictionary:

pornography, porno, porn, erotica, smut -- (creative activity (writing or pictures or films etc.) of no literary or artistic value other than to stimulate sexual desire).
Click to expand...

Does the film do this? Has it no artistic value?

>>If someone needs to watch porn to avoid leading a sheltered life they are one unwell individual.
No, theres no necessity there but it would imply that you'd been sheltered from watching any really porn (see above for definition) by someone who didnt want you building your own views on what it is. Hence the sheltered term.
 
Re: porn

I'd love to continue this debate but I'm afraid that your viewpoint on this geegee is a little simplistic. This idea that having viewed pornography you become some deviant is just not true. It's about differentiating between life and fiction. Human sexuality can be expressed in many forms. Some people go to S&M clubs...some people blah blah <insert strange sexual practice>, but also hold normal healthy and loving relationships with their partners. I have been in a few "normal" and loving relationships...yet I've looked at porn!!! Go figure.

>Time warp? Oh, so porn being on general release means progress - sorry I forgot.

The last I knew porn was not on general release anywhere in Ireland.
 
Not whenever there is rampant social and moral breakdown in society ( an observation not an opinion ).

Are you saying that I am not entitled to my opinions!!?! :eek

I did because your view is so out of synch with the teaching of the churches. Not an issue for you, you point out but it is an issue for the minions who share your views and practice their religion. In my local town, the only traffic jams at the weekends are caused by church attendance. I also know many people whose attendance has lapsed but they still bring up their children to go through the church rituals – baptism, communion, confirmation etc. Why do they bother when they are so ultra liberal in their thinking? The church isn’t so why not give up church altogether?

I don't know. Why don't you ask them...

Generally speaking, I find it bewildering that people have such a sheep-like mentality and go with whatever society deems acceptable rather than making a stand for their own standards.

... rather than jumping to possibly erroneous conclusions?

If someone needs to watch porn to avoid leading a sheltered life they are one unwell individual.

How so? Do you have any objective evidence to show that this is the case or is based solely on your beliefs and prejudices?

The collective harm to society is what matters here. Some people need protecting from themselves and others need protecting from what they might become. Perhaps if some of us were unlucky enough to be victims of a crime perpetrated by someone who has been corrupted we might just realise the implications of poor censorship. Ideally there shouldn’t need to be a censor if the dross wasn’t made in the first place but that really is hypothetical.

Again, I'd be interested in how you (a) measure the collective hard to society and (b) establish a cause and effect relationship between this and, for example, lack of censorship? How do you explain the perpetration of heinous crimes of a violent physical/sexual nature by individuals who were presumed to be moral arbiters in our society at a time when censorship was much more rigorously (and some would say arbitrarily) applied?
 
Clubman, the nub of the issue is there is a time and a place for everything...including porn, and general cinema release (or TV) is probably not the place.
I consider myself a liberal in adult viewing terms, but I agree that there are limits on where and when it should be available.
 
I also know many people whose attendance has lapsed but they still bring up their children to go through the church rituals – baptism, communion, confirmation etc. Why do they bother when they are so ultra liberal in their thinking?
Click to expand...
Probably because they have discovered that they can't get their children into church-controlled schools (which constitute the vast majority of schools) without a baptisimal cert.
 
Clubman, the nub of the issue is there is a time and a place for everything...including porn, and general cinema release (or TV) is probably not the place.

Personally I would disagree and don't see any reason why grown adults should not be allowed to view hard core porn performed by other consenting adults in a cinema if they so choose. It's probably a moot issue since, as far as I know, few porno movies are officially submitted to the censor for classification even if they are widely available elsewhere (there are at least four "adult" stores adjacent to where I work for example) on other media (e.g. video, DVD, CD, online etc.) anyway.

I consider myself a liberal in adult viewing terms, but I agree that there are limits on where and when it should be available.

In my view the main or only limit should be that it doesn't impinge on the rights of other unwilling participants. For example viewing porn classified for over 18 release in a cinema would be fine in my opinion. Browsing internet porn in the local library in full view of other non-consenting individuals would not be. As it happens a colleague of mine is acting as an expert technical witness in such a case in the High Court at the moment.

Getting back to what geegee said earlier about "collective harm to society" I'd be curious as to if/how s/he would view a grown adult going home after a hard day's work and watching porn in the privacy of his/her own home for entertainment as harming society or even themselves?
 
Personally I would disagree and don't see any reason why grown adults should not be allowed to view hard core porn performed by other consenting adults in a cinema if they so choose.
Click to expand...
Then you are content if it all hinges on the cinema management, and how careful they are about controlling access and applying PG ratings?

And, anything that's on general release in cinemas will end up on general release on DVD down your local Xtravision, accessible to kids as well as 'grown adults'. You are content to entrust that responsibility to a teenage employee?

I don't believe cinema managers, or spotty students working in the local Xtravision, should be entrusted with the moral policing of any society.

few porno movies are officially submitted to the censor
Click to expand...
We're discussing one right here!

Adults watching porn in the comfort of their own home - no problem. Anywhere else is just too 'in your face'.
 
Then you are content if it all hinges on the cinema management, and how careful they are about controlling access and applying PG ratings?

And, anything that's on general release in cinemas will end up on general release on DVD down your local Xtravision, accessible to kids as well as 'grown adults'. You are content to entrust that responsibility to a teenage employee?

I don't believe cinema managers, or spotty students working in the local Xtravision, should be entrusted with the moral policing of any society.

Isn't that the case today? I presume that it may be an offence for a cinema or video library to allow an under-age individual view content for which they don't meet the rating criteria even if prosecutions are presumably rare? The problem then is policing/enforcement of the rules and not with the argument that grown adults should be allowed view whatever content they choose. Otherwise where do you draw the line - for example, do you consider the fact that some under-age individuals manage to consume alcohol or cigarettes as reason enough to call for a total ban on these, even for adults?

We're discussing one right here!

I haven't seen the film in question so can't comment on it specifically. Have you seen it yourself?

Anybody remember the Richard Burton film Equus? it included at least one explicit scene of male erection and what looked like actual vaginal penetration. Does that make it a porno flick?
 
Yes, policing (enforcement?) is indeed the issue here, and the simple fact is (as you state yourself) there is no enforcement.

Thats why the restriction on under age drinking in this country is easy to ignore, while in the US underage drinking (and public drunkeness) is practically unheard of and is treated with the utmost seriousness.

The Irish are hopelessly addicted to drink, it pervades our culture, and restricting it is almost impossible - unlike in the US where people have a generally healthier attitude to drinking and don't abuse the rules.

Just because we are hopelessly addicted to drink it does not follow directly that we should be hopelessly liberal about everything else - why not have child porn on the news-stands if thats your logic?

While there is no serious enforcement here then certain movies should not be on general release. I haven't seen the movie in question, but I understand it contains scenes of live sex, and that the lead actress has had a change of heart after making it and asked for her name to be removed from the credits.

Perhaps whats needed here is the reinstatement of the old X Rated Certificate, and that X rated movies are only allowed on restricted release in cinemas like the IFC. It shouldn't be on general release in Xtravision either if it carries an X Cert or possibly even the current over 18 Cert.
 
By equating our drink culture with child pornography you've just ruined whatever point you were trying to make and completely missed the valid points being made.

I lived in the US for 4 years. I was 18 when I went there. You're right, they take underage drinking more seriously than we do. That's why they have parties there - where everyone gets completely legless anyway!! It's just as easy to get drink over there as it is here, as an underager.
 
Anyone, in any country, can get drunk if they really want. Even in Saudi Arabia.

The point you ignored is the importance of the public attitude to the practice, and how it is reflected in policing, which is central to the issue. You just don't see drunk kids vomiting on the streets of US cities every weekend, unlike in Ireland.

By the way, who equated child porn with drinking, if not ClubMan? His point is that drink and porn (and he didn't qualify it) should both be equally available for unfettered consumption because anything else would restrict his rights as an adult to do as he pleases.
 
why not have child porn on the news-stands if thats your logic?

That's not my logic. I've already qualified my argument by stating that no innocent/non-consenting parties should be harmed but as long as that rule is adhered to anything goes in my view. Consenting adults viewing porn performed by other consenting adults is all right in my book. Porn involving non-consenting participants including children is obviously unacceptable.

While there is no serious enforcement here then certain movies should not be on general release.

I disagree. The policing/enforcement of the relevant rules and the freedom of choice arguments are separate in my view.

I haven't seen the movie in question, but I understand it contains scenes of live sex

How can you say for certain that it's porn so? The guy in the Late Late audience hadn't seen it either but was well able to list off each instance of nudity, penetration (which he was also able to sub-categorise into oral and vaginal etc.), etc. which was sort of unusual. I'd be hard pushed to remember such specific details about most movies that I have viewed!

Perhaps whats needed here is the reinstatement of the old X Rated Certificate, and that X rated movies are only allowed on restricted release in cinemas like the IFC. It shouldn't be on general release in Xtravision either if it carries an X Cert or possibly even the current over 18 Cert.

Are you certain that there ever was an X rating in Ireland? Perhaps you're confusing it with limited release club showings which, as far as I know, don't need any authorisation from the censor in the first place (e.g. banned movies such as Natural Born Killers, A Clockwork Orange, Life of Brian, The Last Temptation of Christ etc. were all shown in film clubs such as in universities or the IFC). Anyway, regardless of such potential loopholes, I think that the honest thing for a free society to do would be to categorise/classify all content (within the limitation mentioned at the top) and then make it available for viewing by the relevant audiences if they so choose rather than hide behind some sort of fudged approach.
 
By the way, who equated child porn with drinking, if not ClubMan? His point is that drink and porn (and he didn't qualify it) should both be equally available for unfettered consumption because anything else would restrict his rights as an adult to do as he pleases.

Wrong - please read my posts more carefully. I drew a parallel between the argument that possible unauthorised access to porn (e.g. by children) is reason enough to ban it outright with the same argument applied to other stuff like alcohol and tobacco etc. Nowhere have I said that anybody should have access to child porn or porn involving non-consenting participants! In fact, several times I have qualified my points with the caveat about protecting non-consenting parties so anybody who has been following the discussion to date would easily have inferred it when I did not mention it explicitly. :rolleyes
 
>His point is that drink and porn (and he didn't qualify it) should both be equally available for unfettered consumption because anything else would restrict his rights as an adult to do as he pleases.

Dear god. Porn is not the same thing as child porn. Consenting sex between adults is one thing. Violating childrens rights and abusing them sexually is another thing altogether :rolleyes
 
Gabriel - seems to me that there is not much point in attempting to argue the toss with some people here as, just as they draw conclusions about movies that they have not seen, they also seem to read what they expect to see and not what is actually written down in front of them. :rolleyes
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top