Sex Scenes
 

Making a major assumption that many of us understand the difference between self-righteous moralism and a Gospel-centered life, I have a few questions to pitch out to the folks on AFF.

Issues of violence and language in a movie seem easier to deal with. What's the goal of the movie? What's the point? What's the story? Is it to glorify violence? Is it overboard? We must make those choices for ourselves.

However, with sex scenes, sexual innuendo, etc... what is there to do? This is a problem in PG, R and NR movies. Men, do you watch these naked characters simulate sex? Do you come up with some type of control for that (turning away, forwarding, etc) do you have a tolerance level for it?

Being visual creatures, does this type of titilization pose a threat to a man's integrity and purity? Does it lead you to sin (not an actual external act, but what about internal)?

Specifically, for sexual scenes in otherwise great movies, what do you do for your home?

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Brother,

You should not be watching these movies if they are questionable.

You should make your own sex scene in the privacy of your bedroom with your beloved.

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These questions may be being asked by a woman for any kind of reason. I am interested in hearing from the men (and women) on this forum.

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We'd rather just watch.

:spit

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What do you mean?

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My wife and I watch them.

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Hardy-har-har. :smack

Okay, seriously everyone, where should the line be? You've got all the way from goo-goo eyes and smooching lightly all the way to XXX. Of course, if you watch XXX, a bit of nudity will not check your spirit because your conscience on the matter is seared anyway.:grampa

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Well, someone may be a single mother trying to draw lines for her boys, for example.

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Was watching the Super Bowl with friends who have two pre-teen boys. For some of the commercials, the mom told the boys to close their eyes. And they did. (Far as we could tell, anyway. :lol)

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I just close one eye.

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Should she have? Or was she being extremist?

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So you just see one person in the scene? Is it a male or a female? :ursofunny

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No, I am blind in my right eye, so I close it when anything objectionable comes on the tv.

Then I hit pause rewind. LOL.

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I thought it was a bit of an over-reaction. Didn't say anything, of course -- she can raise her kids as she sees fit.

And actually, I've done basically the same thing, but in a more extreme situation: a movie that my son (15 at the time, I think) wanted to see. I pre-screened it, and there was one scene that I didn't want him to watch. So I took him, with a pre-arranged signal for me to let him know when that scene started and ended. He closed his eyes. (Far as I could tell, anyway. :lol)

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Appreciative of the humor, but no real responses here.

Are we all comfortable with nudity and graphic sexual scenes now?

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It's a just a momentary shot and then goes onto something else, I don't worry about it. If it's lengthy, we fast forward.

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Of course the textbook answer here is often "So if I put just a little poo poo in your cereal bowl it's okay?"

But more than that, do any of us find it amazing we now allow strippers and sexual deviants into our home, as long as they "keep it short?"

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I'm not agains't media in itself,but we must be careful what we watch and listen to ,watching sex scenes is not good for anybody.What I hate is a movie might be pretty decent in itself,but they have to put gutter language in it.

Personally I like alot of the old black and white movies from yrs. ago.

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I was more extreme when my son was younger. Sometimes I wonder if I was too extreme, but then, I'm not sure where I should have been either..

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No. I usually read the small print on the DVD's. Nudity is out. "Some sensuality" (as it says on the cases) is out too but I wonder if that is too extreme sometimes. Not sure....may depend on what is in it.

I would like some serious replies too. Does anybody have any lines drawn for themselves?

Also, it seems to me that it should be the men drawing lines on this. I think it is problematic that it is often left to the women (like in Timmy's example).

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Some here out have come out of extreme legalism ,but we don't need to throw the baby out with the baby water.Speaking as male watching sex scenes and nudity causes one to think things that are not Godly,since males are stimulated visually,watching these sort of things leads to things that aren't good.
Did not Our Lord say if one looks upon a woman to lust after her it's like being in the act of adultery.Adultery is agains't the moral principals of God.

We are chemical factories and when certain feelings get stirred up,we can do wrong things.

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I have no problem with some sensuality if it's without showing naked bodies. My wife is a bit stricter on this than I am. I am more concerned with message. Is it within the confines of marriage or are they committing sin?

The real problem is not knowing exactly what's coming in a scene. The ratings often don't tell you the whole story.

PS My kids are eleven and under - different story altogether with them.

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I hear you Hoovie.

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Hoovie, what is the message is portraying a "bad character" who is having sexual relations outside of marriage (something quite common in the general context of our world)? Should the messages of your movie all line up to the Gospel or is there a larger message important to you?

What about review sites like pluggedin.com?

How we deal with this issue? When staggering percentages of Christian households struggle with pornography, are we too soft with this?

Then there's nudity like that in Schindler's List. Is that different?

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We use pluggedin.com to preview movies that the kids want to watch.

I think nudity in a movie like Schindler's List is completely different than say Striptease with Demi Moore.

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My family has always drawn the line at R rated movies. We don't watch anything past PG-13. The only exception has been "The Passion of the Christ". There are some really good movies that I would like to see that I'm sure are only "R" because of violence, but that is just a line that we've drawn and so we hold to it. It keeps us from getting in compromising situations with movies.

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Yes, it's different. There is no easy answer. When watching a movie (or after) that conflicts with our world view, or stretches the limits of out principles, I think it's important to voice our thoughts and objections to each other, to solidify our stand and family position.

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I agree that nudity in say, national geographic, is different than sensual nudity.

I don't believe in throwing out the baby with the bathwater. However, I do believe there is a place where incessantly obsessing over sexual content may bring it more to the forefront and cause damage in a negative fashion. I am not sure where the line should be drawn between healthy lines and obsessive dysfunctional worry. I am working on that in my own line drawing. However, nudity is, in my opinion, problematic. Sensuality....as Hoove said.....is a bit different. And, of course, childrens lines are different than adult lines.

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Thanks for sharing, Sherri.

Movies that are PG today, only a few years back would have qualified for an R-rating. I see that as a progressive problem. And I've seen R movies that were 20 times more wholesome than PG movies. It's a tangled mess that we rely on Hollywood rating generals to grade for us.

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That is why reading the little boxes where the ratings are for content and using sites like www.kidsinmind.com is handy. We generally do pretty well using these, but sometimes, things do go over the line.

My kids are both adults living at home now. I do not censor what they watch anymore. Either it's inside of them or it's not. They watch a lot of online movies.

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I use kids-in-mind.com and commonsensemedia.com. Kids-in-mind gives every teeny tiny detail, over-the-top really. I like that, because then I know that I have been alerted to any thing I would possibly find objectionable.

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From the reviews, what's acceptable and what's not?

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Sex scenes? Why would I invite such things into my home to view? How can a child of God feel that there is any excuse?

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I've been thinking about how to answer the question you posed in the first post. I hesitate to say 'we never.... yada yada.....' because I'd hate to say that and later realize - "Oh, yeah, we did watch that one..."

We're pretty picky. For the most part, no sex scenes, period. Don't want to watch adulterous scenes portrayed in a positive light, either.

It's hard to just give you a hard and fast rule that we follow, because there might be occasional exceptions. But for the most part, no sex scenes. Or a bunch of sexual innuendos. We like our movies clean.

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watched this movie called Trick or Treat, kind of a campy/goofy/scary flick. Noone seemed to mind the violence, but one scene where this woman becomes a werewolf and showed some skin and it was like "fast forward this stuff" from the women, but the one who complained the most about it was the married guy.

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We generally judge a movie by the content rather than the rating. I have let both my kids watch The Patriot (R rating), Cody has watched Saving Private Ryan, Braveheart, Gladiator, etc. all rated R.

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If you watch movies at all, you find you have to draw some lines.

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When do you feel views against some scenes become extremist and oppressive?

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I think there are several issues here- You can say no sex scenes, etc. but I was driving in downtown DC last week and followed a bus for about 3 miles (no choice, traffic). The advertisement on the back of the bus had a picture of two men, in a clothed, yet sensual position saying "Every BODY deserves love- get tested today". I was appalled, disgusted, and thinking, if I had small children in the car I would not want to explain it to them. It's everywhere, unfortunately.

We are considered "over the top" by my kids friends, concerning what we do and do not allow, but our kids don't seem to mind that much as long as we explain our reasons, they usually don't complain too much.

On another note- I had a talk recently with my daughter about Harlequin romances (and similar novels), I explained to her that they are essentially "porn for women", they create expectations that our husbands cannot live up to- so we need to be aware of what we put into our heads and hearts, not just HOW we put it in.

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How about sexuality in books? No pictures, just words.