Sin City

[Clint]

With the news of Pope John Paul II's death dominating the weekend news, moviegoers appear to have vindicated recent accusations that America is plagued by a "death culture", a charge made by President Bush in reference to the Terry Schiavo case, by flocking to the ultra-violent Sin City.

The movie grossed $28.1 million this weekend. It seems we here in America are caught up in a culture of death. Even The Passion of the Christ was focused on his death. I'm hoping I'm wrong.

[anastrophe]

Clint wrote: With the news of Pope John Paul II's death dominating the weekend news, moviegoers appear to have vindicated recent accusations that America is plagued by a "death culture", a charge made by President Bush in reference to the Terry Schiavo case, by flocking to the ultra-violent Sin City.



The movie grossed $28.1 million this weekend. It seems we here in America are caught up in a culture of death. Even The Passion of the Christ was focused on his death. I'm hoping I'm wrong.
it's just a movie.

[Clint]

anastrophe wrote: it's just a movie.


Yup, just an extremely violent movie. Bruce Willis rips a guy's penis off in it. Doesn't our taste for entertainment say something about us?

[Lon]

I don't know Clint if it's a death culture thing or more just an increasing appetite for violence. Think the auto racing fans just love to watch cars go round and round? Or boxing and wrestleing fans into technique? Nah---they want to see BLOOD & GUTS.

[Clint]

Lon wrote: I don't know Clint if it's a death culture thing or more just an increasing appetite for violence. Think the auto racing fans just love to watch cars go round and round? Or boxing and wrestleing fans into technique? Nah---they want to see BLOOD & GUTS.
So, just because we've always liked "blood and guts" it's okay? Don't you see our apitite increasing for violence and death?

[Lon]

Clint wrote: So, just because we've always liked "blood and guts" it's okay? Don't you see our apitite increasing for violence and death?
I didn't say it was OK Clint. I said the same thing you did, that our appetite is increasing for violence. And I might add, it's in direct proportion to the exposure via film, TV etc.

[anastrophe]

Clint wrote: Yup, just an extremely violent movie. Bruce Willis rips a guy's penis off in it. Doesn't our taste for entertainment say something about us?
let me put it this way. way back in 1972, i saw the movie The Valachi Papers. I was twelve years old, well below the age i should have been let in, as it was rated 'R'. but just as now, it's not much enforced. i don't remember the plot, but it was a gangster/mafia film, and at one point, a woman wants a man killed, and wants the henchment to bring her his penis. they do. the scene where they cut it off was not directly graphic, but the actions were well 'implied' and quite horrendous. it was enough to be certainly disturbing at twelve years old.



33 years ago. now, does our taste in entertainment say something about us? not really. the technical skills available for realistic depictions are certainly better (haven't seen Sin City so don't know how they handled their turn on things). but it really is 'same as it ever was'.



what's peculiar is that i just finished watching 'Grey's Anatomy'. one subplot dealt with a woman who was severely beaten by a rapist - and she somehow managed to bite off and swallow the assailant's penis.



so apparently this is removable penis evening. not exactly what i'd had in mind, to say the least.

[anastrophe]

Clint wrote: So, just because we've always liked "blood and guts" it's okay? Don't you see our apitite increasing for violence and death?
appetite increasing for violence and death != [is not equal to] appetite increasing for depictions of violence and death.



there has been an appetite for depictions of violence and death (and horror and carnage and destruction, et al) since time immemorial. stories around the tribal fire. the paintings of Bruegel or Goya or countless others. We've all seen the moment JFK died probably a hundred times, in slowmo, the cloud of pink and red above his head, General Nguyen Ngoc Loan's execution of a viet cong prisoner in 1968, caught on film as he shot him at point blank range in the side of the head. i was eight years old when i saw that on the evening news.



there is nothing new under the sun.

[Jika]

Lon wrote: Think the auto racing fans just love to watch cars go round and round? Or boxing and wrestleing fans into technique? Nah---they want to see BLOOD & GUTS.


I concur with Lon on this point, however, I would argue that peoples morbid fascination with death, violence and maiming is not some kind of atavistic phenomenon of increasing magnitude.

It is, as it has been for centuries, just another aspect of human nature, or the human psyche.

Think of the carnage and mayhem enjoyed by people at the Roman Colosseum thousands of years ago.

It would seem we have not evolved that much at all.

[koan]

If you'll recall, people used to "flock" to public executions. There always has been and always will be a grim fascination with death and torture.

[hotsauce]

I personally can't wait to see this flick! *Hotsauce wonders if this makes her a bad person.*

[koan]

hotsauce wrote: I personally can't wait to see this flick! *Hotsauce wonders if this makes her a bad person.*


It's a good thing. You can be our guinea pig. Watch the movie then report back if you killed anyone after being exposed to the violence.

[hotsauce]

koan wrote: It's a good thing. You can be our guinea pig. Watch the movie then report back if you killed anyone after being exposed to the violence.


I am thrilled to be your guinea pig!

[Clint]

Good points. Since we’ve had the appetite all alone, is it good to be able to attempt satisfying it in this way? Are we being able to satisfy the appetite vicariously or is this just whetting our appetite for more?

[koan]

Clint wrote: Good points. Since we’ve had the appetite all alone, is it good to be able to attempt satisfying it in this way? Are we being able to satisfy the appetite vicariously or is this just whetting our appetite for more?


It seems like a chicken or egg situation. I can tell you as someone who worked on horror films that the more gore I created the less fascination it held for me. The effect can be different on different people but it takes a sickness for graphic depiction to create a desire to harm or create the violence they saw. On the other hand fights probably break out more after a bunch of people see an action film that gets them "pumped up". But the fascination exists whether or not it is fed. To deny it and lock it up in a closet seems to be the most likely way to create dementia and psychopathology.

[Clint]

koan wrote: It seems like a chicken or egg situation. I can tell you as someone who worked on horror films that the more gore I created the less fascination it held for me. The effect can be different on different people but it takes a sickness for graphic depiction to create a desire to harm or create the violence they saw. On the other hand fights probably break out more after a bunch of people see an action film that gets them "pumped up". But the fascination exists whether or not it is fed. To deny it and lock it up in a closet seems to be the most likely way to create dementia and psychopathology.


Maybe that's why I've been forgetting things. I'll bet that's why I spelled "along" wrong in my last post. The more I think about it, it's probably why some of my sentences don't make sense. :-5

[Raven]

Clint wrote: Good points. Since we’ve had the appetite all alone, is it good to be able to attempt satisfying it in this way? Are we being able to satisfy the appetite vicariously or is this just whetting our appetite for more?
I think it's just the nature of man.

Look at the Roman colloseum. The entertainment has always been at someone elses expense. Just be glad today, it's on celluloid instead of a real arena.

[minks]

Raven wrote: I think it's just the nature of man.

Look at the Roman colloseum. The entertainment has always been at someone elses expense. Just be glad today, it's on celluloid instead of a real arena.


Yes the movie is "Ultra Violent" tis done in black and white to emmulate cartoon like viewing thus reducing the violent appearance. Not only are genitailia ripped they are blown to bits by guns as well. Other scenes are grim and gruesome as well.

And yep I think it is human nature we have the desire to see others worse off than ourselves no matter how violent.

Think of medieval times? They flocked to the town centre to watch people being drawn and quartered, hung, stretched on the rack, burned at the stake etc. It appears to be in our blood.

[Ted]

What is most interesting is that the Romans were ok with gladitorial fights to the death and all of the blood and gore but were appalled at the Greeks athletic games because the athletes played in the nude.

Go figure.

Shalom

Ted :-6

[Clint]

Ted wrote: What is most interesting is that the Romans were ok with gladitorial fights to the death and all of the blood and gore but were appalled at the Greeks athletic games because the athletes played in the nude.

Go figure.

Shalom

Ted :-6
It seems to me though, that when a culture begins its spin toward disintegration, the most obvious symptoms are sexual perversion and extreme violence.

[beyelzu]

proof of this?

define sexual perversion so that it will apply to all cultures, and define extreme violence so that violence of today would be in the same league as violence throughout the ages and yet be extreme.

we no longer have people fight to the death, as a society we value human life, I dont get the culture of death crap.

as a general rule anything that coulter, hannity of mount rush says is complete and utter crap.

that goes double for anything that comes out of shrubya's mouth

[koan]

Glad you brought this thread up again.

I get the feeling that people like to categorize violence and separate it into "them" groups. Those media people, those Muslims, those terrorists. Doing this allows us to deny our own cruel side. Everyone has a part of themselves that is fascinated or lured by violence but some are more successful in controling it than others. But pretending that it is not in our own nature or denying it is not legitimate control.

[beyelzu]

I agree completely, koan. I also think that the western world is less violent than years gone by. Most people just dont revel in the slaughter of the women and children of their enemies, most people dont view other races and nationalities as being subhuman.

[capt_buzzard]

And how many times have we seen 'The Passion of the Christ down the years, The Robe, King of Kings, The Greatest Story Ever Told? People just love the blood and guts movies whether its cops and robbers,rapes ect.

[Wolverine]

Dude, I went to go see it because I am a HUGE comic book geek. I have been reading SinCIty for years. And the fact that Robert Rodriguez was teaming up with Frank Miller(the creator) to bring it to the big screen was too much to pass up. Most of that money opening weekend came from other comic book geeks like me. Not a band of blood-thirsty, voilence-loving frootloops.

Jeez, man. It was only a movie. If it is too voilent for you, then don't see it.

Personally, I thought that Blade was much more graphic than this flick, and i saw more little kids at that one.

[Clint]

I used to be very attracted to violence. I boxed, was a street fighter, a hunter, went to war and loved violent movies. Today my view of life has changed. I literally get sick to my stomach when I think of some of the things I used to enjoy. I even catch myself occasionally letting flies escape rather than swat them.

The love of violence, begets violence. The upsurge in the interest in violent movies will manifest itself in violence. People don’t satisfy their appetite for violence by playing violent video games…they simply further whet their appetite. We can kid ourselves all we want but we as a culture are going to see more violent acts as a result of whetting potentially huge appetites.

As it is we put a clinical mask on a lot of violence resulting in a warped view of what our culture really is capable of.

[anastrophe]

Clint wrote: I used to be very attracted to violence. I boxed, was a street fighter, a hunter, went to war and loved violent movies. Today my view of life has changed. I literally get sick to my stomach when I think of some of the things I used to enjoy. I even catch myself occasionally letting flies escape rather than swat them.



The love of violence, begets violence. The upsurge in the interest in violent movies will manifest itself in violence. People don’t satisfy their appetite for violence by playing violent video games…they simply further whet their appetite. We can kid ourselves all we want but we as a culture are going to see more violent acts as a result of whetting potentially huge appetites.



As it is we put a clinical mask on a lot of violence resulting in a warped view of what our culture really is capable of.
i disagree quite emphatically. i play violent video games, and even with the degree of realism current games can muster, there's not the slightest hesitation to recognize that it's not real. it doesn't inure me to violence at all. seeing *actual* violence, something on the news, or that television show that's half about violence but dolled up in cute, "America's Funniest Home Videos" (which i refer to as "America's Favorite People Getting Hurt") - seeing actual harm come to a human being immediately creates a feeling of dread, fear, and revulsion in me. shooting synthetic images of aliens, or people, no matter how bloody, is not going to inure any reasonable person to violence, nor create an appetite for the real thing.



my opinion, of course. i believe i'm a reasonable person. others might disagree.



a person who shoots up a 7-11 is not a reasonable person. a person who plows their car into a group of bicyclists is not a reasonable person. for every loonie-tunes who does something like this, there are about 100,000 'normal' people who will live an entire lifetime, seventy, eighty years, without ever causing grave harm to an innocent person intentionally.



the question of *children* viewing violence, however, is an entirely different matter. i can distinguish an image of someone having their brains blown out in a video game from reality. a child, depending upon their age, may not.



on the other hand, i was eight years old when the film of the execution of a viet cong at the hands of Vietnam's police chief, Lt. Colonel Nguyen Ngoc Loan was shown on the national news. a revolver to the head, a shot, and blood gushing from the man's head. contrary to giving me the desire to go out and shoot someone in the head, i was haunted by those images for decades, and still am today. revulsion, horror. no sensation of wanting to do the same to someone else.



the same can be said for most people. the overwhelming majority of people.

[Clint]

anastrophe wrote: i disagree quite emphatically. i play violent video games, and even with the degree of realism current games can muster, there's not the slightest hesitation to recognize that it's not real. it doesn't inure me to violence at all. seeing *actual* violence, something on the news, or that television show that's half about violence but dolled up in cute, "America's Funniest Home Videos" (which i refer to as "America's Favorite People Getting Hurt") - seeing actual harm come to a human being immediately creates a feeling of dread, fear, and revulsion in me. shooting synthetic images of aliens, or people, no matter how bloody, is not going to inure any reasonable person to violence, nor create an appetite for the real thing.



my opinion, of course. i believe i'm a reasonable person. others might disagree.



a person who shoots up a 7-11 is not a reasonable person. a person who plows their car into a group of bicyclists is not a reasonable person. for every loonie-tunes who does something like this, there are about 100,000 'normal' people who will live an entire lifetime, seventy, eighty years, without ever causing grave harm to an innocent person intentionally.



the question of *children* viewing violence, however, is an entirely different matter. i can distinguish an image of someone having their brains blown out in a video game from reality. a child, depending upon their age, may not.



on the other hand, i was eight years old when the film of the execution of a viet cong at the hands of Vietnam's police chief, Lt. Colonel Nguyen Ngoc Loan was shown on the national news. a revolver to the head, a shot, and blood gushing from the man's head. contrary to giving me the desire to go out and shoot someone in the head, i was haunted by those images for decades, and still am today. revulsion, horror. no sensation of wanting to do the same to someone else.



the same can be said for most people. the overwhelming majority of people.
I don’t recall saying that everyone had the same reaction to violence. I do believe the aggregate result is not the same as what you experience personally. Exposure to violence most definitely has a desensitizing affect. Once desensitized, the consumer needs more to get the same reaction. Is the real thing more of a dose than imitation? Sure it is.

Obviously, younger people are more likely to become violent as a result of exposure to violence.

Not everyone who drinks alcohol becomes and alcoholic. If alcohol didn’t exist, no one would get hooked. Because alcohol does exist some people become alcoholics. If there was only enough alcohol in existence to supply 25% of the population the instances of alcoholism would be less than if there was enough to supply 100% of the population. The more immature the individual is the more likely they are to become addicted to alcohol. I think that there is a parallel with violence.

[anastrophe]

Clint wrote: Exposure to violence most definitely has a desensitizing affect. Once desensitized, the consumer needs more to get the same reaction. Is the real thing more of a dose than imitation? Sure it is.
my argument is that exposure to violence and exposure to depictions of violence are so far separated from each other as to render the argument moot. seeing violence, and committing violence, are completely different things. much like seeing a painting, and actually creating a painting, are two completely different things.



seeing lots of paintings won't make me more likely to try to create paintings, all other things being equal.



of course, then there's 'art imitates life'. does life imitate art? i've never owned a clock that you could drape over a branch.

[Clint]

anastrophe wrote: seeing lots of paintings won't make me more likely to try to create paintings, all other things being equal.
Not exactly the same thing, but are laws limiting the advertising of tobacco and alcohol useless laws? I think there is a correlation.

[anastrophe]

Clint wrote: Not exactly the same thing, but are laws limiting the advertising of tobacco and alcohol useless laws? I think there is a correlation.
right, the 'art imitates life' stuff was more of a throwaway example. i would submit that the advertising directed towards enticing people to do things that are (by and large) pleasurable is a lot different from depictions of violence getting people to actually commit violence.



alcohol and tobacco are harmful to the individual, but only in the abstract - there is no immediate harm, and absent knowing the later harm that may be rendered, there's nothing directly that would cause a person to not want to do those things, whereas, except in some individuals, committing violence is not pleasureful, and can do immediate harm to the individual (due to the risks inherent in committing violence). i see ads for haagen daaz icecream. it makes me want to have some haagen daaz icecream. if i go out and buy some haagen daaz icecream, i'm likely to experience pleasure upon consuming it. looking at the ad doesn't give me pleasure directly. looking at depictions of violence, for most people, does not make them want to go out and cause harm to others, quite simply because most people know what it's like to experience harm. trip and fall on the sidewalk, and it hurts. we know it's not pleasureful. lots of people think it's funny *watching* someone trip and fall on the sidewalk. and in and of itself, that's pretty much fine too. few people will actually go out and push someone to the ground after seeing that, because most people know that they're causing pain in doing so.



maybe this is the antihistamines talking. i'm going to go play halo 2. :yh_silly

[beyelzu]

Clint wrote: Not exactly the same thing, but are laws limiting the advertising of tobacco and alcohol useless laws? I think there is a correlation.
no not really.

over the last thirty years, movies have become violent and the number of violent video games has increased nigh infinitely, as there were virtually none thirty years ago, if this was going to cause an upswing in violence then we would have been seeing it for thirty years.

the question then becomes has crime increased in that time.

the answer is no, americans are far less likely to be a victim of a violent crime than they were in the 1970s.

the facts just dont support your hypothesis.

[Ted]

Surprise, I happen to agree with Clint on this one. I have seen examples of violence on TV leading to violence in children. Being somewhat naieve about the TV programs kids were watching when I was a principal I was surprised to find children in grade one kicking at each other etc. When I asked about it they referred to a TV program for kids their age: I can't even remember what it was now but the violence was the direct result of of a cartoon program on TV.

Shalom

Ted :-6

[anastrophe]

Ted wrote: Surprise, I happen to agree with Clint on this one. I have seen examples of violence on TV leading to violence in children. Being somewhat naieve about the TV programs kids were watching when I was a principal I was surprised to find children in grade one kicking at each other etc. When I asked about it they referred to a TV program for kids their age: I can't even remember what it was now but the violence was the direct result of of a cartoon program on TV.



Shalom

Ted :-6
i don't think i've ever experienced a first grader who *didn't* kick other kids at some point.

[Frederick]

anastrophe wrote: let me put it this way. way back in 1972, i saw the movie The Valachi Papers. I was twelve years old, well below the age i should have been let in, as it was rated 'R'. but just as now, it's not much enforced. i don't remember the plot, but it was a gangster/mafia film, and at one point, a woman wants a man killed, and wants the henchment to bring her his penis. they do. the scene where they cut it off was not directly graphic, but the actions were well 'implied' and quite horrendous. it was enough to be certainly disturbing at twelve years old.



33 years ago. now, does our taste in entertainment say something about us? not really. the technical skills available for realistic depictions are certainly better (haven't seen Sin City so don't know how they handled their turn on things). but it really is 'same as it ever was'.



what's peculiar is that i just finished watching 'Grey's Anatomy'. one subplot dealt with a woman who was severely beaten by a rapist - and she somehow managed to bite off and swallow the assailant's penis.

so apparently this is removable penis evening. not exactly what i'd had in mind, to say the least.


Man, that's put me off wanting a blow job for life! The trouble is, prosthetics in the film industry are so s**t hot, you don't know for real what is real, and what is fantasy, especially when it comes to oral sex.

[capt_buzzard]

Is The Passion of The Christ anything to go by? Millions saw it.

[minks]

as well, are the violent acts seen as entertainment duplicated in real life? Gawd no after watching sin city, there is no way the average joe human is going to go out and commit such a degree of violence. I think generally we as humans are learning how to distinguish entertainment from real life actions. The failings come from those who fail to accept that, or who are poorly educated or from those who were never diciplined against it., or from those who grew up with it as a way of life.

[Ted]

anastrophe :-6

The show was "Power Rangers". When I asked them why they were doing what they were doing they said they "were being power rangers". Seems clear to me. And while I have not seen the actual research it is apparently shown that violence breeds violence.

Shalom

Ted :-6

[anastrophe]

you'll have to forgive me for being pedantic - or am i being pedagogic? so hard to keep track in this modern world.

we are discussing very specific things, and very specific behaviors, so i think that very specific language is important.



"violence breeds violence". this may or may not be true. it's an extremely simplistic 'nugget of wisdom' that has not always shown itself to be accurate, notwithstanding that sometimes it is indeed. but what we've been discussing here is not whether violence breeds violence. we've been discussing whether depictions of violence breed violence. for that, i think there is considerably less evidence.



taking it a step further, depictions of violence as viewed by small children (before they've formed clearcut understanding of right vs wrong), and depictions of violence as seen by teens and adults, are also exceedingly different in scope. i have no argument in favor of small children viewing depictions of violence. i would submit, that the nature of the violence being depicted does not exist in a vacuum. violence, in and of itself, it not inherently good or evil. violence in defense of innocent persons may be not just right, it may be called for (notwithstanding the pacifists amongst us). very young children, because they can't differentiate the 'good guys' from the 'bad guys', are not the best audience for such fare (we'll leave out for the moment children watching their parents being slaughtered in Darfur, who rather don't have a choice in what they see).



i believe i've seen about two minutes of 'power rangers', more than enough to cause my eyes to bleed from the seizure-inducing flashes of multi-colored light and frenetic action ('frenetic' doesn't do it justice however). there are distinct 'good guys' and 'bad guys', but the fare is meant for consumption by unformed minds, and i think in that respect it's not appropriate. inculcating small children into the notions of right and wrong via what would otherwise be considered a bad acid trip doesn't seem entirely like a great idea.



all that blather said - what is the very worst you've seen children do after seeing the power rangers? same i presume as i have: a lot of chopping at the air, kicking, and running around. children tend to mimic what they see - but the emphasis is on mimic not actually do. the children can't fly, can't send out paralyzing beams. the most likely injuries might be bruises and scrapes - daily fare for a small child. i do not think that view the flying, chipmunk-speed, flashing light puff of smoke power rangers is going to turn a small child into a mass murderer as an adult, or even a caped crusader for Good.



the small child who witnesses his mother beating the hell out of his father will likely have a very different experience. *real* violence, within their presence, *does* strongly affect children, and here's where 'violence breeds violence' has validity - although again, not always.



so, what am i getting at? dunno. all things in moderation? perhaps parents should act with more discretion on their children's behalf, rather than letting them consume a diet of whatever is fed out of the television tube? perhaps parents can act as the primary teachers of right and wrong, rather than popular culture?



that's really what it boils down to for me. that there are derelict parents out there, by the seeming millions, is *not* my responsibility - nor should *my* choices in what i view be limited because of the moral penury of said parents.



if we continue to insist that all the world be dumbed-down to satisfy the 'safety' needs of small children, then it won't be much of a world. (cue true tale of legal requirement that buckets be labeled 'may be a hazard for drowning for small children'. no shite, really?)

[Ted]

anastrophe :-6

I am in agreement with you on that.

Shalom

Ted :-6