Media Sex

What Are the Issues?

Barrie Gunter

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2001
• ISBN:
  9781135653255
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Communication Studies
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

This book examines the representation, impact, and issues relating to the control and regulation of sex in the media. It covers work that has been conducted around the world on the depiction of sex in the mainstream mass media, especially the audio-visual media of film, television, and video, and the alleged effects that such content may have upon media consumers. In addition to reviewing the research on the effects of media sex, the book also examines what is known about public opinion concerning sex in the media. A key theme running through the book is whether the evidence about media sex can be taken at face value. Are the methodologies used by researchers to investigate media sex problematic? Have they yielded data that can be questioned in terms of validity and reliability? Media Sex questions whether media sex poses a serious problem for most viewers of mainstream media. It acknowledges that there may be serious issues relating to the causation of public offense and the cultivation of anti-women attitudes and beliefs that need to be addressed in productions where more extreme forms of sexual conduct are combined with violent and sadistic behavior. With the unrelenting growth of media, media consumers demand and are given greater personal control over the reception of media content. The notion of freedom of speech conflicts with the view that media content needs to be centrally regulated and controlled. This conflict creates problems for regulatory organizations and the legislators in nation states in which freedom of the press is legally protected. The book examines the debate surrounding this conflict.

1

What Concerns Have Been Raised About Media Sex?

Sex has been at the center of many forms of public entertainment for many centuries. Sexual themes have featured prominently in fiction, whether played out on the screen, stage, or page. Ancient Greek comedies were frequently laced with sex. Literary classics such as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew were filled with sexual double entendres and overtly sexual themes. The blending of sexual titillation with violence, a subject of contemporary concern, was also witnessed in Roman times with the introduction of women to gladiatorial contests. Scantily attired with their breasts naked, such women fought with wild boars and with each other in armed combat or from chariots (Guttmann, 1991; Juvenal, 1958; Robert, 1971).

In recent history, sex has been one of the major themes covered by the contemporary mass media, including books, magazines, newspapers, film, video, and television. Popular dramatic narratives frequently center on relationships between characters that, as often as not, involve sexual interactions—no matter how mild these might be. Sex is also the stuff of news. Sexual scandals involving politicians, media celebrities, and other public figures are featured virtually every week in tabloid newspapers, with such stories regularly spilling over into editorials and other media commentaries or into comedians’ jokes. Accounts of the sexual lives of ordinary people and sex advice columns also represent prominent aspects of glossy magazines targeted at various sexually active age groups.

Although much of this media preoccupation with sex passes off without comment, the representation of sexual behavior by the media has not received universal acceptance. Complaints have been invoked by certain types of sexual presentation in specific media and under particular circumstances. An alleged preoccupation with sexual issues in magazines aimed at teenage girls, for example, sparked a controversial debate about the role such publications might play in shaping sexual attitudes among young girls. This concern has been focused especially by statistics showing steady increases in the rate of underage pregnancies among teenage girls under 16 years of age and of unwanted pregnancies occurring among girls age 16 and over who are not in a steady relationship with a partner likely to serve as a supportive and responsible father (Harris & Associates, 1986).

Even more widespread concern has been publicly voiced about depictions of sexual behavior in cinema films and television programs that attractive significant audiences. It has been charged that these media have become increasingly preoccupied with sex and that depictions of sexual behavior have become more graphic and gratuitous (Greenberg, 1994). With the growth of cable television and home video, sexually explicit audiovisual materials have become more widely available to the general public, and, more worrisome for some commentators, such materials have become more accessible to young audiences. A number of sexually explicit television channels have launched on cable systems in North America and Europe. Some of these channels, such as Playboy, Tuxxedo, and American Exxxtasy in the United States and The Adult Channel in the United Kingdom, reach large audiences. Such channels depict explicit simulations and, in some case, real sexual intercourse. Latterly, the Internet has emerged as a source of anxiety among parents because of its largely uncontrolled provision of highly controversial, potentially offensive, and even illegal content and the readiness with which children and teenagers are able to gain access to such material.

WHAT CONCERNS HAVE BEEN RAISED?

Concerns about sex in the media have centered on a number of issues relating to offence to public taste, impact on young people, influences on family values and effects on marriage as a social institution, the social and sexual implications for women, and the potential causal agency of such content in relation to the commission of sexual offences. These concerns have been directed towards the representation of sex in mainstream audiovisual media available to everyone and also towards media content for which they is more restricted access. The latter forms of entertainment include encrypted erotic television channels for which subscription charges are levied and explicitly sexual videos available through special outlets or via mail order. These materials can take on an extremely graphic nature, showing actual sexual behavior involving same-sex and opposite-sex participants, group sex, and sex with violence. Even mainstream entertainment channels such as non-encrypted television services and cinema films have been criticised for a growing emphasis on sexual themes and wider use of nudity and increasingly explicit simulated portrayals of sexual intercourse. Concern about the sheer volume of media sex begs the question of how much sex is actually contained indifferent media. The research evidence on this question is reviewed fully in chapter 2.

Offence to Public Taste

One focal point of concern about media sex is that it can cause offence to large numbers of people. This type of concern has been especially acute with regard to sex on television. Mainstream television channels are freely available to anyone with a television set. Sexual depictions can therefore be seen readily by anyone who tunes in, should such scenes be included in programs. This experience might not just be a source of personal distaste to viewers, but may also cause them considerable embarrassment if they are watching with their children, parents, or other people. The truth is that public attitudes towards media sex vary widely with the nature of the sexual content, the gender, age, social background, and personality of individuals, and the social context of consumption. Furthermore, while some people may object to having media sex thrust before them because they find it personally distasteful, they may nevertheless accept that this does not mean it should be banned. Indeed, many viewers are prepared to tolerate the provision of adult television channels for those with a taste for the material such channels supply, even though they would not wish to watch those channels themselves (Gunter, Sancho-Aldridge, & Winstone, 1994).

Ultimately, if individuals are upset enough by sex in mainstream media, they will let their views be known. In the case of broadcast television, for example, viewers are not slow to complain to the authorities when offended. On some occasions, when a medium goes too far, professional critics join the debate about whether the media are serving the best interests of the public.

By the end of the 20th century, complaints from viewers in Britain about sex on television achieved an all-time high. Of 4,892 complaints from viewers received by the Broadcasting Standards Commission in 1998–1999, 31% were about sex, compared with 18% over the previous 12 months (Harvey, 1999). During the same period, Britain’s commercial television regulator, the Independent Television Commission (ITC) received 318 complaints from viewers about sex on the commercial television channels, and the BBC’s Program Complaints Unit received 40 complaints about sex on BBC programs (5.1% of all complaints). Not all these complaints were upheld by the regulators (Petley, 1999). Concern focused not simply on the nature of the sexual portrayals, but on the time when they were shown. Much of the public’s concern centered on sexual stories creeping into programs aimed at teenagers and sexual innuendo in programs that were popular with children. Another area of concern was the increasing prevalence of sexual themes, often discussed in graphic detail, on daytime talk shows (Harvey, 1999). The ITC (2000) reported a total of 280 complaints from viewers about sex in television drama and entertainment during 1999, the biggest single category of complaint, exceeding violence (121 complaints) and language (133 complaints) combined.

Prominent television commentators joined in the chorus of criticism about broadcasters’ apparent growing obsession with sex. Late-night exposés of the sex industry in Europe or reality shows featuring ordinary people talking about their sex lives were billed as investigative journalism with an educational function by their producers, but dubbed as mere ‘sexploitation’ and titillation by critics (Dunkley, 2000). Even the regulators were dubious about the justification for some of the reality shows with strong sexual themes, even though they were transmitted late at night (Petley, 1999).

One aspect of concern about sex in popular entertainment media is that it can cause offence to members of the public. This concern stems in part from the perception that portrayals of an erotic nature present depictions of (sexual) behavior that would normally remain hidden. For some people, the sexual act is a private behavior. The depiction of graphic sexual portrayals, involving the realistic simulation of sexual intercourse and other intimate sexual practices, is offensive. Herein lies the inherent appeal of sexual depictions in the media. Although media sex is publicly criticised, it is also publicly consumed. By bringing intimate acts out into the open and rendering them available for close scrutiny, they generate extreme curiosity among their consumers who may then seek further exposure to what some scholars call ‘forbidden fruit’ (Bryant & D. Brown, 1989). Viewers become voyeurs, curious to see other people having sex. The camera brings the details of such activity into close-up. As well as this curiosity, there is the added factor of increased availability of erotica. More people have ready access to such material in the privacy of their own home. They can consume it easily and without embarrassment (Zillmann & Bryant, 1989).

The nature of the appeal of media sex, however, can itself lead to an appetite for more of the same for a while, but then to a demand for more extreme materials. Passive consumption on its own may lose its appeal after a while (Zillmann & Bryant, 1988a). As viewers habituate to one kind of sexual material, they may develop appetites for less familiar types. Sustained interest in explicit sexual material may also be driven by the role it plays as a sexual stimulant or a substitute for the real thing (Glassman, 1977). Erotica can also provide information about sex that its consumers may utilise in their own sex lives (Bryant & D. Brown, 1989; Lawrence & Herold, 1988). The popularity of erotica varies across the population. Sexually explicit materials are not enjoyed equally by men and women (Bryant & D. Brown, 1989; Day, 1988). Males are more active consumers of erotica than are females. Although females will watch sexually explicit material, they usually depend on others to instigate the experience (Lawrence & Herold, 1988). We return to the subject of public opinion about media sex in chapter 3.

Impact on Young People

The concern about the exposure of young people to sex in the media has two main aspects. First, there is a worry that very young children may be upset by seeing explicit sexual scenes that they lack the maturity to interpret. Second, exposure to media content that places emphasis on sexual themes among teenagers is believed to encourage early onset of sexual behavior and contributes, in turn, to the growth in unwanted teenage pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases (Greenberg, J. D. Brown, & Buerkel-Rothfuss, 1993). Social statistics for the United States have indicated that by the age of 20, 70% of females and 80% of males have had sexual intercourse. One in seven of these individuals has contracted a sexually transmitted disease—in some cases AIDS (Greenberg et al., 1993). The United States has the highest rate of teenage pregnancies in the industrialised world (Bigler, 1989; Jones et al., 1985). By the early 1990s, one in four pregnancies occurred to mothers under 20 years of age (Greenberg et al., 1993). This, in itself, may not be so bad, except that often these young mothers are having children before they have themselves reached psychological maturity or financial independence. Early onset of motherhood may, therefore, prevent them from enjoying their teenage and young adult years free from the responsibilities of child rearing. They may be driven to take steps to recapture their youth in later life, with disastrous consequences for family cohesion. The propensity for engaging in unprotected sex with numerous partners increases the likelihood of infection or further unwanted pregnancies. The impact of media sex on young people is examined at greater length in chapter 4.

Media sex has been identified as a contributory factor in connection with all these behavioral trends. The impact of media sex has been hypothesised to operate through a number of stages. First, the media place sex high on the public agenda. Second, the media prime people to think about sex a lot. Third, the media present role models for emulation. Fourth, the role models do not always behave in a responsible fashion. Thus irresponsible lessons in sexual conduct and morality may be learned. These concerns stem from the observation that the mainstream mass media are permeated by sexual references. These references readily occur in television programs, movies, videos, magazines and song lyrics in popular music (Dorr & Kunkel, 1990; Fabes & Strouse, 1984, 1987; Wartella, Heintz, Aidman, & Mazzarella, 1990). Some media productions present highly explicit sexual depictions. In certain instances, sex is combined with violence or horror. Such materials, as we see later on, can sometimes produce socially undesirable changes in viewers’ attitudes towards sex, female sexuality, and the use of coercive or degrading sexual practices.

Effects on Family Values and the Institution of Marriage

Depictions of sex in the mass media have been accused of taking place outside of a romantic, loving context. Instead, they tend frequently to represent casual sexual couplings or infidelity and convey an implicit message that promiscuity and unfaithfulness are acceptable and normal forms of conduct. Some writers have called attention to the possibility that this pattern of representation could cultivate values among individuals regularly exposed to such content that underpin a wider acceptance of sex outside marriage, childbirth outside marriage, marriage as a temporary rather than permanent estate, and an expectation of many sexual partners in one’s adult life (Zillmann & Bryant, 1982, 1984). This, in turn, may contribute to the breakdown of traditional family values and the willingness of people to commit themselves to lasting partnerships and the responsibilities that raising a family entail.

Social and Sexual Implications for Women

For some individuals this trend, and the kinds of portrayals it has brought with it, is an undesirable development because of the kinds of attitudes such material can cultivate among viewers. Feminists claim that depictions of sexual behavior in the mainstream media have tended to show women as sex objects and sexual subordinates to men (Brownmiller, 1975; Diamond, 1985; Longino, 1980). Not only does this convey certain unwanted messages about the role of women in sexual relationships, but it cultivates a broader set of beliefs about the relative power of men and women in society.

Zillmann and Bryant (1984, 1988a) have maintained that continued exposure to explicit depictions of women engaged in sexual activity may activate thoughts about female promiscuity in viewers. Greater availability of these thoughts in memory (Tversky & Kahneman, 1973) may lead to inflated estimates of women’s tendency to desire and engage in unusual and abnormal sexual activities, including rape. The probability that these ideas will be accessed and used in evaluations of women increases as a participant is exposed to more of these behaviors in movies.

Research with young college-age males found that when fed a controlled diet of movies for up to a week that contained sexually aggressive rape themes, the men’s beliefs about female sexuality and attitudes towards rape appeared to be changed by the experience. Such psychological changes persisted for over a week to a point when they were tested for their perceptions of a simulated rape trial. Those men who had consumed a diet of films with rape themes exhibited more callous attitudes towards female sexuality, stronger beliefs that women enjoy being raped, less sympathy for a rape victim, and more sympathy for the accused, as compared with similar young men who had watched a diet of erotic movies with nonviolent themes (Linz, Donnerstein, & Penrod, 1988).

Whether or not increased rape myth beliefs and more callous attitudes towards women represent normal responses to sexually explicit films aggressive themes has not been consistently demonstrated. A further body of research has found that men are not easily affected by sexually explicit materials that portray the sexual objectification or victimisation of women and has detected no relationship between exposure to sexually explicit material and the development of negative attitudes and aggressive behaviors towards women (Becker & Stein, 1991; Fisher & Grenier, 1994; Langevin et al, 1988; Malamuth & Ceniti, 1986; Padgett, Brislin-Slutz, & Neal, 1989). Chapter 6 considers, in great depth, the empirical evidence concerning the role of explicit media sex in shaping male perceptions of women and female sexuality.

Causal Agency in Sexual Offences

The appearance of explicit sexual material in the media has often been linked anecdotally to the prevalence of sexual offences in society and to the onset of sexual offending in individuals. A further and more direct link has been made between the production and distribution of certain kinds of pornographic material and child sex offending. In this context, public concern is not simply focused on the possibility that graphic depictions of sex in audiovisual (and print) media causes the development of sexually deviant propensities among those who consume such material, but that the material itself may contain illegal acts of sexual behavior. The relationship between pornography and sex offending has been examined through four principal methodological approaches: (a) studies of sex offenders’ exposure to pornography; (b) laboratory research with offenders and nonoffenders; (c) aggregate statistical analysis of crime figure...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• 1 What Concerns Have Been Raised About Media Sex?
• 2 How Much Sex Is Shown?
• 3 What Is Acceptable to the Public?
• 4 Does Media Sex Influence Young People?
• 5 Is Media Sex Degrading to Women?
• 6 Does Media Sex Give Men the Wrong Ideas?
• 7 Is Media Sex the Cause of Sexual Deviance?
• 8 Can Media Sex Portrayals Influence Nonoffenders?
• 9 Can Media Sex Sell Commodities?
• 10 How Are Effects of Media Sex to Be Explained
• 11 Can We Trust the Research on Media Sex?
• 12 How Effective Are Controls Over Media Sex?
• References
• Author Index
• Subject Index