In 1620 a bunch of Puritans, looking for freedom in the New World, landed in what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts. On that ship were no fewer (though no more, either) than three of my ancestors. That means that I am a direct descendant of some of the first Puritans on this continent. Given this, I believe it is not only my right, but my prerogative to ask the following question – what the FUCK did they start?
Let’s think about this. The United States is a nation founded on principles that are supposed to uphold various personal freedoms. Before we became a nation of exiled Europeans, we started out with a nice smattering of Puritans. Both of these things are very well established from the beginning and continue to perpetuate and expand themselves right up through present day. Puritanism is alive and well today, if you think about it. But so is the desire for personal freedoms, etc. And given the fact that Puritanism is generally dogmatic, close-minded, and completely unwilling to listen to any opinions other than their own, and also given the fact that the pursuit of freedoms in the US now takes the form of gay rights, abortion rights, etc these days, you can see how some trouble might be brewing. And that’s only one tiny facet of it.
For the sake of not letting this get out of hand, I’m going to concentrate on how these two opposing forces are making sexuality completely fucked up in the US in the 21st century (though it’s hardly new). And for that matter, let’s concentrate on sex in the media.
Earlier today I saw on the internet an ad for Trojan condoms that aired in England. Do a search on “pelvic power lift” and you might be able to find it (I don’t have the URL handy right now. It’s very suggestive, in a very humorous way. It’s hilarious and rather refreshing, actually. It is not, however, what I would call sexually explicit. I found it quite innocent and fun compared to some common images in American media. However, had that same commercial aired in the US, there would be public outrage, angry senators, and it would be banned faster than you can say, “Bob’s your uncle.”
There is a distinct difference in how human sexuality is regarded in the United States versus how it is regarded in places like Brazil and Europe in general. On the other side of the Atlantic (from my geographic perspective, that is), people in general seem to have a lot less of a problem admitting to the fact that humans are sexual beings, that everybody has sexual desire, and that there’s nothing wrong with that. We’re all human, we are all born with sexual reproductive systems that starting in adolescence lead us to have sexual desire. Sex is natural and nothing to be ashamed of. There’s a lot less denial of this in places like the UK than there is in the US.
Because of that ever-present Puritan element in American society, human sexuality as it appears in the media (and just about every other facet of American society) has been completely perverted and barely resembles what it very well should. Sexuality has been demonized. Sexuality is harmful, evil, and contrary to everything that is good. The Puritan element has taken it upon itself to see to it that all of American society knows this and is, one way or another, protected from its own deviant tendencies.
The media has taken advantage of the prissy, easily-offended nature of ye olde puritanical moralist freaks and over the years has manufactured a new way to portray sexuality. This is technicolor sex. This is high-definition holographic Warner Brothers sex. This is sex that bears absolutely no resemblance to any actual, naturally-occurring human sexual desire. This is the naked lady in the ice cube. This is the rap video with endless booty and impossible cleavage. This is sitcoms throwing in sodomy jokes because offending people gets their attention. This is everything but an honest attitude towards and portrayal of actual human sexuality.
Nobody wants to talk about sex for what it is. Ask the media why sex is appealing, and you’ll have something moronic and illogical screamed at you at 900 dB that probably includes a sales pitch for a new SUV or brand of cigarette. Ask me the same thing and I’ll say it’s appealing because it’s fun and because it’s an integral part of human nature. It doesn’t have to be any more than that, but it is constantly blown into such huge and freakish proportions that most people know little or nothing else.
I cannot accept the blind idiocy that sexuality is approached with in this country, and at some basic level I cannot help but blame the Puritans. They started it all. They’re the original reactionary zealots who lived (and continue to live) in the constant fear that someone, somewhere might actually be enjoying some tiny part of their human existence. They want to purge any positive view of anything remotely sexual from all things that appear in the public eye. Literature, art, discussion, etc. If you walked into a crowded room, stood on a table, and calmly said to the crowd in a cheerful tone, “I enjoy sex. It’s part of who I am and see no reason to think ill of it,” someone would almost certainly be offended, and quite likely a good number of the people in the room would be made to feel uncomfortable at the very least.
And this isn’t just a little problem. The Puritan element in society is causing major problems. Ever hear of HIV/AIDS? I’m assuming yes. But how much is being done to combat it compared to what could actively be done? Not much. HIV is a worldwide PANDEMIC. People freak out about SARS and avian flu, but don’t seem to be bothered by HIV too much. Sure, very few people actually want it (and yes, there are some people who have purposefully become infected with it in the belief that by the time they start to get sick, there will be a cure for it), but how many people do you know are actively discussing both the disease itself and measures for combating it? Again, not enough. With statistics like the 10,000,000+ children in sub-Saharan Africa with HIV and the rapidly growing numbers in the US and in places like China and Southeast Asia, you’d think that people would be a lot more worried about it than some of these other bugs, which while serious enough in their own way, almost exist as fads in society (being afraid of them, anyway – “Hey Jimmy – what are you afraid of getting?”).
So what’s the problem? The problem is that, by and large, people regard HIV/AIDS as only being transmitted sexually. *gasp* No, we must not discuss sex or anything thereto related!!!! Breathe in the wrong particles and you’ve got SARS, but you’ve got to screw the wrong person to get HIV, right? Wrong. But that’s the impression a lot of people are getting. HIV is a disease of blacks and hispanics. HIV is only something fags get. If you get infected with HIV, there was already something wrong with you. Not in the least bit true, of course, but it’s this sort of attitude that the continued Puritan view of sex helps perpetuate. Why else would AIDS awareness programs be so controversial? The Puritan element seems to think that adopting a policy of only teaching abstinence is going to solve everything. Yeah, like nobody’s going to refrain from having sex until marriage because the conservative Right says you should. But because people are so uptight about anything honestly sexual in the public arena, the important things don’t get discussed. The why and how of condom use – yeah, it could stop a lot of transmission of disease in theory, but teaching high school kids about safe sex is going to corrupt them and just add to the problem. Yeah, right, of course it is. Because teenagers aren’t having sex ignorant of precautions. HIV awareness programs teach a lot more than safe sex. But because sex is always part of the educational agenda, it will always be met with resistance, no matter how dire the consequences of ignorance are. Everybody with HIV got it from having sex, right? Fuck no. You think those ten-million children I mentioned earlier all got it from fucking without a condom. Not bloody likely. There’s a whole lot more to things like the HIV pandemic than the aspect of sexuality, but it’s that very aspect that is preventing it from being effectively and intelligently dealt with.
The Puritan attitude says push it out of the public consciousness and it will ultimately resolve itself. Reality says ignorance is death and you’re just helping the process along.
And how about sexual abuse? Rapists, molesters, etc are just fucked up to begin with, right? Society is not to blame – after all, it is clear from public sentiment that things like rape and Catholic priests fucking altar boys is bad. Everybody with a brain knows that these things are bad, so anyone who does them is simply depraved and it’s nothing but their own damn fault. I won’t deny that some people have certain tendencies of behavior from the start – we all do. But to put the blame solely on that is stupid. Ever stop to think what the hypocritical and distorted view of sex maintained by the media does to encourage these things? I once saw a list of attributes most commonly found in the personalities of men guilty of committing rape. I’ll be damned if most of them weren’t also personality traits and behavioral characteristics that American popular society also holds in high esteem. Always having to be in control, being self-assured, being virile in that hollywood sort of way, etc. I dare anyone to make a comprehensive argument that the way sexuality is portrayed in the public eye doesn’t complicate things and encourage certain behavioral characteristics.
People don’t just go out and commit rape just because of television, of course, much as they don’t go out and kill people just because of a video game. In some cases, sure, these things might be contributing factors, but there has to be a lot more to it than that.
Another aspect of the whole sexual assault thing is the victim coming forward. It’s pretty well known that many people who have been sexually assaulted or raped are very reluctant to come forward about having been abused. They feel ashamed, they feel its their fault, etc. If sexuality was dealt with more honestly in public, doesn’t it make sense that those who have been abused would be more willing to come forward and do so more quickly? No, changing how sex is portrayed in the media and by anti-sex moralists isn’t going to just fix these things (there’s a lot more to it than that), but it can’t do but help.
This is getting too long and I’m just ranting now. But do you see what I’m getting at? I’m all for maintaining good values, etc, but the Puritan mentality that got the colonies started almost 400 or so years ago is simply detrimental to society at this point in time. All it does is complicate things unnecessarily and so twist our view of reality out of whack that it’s getting more and more difficult to know which way is up. A disoriented and confused society? I think so.
I wonder what my ancestors would say to all this.
Second train of thought tonight – guerrilla art.
What is guerrilla art? Guerrilla art is generally installation art that is done anonymously, often illegally, in both public and private places, unexpectedly, and never through established channels. Guerrilla art takes the form of things like an anonymous bronze sculpture that randomly appears in a park one day, commissioned by no one, not officially permitted by anyone, attributed to nobody in particular. Or a mysterious painting that appears on the wall in a subway station overnight. It can be just about anything.
I, for one, love guerrilla art. Installation art has huge potential and almost limitless possibilities from the start. Installation art that specifically denies the control of public agencies, art commissions, etc has all the more potential for expression. There are, of course, times when things go too far, but with the sort of crap being churned out by artists being given funding and support from bullshit organizations like the National Endowment of the Arts, I’m willing to put up with that.
To some extent, art was always been meant to defy convention. If nobody ever pushes the boundaries of creative expression, no progress is ever made – it’s that simple. Pushing the boundaries is something that can be done in all sorts of fun ways, but it seems like no technique can really beat the oldest and most powerful approach of all – anarchy. I think people don’t generally think of anarchy in the best light. Too often it is portrayed as a long-live-revolution communist flag-waving down-with-everything sort of thing. But anarchism isn’t just an idea of tearing down and everyone governing themselves. Anarchism is also challenging that which is established in an attempt to further alternative views that are genuinely held to be superior than what is currently in place. In the arts, anarchy can be downright beautiful.
A friend showed me something in a graffiti magazine back before I left school. It was a number of things that, had they been put on a canvas would probably be considered fine art. But they weren’t on canvases, they were on the sides of busses, on brick walls, etc. One thing I remember in particular was a few hummingbirds that had been painted on a light pole or something. They were absolutely gorgeous – I have no idea how they were done. But they were done, and for that I am happy. But technically they’re graffiti, thereby unauthorized, thereby illegal. That makes them bad, right? Absolutely not. If you take an authoritarian point of view, of course you’re not going to like it, but to me it’s something that makes me genuinely happy and enthusiastic about other creative individuals that are out there doing things of their own.
Guerrilla art gives me hope. Judge me as you will for that, but it’s true. It’s not always pretty and truth be told it’s probably bad more often than it’s good, but oh well. It helps keep things fresh. It keeps people guessing. It gets people’s attention and has the power to make them break out of their tunnel vision and notice something beautiful in an otherwise drab, almost institutionalized existence. Guerrilla art is a good medicine for life-long tunnel vision.
Officially, I will say that I will never do guerrilla art. It’s illegal, after all, and I’m a law-abiding citizen. Unofficially I see no way that I won’t. Funny, isn’t it, that being a big copyright advocate like I am, I am also a big advocate of public art that is unauthorized, anonymous, and free for all to take, explore, exploit, etc. But then there’s a difference between the two philosophies. From a business sense, of course I’m going to protect my creations for all they’re worth, because if I don’t, somebody else will make profit from it that is rightfully mine. But guerrilla art isn’t done for profit. It is an end in itself. It is a public act of beauty in a world that is very much lacking in depth and passion and all the things that I think make life so wonderful.
