Sex in TV shows...

[TwoPintsOfAleAndABagOfPorkScratchings]

I'll start this by saying that I don't really watch TV. I have one and I'll sometimes watch a documentary on Netflix or something but I don't watch TV.

Shows that other people have watched over the years have completely passed me by. For example, last year, I watched the first season of Prison Break for the first time. I just find it boring. I don't get invested or care about the characters so I generally don't watch it.

Anyway, my partner is more of a TV watcher than I will ever be and, if he wants to watch something, I go and do something else.

But because of him, I've become more aware of what is out there. I still have no interest in watching any of it though!

One thing that has really come to my attention is how much violent and explicit sex is in just ordinary TV shows. I know he watched Game of Thrones before we got together and he talked about watching House of the Dragon although, as far as I know, he hasn't yet. He's also just finished watching the most recent seasons of The Boys.

I'm just really uncomfortable with the level of nudity and explicit sex in these shows. I haven't said anything to him about him watching it because we've only been together for 2 and a half years and these are things he started watching before we got together. But he does know I don't like it and doesn't suggest we watch anything like that together.

But he's now shown an interest in a new series on Prime called something like Those Who Are About to Die or something. I looked it up to see if it was something i could watch with him and again its full of explicit sex, nudity, prostitutes etc.

It just feels, I don't know, degrading to me as a woman that women are exploited in this way for entertainment? That entertainment has to include gratuitous sex and violence against women. And men too to be honest. I don't like that either. It just feels unnecessary And I don't like it.

It might sound extreme but I just can't get my head round being with someone who is so kind and loving towards me enjoying watching women being raped and brutalised. Or even just the explicit sex and nudity.

And I don't think I want to be in a relationship with someone who watches it week in and week out for entertainment.

But I also know that some women enjoy these shows too. I've tried telling myself that it isn't real but the nudity is real, the bodies are real and the sexual acts are either real or designed to appear very real.

What are other people's thoughts on this?

Some of it is what you're partner is choosing to watch. I watch TV I don't watch things like game of thrones, house of the dragon, they're all the same, violence, sex, degradation of women and I work with violent and sexual offending so I'm not a prude or easily shocked.

It's what he is watching not all tv. Ed actually laugh about the opposite, that in tv programmes and movies women keep their bras on most the time! Also how keen on pj's people are when I've never personally encountered a man who wears them (apart from my brothers as little boys)

I do t watch fantasy type programming though

I guess that depends where you lived in the 80s. I’m from the Netherlands and 70s/80s there was definitely more sex in Dutch movies then there is now.

If men want to male films about men killing other men they can crack on with it. In action films, there is usually a narrative that supports it. It's rarely an innocent being exploited for the kicks of someone else. And, when it is, I don't feel.comfortabpe woth that either. But at least no one is getting sexually aroused by it.

It's the sexual element of rape and violence against women that I don't like. The extreme and explicit nudity that, as someone else said, the women acting in them can't possibly be comfortable with (and many have come out to say they're not and they werent at the time).

I do wish for there to be more control on what is shown on the screens, actually.
We are primates, we learn a lot by our mirror neurons in the frontal cortex - that is from whst we see.
Of course we know it is ‘only telly’ but seeing a lot of this crap does normalise it to some extent. There’s no need for it.

Totally agree, so refreshing to hear other people having a problem with this. Why are the majority of TV shows and films catered towards men when women make up 50% of the population. Why aren’t they bothered about not appealing to such a large audience. I guess because they get away with it, women still watch this stuff, I doubt men would if it was the other way round. And in shared households they still get the same viewing figures. How to get our views heard and our preferences catered for.

And as another poster pointed out; many if these writers are guys with a rather poor concept of what constitutes consent anyway. It really shows in the way they write their dialouges and scenes (which I fast forward through…)

i don't think it’s right to say people enjoy watching brutal sex scenes (although some may do) but rather they enjoy watching programmes that are grittily realistic in their context. I enjoyed GoT and would have been surprised if every relationship had been gentle and romantic.

Why are the majority of TV shows and films catered towards men when women make up 50% of the population.

Because men see male stories as normative and female stories as marginal. They also don't want to risk their money on the unknown. They go by what has sold in the past and sure certs for making profits, hence all the comic hero films and other franchises. There aren't enough female writers and producers making good TV.

Women are seen as equal in society /workplace ,but not on entertainment it seems .We wonder why so many females suffer at the hands of men

Are we seen as equal though? I mean, there lip service paid to it but we can't be equal if, as you say, so many females suffer at the hands of men.

I hate gore, violence and explicit sex - it either turns my stomach or I feel really bad for the actresses in the scenes. I would feel so uncomfortable having to do it and my sympathy for them spoils the enjoyment- also there are now a lot more explicit gay sex scenes and I feel bad for the male actors in those. It’s so awkward I don’t get why directors feel the need to add all the nudity in.

There is so much you can do with suggestion and good storyboarding there’s no need to be explicit. In the Psycho shower scene, there was only one shot of the woman and the knife together, the rest was just POV and reaction shots of her face.

I didn’t watch GOT for that reason.

But I do think YABU about TV in general. There’s some amazing drama out there and the real life crime dramatisations you get mainly on ITV are brilliant and sensitively done. Not everything is sensationalised and sexualised violence.

Because men see male stories as normative and female stories as marginal.

Again, not equal.

My SIL was raped around a decade ago, by an ex boyfriend. For the next few months, we had a number of conversations about it. She needed to, but found it hard to talk about it with her parents, or her sister (my DP).

I'm male, so I'm not going to even try to pretend that I have any understanding of what being raped is like, but one of the things that came up in our conversations and helped me grasp it a little is Buffy the Vampire Slayer. A daft show about a cheerleader with superpowers who kills vampires. And then in one episode an ex boyfriend tries to sexually assault her.

It's hugely uncomfortable to watch. Compared to a lot of TV today, it's very tame. There's no nudity, the female character actually manages to fight the male one off before anything sexual actually happens. But I think that lack of gratuitousness actually makes it worse. This isn't meant to be titillating, or exciting. It designed to make you feel horrified. To feel Buffy's terror at the inevitability of what's about to happen, the betrayal that someone she (and the audience) loved and trusted can do this.

Films, TV, books, stories in general are meant to make you feel something. Often it's meant to be something positive, but that doesn't mean that stories that make you feel fear, dread, revulsion aren't also important. There's another episode of Buffy, around the death of her mother. Nothing supernatural, just a normal average death due to a post-surgical complication. It's one of the most accurate depictions of the immediate aftermath of death ever written. It's widely considered one of the best episodes of TV ever made, but it's nobodies favourite episode. No-one enjoys watching it, because it wasn't designed to make you feel enjoyment, it was designed to evoke something different. But that doesn't make it any less valid as a story.

I'm not saying that many of the depictions of sexual violence on TV aren't gratuitous, and that they haven't just been included because shows feel they have to do it, without any thought to whether the plotline is really needed. But I do think that there are stories to tell around subjects like this, violence, torture, rape etc. And that when done properly, they can be important.

Probably not but it's hard to find anything where there isn't an exploited teenage girl, a woman who is raped, a woman who is at risk of being raped, the threat of rape...

Even if it doesn't happen and isn't seen.

So what do you want him to do? Never watch TV shows that have sex and nudity in it?

Women are clearly not equal in society, you just have to look at violence against women and girls which partly because of exposure to violence and porn, is getting worse. Women are not equal in the workplace, are not treated with as much respect as men and are increasingly sexualised from a very young age.

The older I get the more uncomfortable I get watching sex scenes bendy I can't suspend my disbelief and keep thinking of the actors having to pretend to do those things.

May I recommend Leverage on Amazon Prime. Con men and women bringing justice on people the law can't touch, like crooked bankers. It's fun fiction that doesn't ever use women for entertainment.

I think it’s generally accepted that while girls will watch “boy’s things” (Marvel superhero movies, GOT, James Bond) very few boys (or heterosexual ones at any rate) will watch “girl’s things” (period costume dramas, romantic comedies, low key family dramas) so obviously it makes financial sense to go for the biggest possible audience.

I'm familiar with Buffy, so yes, I know what you mean.

But it feels like that wasn't enough for men. The men who are making the programmes nor the men who consume them. They're not interested in feeling the female character's pain or discomfort as an emotional experience to understand their viewpoint. What they want is a sexual experience, setting to recall to mind later, something that they can talk about with their mates. Something that feels erotic and arousing ro them. The woman's experience is less important to them than their experience of it. And it just wasn't enjoyable enough without the extreme explicit nudity or seeing just exactly what that man did to her.

That's what it feels like.

Ideally, yes. But I'd never ask that of anyone beecause it would be unreasonable.

I'm considering ending the relationship over it though.

Most people probably don't even think about or consider the underlying misogyny in what they're watching. It creeps in and infiltrates the subconscious and then just seems "normal".

I think we need a modern-day Mary Whitehouse type of figurehead to speak out about these issues and bring them into public consciousness.

My point exactly.

In fairness, if you had to ask most people to give you three examples of shows with shocking sex scenes, Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon and The Boys would probably be the top three named.

Game of Thrones can be shocking but it is probably historically correct. Incest and the use of prostitutes was rife in the past, particularly within the ruling classes. House of the Dragon had the Mother-son sex scene, which is literally vom inducing, so I do think they're trying to shock. Historical misogyny is hardly shocking.

The Boys sex scenes often feel like something from a comic - which is exactly what the show came from. It is ridiculous and amusing in equal measure (the scene where the man 'went small' and ran into the penis then accidentally sneezed and 'went big' again will literally stay in my head forever). What I would say about The Boys though, is that crazy sex scenes often include only men. I've never felt that show to be misogynistic.

I find sex scenes in shows generally pointless. I often run for a wee or put the kettle on. I do hate that they always focus on women's bodies, though. Bravo to Bridgerton for the looooooong sex scene between Pen & Colin - so well done and respectful of her curvy figure, I thought.

All in all, sex scenes are a general turn off.

I do stick around for sex scenes in The Boys, though. Who knows what batshittery will ensue?! 😂

I'm female and don't watch period dramas or romantic comedy. I want film and TV with strong female characters and a good storyline for example Happy Valley., Fleabag, I May Destroy You and Kill Bill. There is definitely an audience out there but people need to be prepared to take the risk.