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?

I'm in the same position, my partner likes to watch similar shows to your partner and I don't for the exact reasons you have described.

It has left me feeling quite insecure at times with my body and I have discussed it with him. He doesn't see my view point and doesn't understand (or won't admit) that the nudity is often gratuitous. It often puts me off being intimate with him or sharing my body as I think he will see me as just another pair of (less perky) tits.

He does however compromise and doesn't watch those TV shows or movies with me. I often find things that are suitable for me to watch and suggest those for when we are together.

It's not enough for me to break up with him but certainly has caused some heated debates over the years.

It’s not that they need breasts, it’s that they haven’t thought through the sex imbalance and the sexual exploitation of the female performers. Sometimes you need to argue at length to have something so normalised understood.

The debate comes from his lack of understanding of my point I think and as PPs have said thinking that I'm having a go at him for finding women attractive rather than the over sexualisation of women as a whole.

He says that he's not watching the TV show for the nudity, he enjoys the story. He doesn't feel that TV or film should be completely censored because then it isn't true to life and there is nothing wrong with naked bodies.

My point is that it's always women's bodies that are being used to further the plot, or being exploited, if it's truly about being 'authentic' then we would have naked men too? He agrees with that but if I ask the question 'why is this necessary' he just now won't answer because we essentially disagree.

This exactly - far more articulate than I was able to manage!

@Everintroverte He doesn't feel that TV or film should be completely censored because then it isn't true to life

Who on earth watches TV or movies for realism?

If he wants realism, he should watch Prime Minister's questions. Or just go outside.

I loved Games of Thrones. I also enjoyed Prison Break for the first couple of series (got repetitive after that). I like edgy drama and find a certain degree of violence exciting, if it fits with the character and plot development. Sex for the sake of sex or violence that is gratuitous can annoy me If I feel it's just there to titillate and unrelated to the plot line though.

To me it's just entertainment and doesn't relate in any way to my real life moral sense. Shakespeare is full of murder and suicide as well as absurd romances but is revered by many.

I can't relate to OPs concern about her partner unless it was just that they don't have common interests. DH and I watch a lot of shows together but we also watch things separately. I don't judge his choices.

I completely agree. There's nothing real about half of the crap on TV, even the sex and rapes in GOT being true to the 'time period it was set in', you know, the time when dragons were flying about!! 🙄

This is why we get heated, he won't admit he's wrong and I'm clearly right! 😉

That's definitely not the case in a lot of shows. Many cop shows have a strong female lead, for example. There were strong female characters in Game of Thrones, and good / bad male and female characters.

Op, why are you assuming that he is sexually aroused by watching these scenes? Or assuming that he’s recalling the scenes whilst having sex. Is that you projecting your fears?

You can split up with him for any reason you like but maybe you need to have a conversation with him first.

I haven't watched GoT or some of the other shows mentioned because it really isn't the type of show I enjoy. I would agree though that it seems to have become the norm to chuck in some sex scenes into a show that really doesn't need them. It often seems to me like lazy writing and a desperate attempt to be edgy, get people talking and raise viewing figures and I guess it's probably worked. I'm not sure GoT would have been so popular if it hadn't contained so many sex scenes and other violent scenes I've heard it contains, they're the talking points. I watched a bog standard police drama the other night where for no apparent reason there was a really long scene between two female characters where the "edgy" character spent an age and a day swearing about her sexual activity and both characters swooned over this and panted a lot. It was ridiculous, didn't further the storyline, was really quite off putting and boring but I'm guessing was supposed to serve some sort of purpose of being exciting because it was two women and there was swearing and the promise of two women having sex (spoiler, they didn't in the end). Just nonsense. I found myself thinking that it couldn't even be argued that it promoted same sex relationships because that wasn't the angle it was going for and actually it was all a bit sordid. So in answer to your post, I think its difficult to avoid and I wouldn't say there's anything particularly wrong with watching those shows, I guess it's how someone reacts to them and whether they can see the issues with how women are portrayed, how consent is portrayed etc. If someone really didnt get it or was only watching the show for that specific reason then I'd have an issue with it. I remember reading something recently saying that a lot of teen boys had difficulty in distinguishing violent sexual behaviour from normal sexual behaviour because of the increased access to porn online. I'm not sure porn can be blamed entirely given that virtually everyone on this post can give examples of terrible portrayals of these things within ordinary TV programming. How someone reacts to these scenes on TV is far more important I think than whether they're watching a show that happens to have those types of scenes in it. I'm pretty sure not everyone watching GoT watched it for the sex scenes, although I could be wrong!

I don't think it makes me feel insecure about my body. I don't feel particularly secure but I don't think it's going to make him less attracted to me but I completely get what you mean about being just another pair of (less perky) tits! Why would he want/need to see me naked or have dull midweek sex with me when he's just spent an hour before bed watching far more naked women/explicit sex than he's ever going to see with me. So, yes, it does put me off having sex with him. There's nothing special about me if he's seen everything the cast of whatever he's watching has got to offer already. And so there's no need for me.

I do the same as you if he wants to watch something with me - I find something that's appropriate for me. But it's becoming more difficult.

If he puputs mething on that he thought would be ok, he turns or off as soon as its not. I don't have to ask him. We have talked about it and I think he gets it somewhat. He never makes me feel stupid for how I feel. He has said that even when he's watching stuff on his own now, he's thought about what I've said about the sexual violence and said he'd never thought about it before. And a lot of the stuff he watched was before we got together.

But like someone else said, I just think it's so ubiquitous that he doesn't even notice it really. There's so much in so many films now it makes it really hard. I've tried just ignoring it but it makes me really uncomfortable and I almost feel like I'm intruding like I shouldn't be there.

We've had a similar discussion. He didn't try arguing a point but he said the same about not really noticing. That's bollocks. If men didn't notice the abundance of naked women, there would be no point in having them. He (says he) can see the imbalance - lots of very visible naked women vs no naked men.

Yes, it's the sexualisation of women as a whole that is the issue.

Like there's little point in casting women unless they're going to be naked.

There aren't as many naked women outside.

Thank god its not just me!!!!

Your position is one I've tried to take. And that's when I come back to the sexualisation of women on the whole being an issue.

If there were an equal number of naked men and women, and equal number of gratuitous genital shots of men as there are of women etc then I still wouldn't like it but Iightbat least accept it was reflective of life.

We watched The Babadook the other week. Totally innocuous and then, boom, out of nowhere a woman masturbating in bed. Totally irrelevant to the storyline. It added absolutely nothing.

Why are they included of not to sexually titilate and arouse male viewers?

How someone reacts to these scenes on TV is far more important I think than whether they're watching a show that happens to have those types of scenes in it.

That's also what I try to tell myself. But then I don't know how he reacts because we don't watch them together.

The vibrator scene is there to demonstrate how lonely and frustrated the woman is and how every part of her life is governed by her son. She can’t even have a wank without him crawling into bed and ruining it!

It’s not a remotely titillating scene. You really are clutching at straws here.

I didn't say it was titillating.

I also know why it was included but that message what quite clear without adding a scene in of her masturbating.

She could have been reading a book. It would have conveyed the same message.

No one here better ever watch the TV series Californication, they would get over their sex aversion in a hurry.

I don’t really think reading a book would have explored the woman’s utter despair in not having a life of her own in quite the same way.

Can I ask a question? Do you think there’s such a thing as an artistically-justified sex/nudity scene? Or do you just think it’s all porny exploitation?

I can't remember the scene that clearly but could it be used to convey loneliness and lack of intimacy or human connection? She was alone in that house, had no real friends, she was widowed and having some me time as her sole source of comfort. There was no nudity as far as I recall.

If there is one, I haven't seen it.

So my experience so far is that it's all exploitative.

No, ther wasn't any nudity.

But I was in a very similar position to the character at one point in my life and I'll be quite honest and say that lying in bed and having a wank was the furthest thing from mind and that is probably why it stood out to me.

Have you seen the 1973 film “Don’t Look Now” with Donald Pleasance and Julie Christie?