Do the media aid in telling teens sex is OK?

I think your elaboration really answers the initial question.

Clearly, you think it does.

The problem is parents not elaborating on the subject or failing to provide a fine line between reality and superficial glamour. You raise your kids, not TV. Down with fucking censorship.

Sex is OK.

The media is not their parents.

Why isn’t sex OK? I am not sure I understand. I have always enjoyed it.

what might help is contrasting the difference between kids in the US and kids in the EU, in Europe, sexuality is more pronounced and less “hush-hush” like it is in america. I think that’s why we have a lot of our problems concerning this subject.

I think that the media makes more of an effort to say sex of anykind – premarital or not – is ok than it does to say its not.

You never see anything on tv pushing abstinence.

The FCC is very serious about maintaining respectable standards of broadcasting.

Unfortunately, I’ve only seen them take action against Howard Stern and Janet Jackson’s breast.

@SABOTEUR and to think Lucy and Ricky had to sleep on seperate beds.

@Sonnerr Indeed.

“Sex is pumped up as the main thing to strive for second only to breathing.”

Well, it is, though, isn’t it?

“when it is made to seem like the ultimate rollercoaster ride you just can’t say no to?”

Well, it is, though, isn’t it?

I think the fact that sex sells indicates many people feel it is ‘OK’. The media only gives us what we already want. Granted it’s cyclical, but come on.

I also think you misused the phrase tongue in cheek, by the way. Those preachers of abstinence probably don’t walk away from middle schools laughing at their own hypocrisies.

P.S. @Symbeline: I would also argue television (plus Internet, etc.) contributes to the rearing of a child as much as a parent does in today’s society, for better or worse.

The media doesn’t make kids want to have sex, hormones do.

Sex is O.K.

@Hypocrisy_Central – You are right on!

The bottom line… Sex sells.
It is sad our society is becoming so desensitized to it.
And, what it it doing to our youth.

I’m quite fond of sex as well, but I think having sex Everywhere is taking away some of the magic and mystery of it.

“if you’re watching a TV show and you decide to take your values from that… you’re an idiot. Maybe you should take responsibility for what values you’re kids are getting. Maybe you shouldn’t be letting your kids watch certain shows in the first place if you have such a big problem with them, instead of blaming the shows themselves. [long pause] Yeah.” -Peter Griffin

@Violet Word.

@Violet – I see your point. I will give you a GA.

But, Television is designed around influencing people.

thank you @Symbeline
@ChazMaz – tv is for entertainment, not influencing. It tv influenced everyone who watched it, we’d all be killing people. If children are watching tv parents think is “influencing” them, that is the parents fault. Like Peter said, “Maybe you shouldn’t be letting your kids watch certain shows in the first place if you have such a big problem with them, instead of blaming the shows themselves”.

@Ivan @pdworkin @danbambam @lillycoyote @the100thmonkey Yes sex is fun, but how young of a minor should be able to just indulge because they want the rollercoaster ride?

Media has an influence in intimating to teens that everyone else your age is having sex. That’s a problem.

As a country we send mix messages. Tiger Woods gets nailed in the media for cheating on his wife, but television shows create the impression that all teenagers are sexually active.

@Hypocrisy_Central What gives me the right to determine that for another human being who has control over his or her own body? Are we Puritans suddenly?

@pdworkin No one has control over their own body. Control has its limits. If I die I can donate anything that is usable, eyes, spleen, heart, etc. If I should find someone who needed a lung, or a kidney I could not sell them one of mine if I needed money. Minors do not get that much control little as it is until they are no longer minors. The media makes sex seem like the greatest thing since sliced bread and not to be missed so if you had a son or daughter in there teens no matter what age they wanted to get “busy” it would be OK with you?

I have raised a boy and a girl to majority, and I have another boy and girl who are 12 year old twins. I have always taught them to question authority, and that as individuals only they can decide what is best for themselves. I am fully gratified by their exemplary behavior.

@Hypocrisy_Central – your second question is different, and, frankly, naive.

If my teenaged children wanted to have sex with someone, it is unlikely I could stop them.

Teach your kids to determine what they think is right from what they think is wrong. Teach your kids responsibility. The rest is up to them.

@the100thmonkey And that exposes a vital flaw in society when the buttler holds the keys to the Bently. There are ways to better control that sort of behaviour we don’t have guys just dragging women back to their home or condo caveman style to do with them as they wish because there are consequences to that type of action. Teens can be controlled in the boinking area, society just don’t have the cajones to tackle it.

“tv is for entertainment, not influencing.”

I have been doing it and marketing on it for 25 years now. Television and movies make so much money off your susceptibility to manipulation. That is why they make so much money. So glad you get entertained in the process.
It is apparent as Billy Mays pushing a product even after death. To an actor wearing a dress and drinking a coke. It is all engineered around, need I say, “mind control.” Yes very Sy-Fy. :-)

In the beginning, it sold itself. Entertainment was good enough.
People would line up around the building to watch a train go down the tracks. It was figured out real quick that it was VERY easy to sell food and drink at these places.
Food and drink was not enough. Though we still do it today.
Theses days, as much time and manpower goes into the making of the movie or TV program. If the program does not make the sponsors happy it will not air.
How they are dressed, the message they want to put out and the demographic they want to connect with are all part of what you are watching.
You are right. The parents should know better. But they were turned into zombies along time ago.
I say keep the kids away from the stupid box and the internet for that matter.

I will say it again. Sex sells and money knows no age boundary.
With sex and kids, it has been a slow and subliminal evolution, engineered by society alone. We all saw it coming, no one did anything about it.
The media took advantage of it as they do with anything they get their hands on. It is just too powerful a tool.

People are so lazy and gullible.
Including myself :-)

Keep on kidding yourself. I make a good living off of that. :-)

@Hypocrisy_Central:

Basically, you don’t trust teenagers.

Question: why is teenagers having sex so bad?

So if TV has made us all zombies why is it we can question it’s influence. As if we are all a bunch of mindless drones drooling infront of the TV. Please.

Exactly!

“all a bunch of mindless drones”
I would rather say junkies.

I so want to say there are exceptions. And, I know there are.
But, honestly, they are insignificant to the big picture and if you dig deep enough.
You will find them suckling on the breast of some over gorged vice.

We all have our price.

I do not agree. But I expect that with you.

And, I think that it cool!
Where would we be without diversity of opinion and thought?

Can I have a hug? :-)

Yes. There are also schools with staff who actually ENCOURAGE teenagers to have sex as long as they are using contraception. Believe it or not, there are also parents who encourage it as well. It’s not just the media!

I don’t hug, but here’s a high-five.

@the100thmonkey You think society trust teens? They get trusted as certain levels but it has to be earned or metered out. They have to wait a certain age to get their 1st job, even then with restrictions. They have to be a certain age to drive, again with restrictions. There are controls on teens and when society has the stomach to enforce it; it works more than it don’t. Teens cannot be trusted in the decisions of sex that is why there are consent laws. Why is that? Because teens are suppose to be too green, too naive to understand love from lust, and fully be equip to deal with the emotions surrounding it. The message put out is parallel to telling kids to stay off drugs but the trip is to die for, and if you have not been on that trip you do not know the full meaning of life; but you don’t do it <wink wink>

I agree with violet and 100thmonkey. While the media can influence young people, if you’re a good parent who maintains open communication with your teens, then they will look to you for guidance, and not the characters they see on TV.

Also, while I agree that there is a minimum age limit at which a teen is too young for sex, older teens have been having sex for centuries. As recently as 50 years ago, people routinely married at age 16 (and sometimes even younger). Even thirty years ago, it was not uncommon for young people to marry during the last two years of high school or shortly after graduation. Is it any surprise, then, that high schoolers today want to have sex? At their ages, their parents were already married. If Boomer parents could successfully provide for and maintain their young families, then teens today can have sex responsibly, as long as they are educated properly. But instead of preparing them for the adult world, society (with the help of parents) keeps prolonging adolescence.

@ChazMaz – that was very rude. I don’t drink coke, and I don’t drink beer, so how are you mind controlling influencing tv show/commercials working on people like me? You are assuming all people who watch tv are stupid and naive, and that just isn’t true.
You sound like an evil CEO, who smokes cigars, and steps on the “little people”.

“You sound like an evil CEO, who smokes cigars, and steps on the “little people”.”

Welcome to the real world.
It is that attitude the sells plenty of what you like.
Keep up the good work. :-)

And, it was not intended to be rude. I apologize if you got that out of it. But, an observation from years of being part of the machine. It is what it is.

@ChazMaz – why are you so negative and rude? Welcome to the real world? No, sorry, that’s just YOUR world.
And you didn’t respond to my other questions/comments.
Plenty of what I like? What I buy, isn’t seen on tv, commercials, or in movies.

@lonelydragon If all teens were that in tuned to their parent’s teaching or the parents were that good we would not have roaming gangs out terrorizing the public and selling drugs on our street corners. And many of Manson’s “Family” came from so-called “good homes”. But it is not really about what the parents can or can’t do, it is the hypocritical message that works against the parents at best. Sex is wonderful, but it is mostly for fun without responsibility and don’t even need to be backed by love. You are defined by how much you get (or not), if you are getting a lot it is because you are cool or attractive, and if you are not, it is because you are a dweeb, dork, geek, or some other uncool cretin, plus you mist be mud duck ugly because someone would rather lick a toilet than get naked with you.

I agree, as I have told many, it is thought and emotion of society on the front end that tries to make young adults stay kids longer. They forget that no too long ago girls were married and starting families by age 21, and to be 33 and not married or with children you had to be an old maid. The average age of consent around the globe is near 15.5 years (guess they have smarter kids). The way the US handles sex is like a man before a mirror who once he turns away, forgets what he looks like. Teens are going to want to have sex because it is natural. Either you give them consent to do so or make them wait. Saying “wait you are too young” but “If you ain’t getting any are a loser” kinda runs smack dead against hypocrisy.

Not being negative or rude.

:-) <———See, smile.

Everything that you watch on TV or in the theaters, unless there is profit to be made, it will not get a green light.
That profit is not generated just by the value of the program. It is a good start. Anything and everything that can be attached to it to increase profit will be.
THAT is a very long list of possibilities. Highest on the list is the gullibility of the viewer. We are all influenced by one thing or another.
It is just getting the recipe right.
You seem to prefer the sugar coated approach.

I am saying it this way, removing all the fluff. Would you rather me blow wind up your skirt?
:-) <———- Another smile.

I mean believe what you want. I am just answering the question.
I also admit that I am one too.
That is just the way it is. It is not being negative. It just is.

To answer your questions:

“so how are you mind controlling influencing tv show/commercials working on people like me?”
I do not know. That is a question you have to ask yourself. I guess you do not watch TV.
You do not know what you will buy or where to go till you get there?

Billions of dollars go into just advertising to get you from point A to point B.
Let me tell you. It works very well. And every trick in the book is used.

“You are assuming all people who watch tv are stupid and naive, and that just isn’t true.”
I was using some creative writing to make a point. Like I said, I am one of those too.

“Plenty of what I like? What I buy, isn’t seen on tv, commercials, or in movies.”
Sometime it is not what you see but what you do not think you see..
Example: It is amazing the power of billboards. Especially the amount of time we actually look at them.
It is all around you, TV, print, your friends shirt, a simple jingle someone sings.
You can’t escape it.

:-) <———One more.

@ChazMaz – just because the ads are all around doesn’t mean I buy all that crap. I go out of my way NOT to buy highly commercialized items/products.
“You seem to prefer the sugar coated approach. I am saying it this way, removing all the fluff. Would you rather me blow wind up your skirt?”
Sugar coated? Removing all the fluff? Skirt? lol, sigh… I know what you are saying, or trying to say, it just isn’t isn’t as accurate as you might think. Some of us, are not as commercialized as you wish we were.

Ok. :-)

@Hypocrisy_Central You made my point for me, effectively. The parents of children in gangs probably don’t have much quality time to talk with their kids because they are too busy working multiple jobs to support the family. Furthermore, even good parents are squeamish about discussing sex with their children. This happens for several reasons. First, they may be embarrassed. Second, they fear that if they discuss sex with their kids, then that will pique their curiosity and they’ll want to have it. But parents who practice open communication with their children are in a better position, because the kids are more likely to talk with them about sex instead of relying on peers or the TV to inform them. Is this a fool proof approach? No. But it is better than doing nothing.

Of course, I do agree with you that peer pressure is a powerful tool, and that children need other protective factors besides good parenting, such as a strong support network of like-minded friends and alternative media sources that depict sex and relationships in a healthy, realistic way. These good sources may not be as plentiful, but they can be found.

I am glad that you, too, see the impact of prolonging adolescence. There needs to be a happy medium between the abstinence-only approach and the societal pressure to sleep with as many people as possible.

I am watching you mister.

The media tends to want to glorify self and premiscuous behaviours becase it sells. People want to see sex, mainly becase most movies/tv shows have to fill in the gaps of scenes to excite the viewers. However when tv shows and movies are showing sex every five minutes it kind of makes you wonder what message people and teens are getting out of it. The media needs to find alternatives for entertainment. Most when tv shows/ movies show most sex it’s because the writers are not creative enough to come up with a good story line.

@lonelydragon I am glad that you, too, see the impact of prolonging adolescence. I think it is more of an American thing, a folie a deux. I think possibly because as American we are so busy working we miss a lot of high points in children’s lives and it appears they grow up too fast, so society tried to keep their kids “kids” as long as possible ignoring biology. ;-)