"New era of permissiveness" - valid or delusional?

Great Debates
1

I just have a question for those who believe the recent trend of porn culture becoming mainstream over the last few years is a wonderful thing.

Every time things change & there is a cultural shakeup, there is a value judgement made by society. After the civil rights movement, as a society we came to the conclusion that it was a revolution that deserved to be embraced–it forced us all to look within ourselves and make a choice between self-denial or acceptance of moral truth. In other words, the movement had undeniable value.

The Vietnam war–ultimately we resolved ourselves to the fact that it was a mistake. Our efforts were misguided, therefore there was not enough value in it for us to consider it “a proud moment” in our history.

The hippie movement–it started out with good intentions but had serious flaws, which ultimately obscured the positives. There was value but the inherent problems (drug abuse, stupid extremisism, excess) pretty much nullified the initial idealism. So that one more or less ended up a toss-up.

My point is, history makes the judgement ultimately.

Let’s take the current permissive porn culture movement. Young people are just lettin it all hang out. Kids of any age can go online & see any kind of visual representations of human fetishes that exist. Some people think this is great and healthy. There’s a growing mentality that there should be no barriers, no taboos, everything should be available to anyone, no matter how bizarre, neurotic, deviant, or disturbing it might be to the “repressed”. Kids are being exposed to representations of rape, murder and incest by artists who are being embraced by the mainstream entertainment industry. Young girls are being encouraged to alter their bodies (breast implants, plastic surgery) so they will be “accepted” by a societal sub-culture that is driven by, and obsessed with, empty superficiality.

Say we just “let go” as a society and become a nation of unrepressed sexual animals who are free to give in to our deepest impulses and urges, with no restrictions or moral codes or self-consciouness. We create for ourselves a culture of self-gratification, where the most important thing is making ourselves feel satisfied, free, happy, unencumbered. According to many, this is the direction the human race should go.

In the end, isn’t this philosophy basically an ego-driven wallow in self-centered miasma? What is the value of it? How will society benefit down the road? How will mankind be improved by this evolutionary (or maybe de-evolutionary) process?

Isn’t this just an obsessive, neurotic withdrawl from humanity? Or am I hopelessly repressed?

2

Well…I dunno. Maybe, in as much as you’re focusing all your thinking about the ego-driven wallow in self-centered miasma that we are living in in the part that is about sex. Why just think about sex? There are just as many “moral” self indulgences that are supported by our society.

3

No, don’t get me wrong, this isn’t just about sex, it’s about ego. It’s about an entire generation being trained to be egocentric braggarts, ala Eminem, Puffy, et al ad infinitum. It’s about young people being encouraged to “go with the flow”, give in to the corporate mentality, it’s about ego and shoes and ego and sex and ego and McDonalds and ego and Mastercard. It’s all a bunch of BS culture. Meaningless, value-less, consumer-driven. Light as ether. Yet we have to justify it to ourselves, don’t we? So we give it false meaning by deluding ourselves into thinking it’s cultural progress.

4

(sorry I wasn’t able to edit my post)

The sexuality is obviously a huge part of that. It’s become a part of the consumer culture. If you wanna sell pop-tarts, you gotta put some tits and ass out there. And if the little kids see it, oh well. It’s the parent’s fault for not putting them in a cage and isolating them from the culture.

IF the intentions behind this movement of free expression were based on some kind of obvious altruism, then I would have to say OK, we need to let this play out. But since it’s based on self-centered, consumerism-driven, corporate-endorsed amoral shit-shoveling, I feel the need to say, hey this is complete bullshit, and all the dumbasses who promote this crap are just neurotic idiots who are in self-denial about whatever love they didn’t get as children and unfortunately feel the need to lay all their dysfunctional crap on me and call it “a dose of reality”.

Whatever.

5

Every generation thinks that the next is going to hell in a handbasket. Every generation has those who weep and moan for the “good old days” and the decent moral standards of the past, getting sentimental for the way things “used to be.”

Personally, I think that we’re no better or worse than we were before. We’re just different, and change scares people.

6

I think you’re referring to the id, not the ego. And I don’t see anything inherently wrong with the id. If someone is being hurt, then I agree there’s a problem. But what’s wrong with the id, in and of itself?