The Big Television Sex Lie

I spend a lot of time watching TV. I spend more time than I have to spare watching TV. Why? Well it keeps me out of the gym and from writing my novel and all kinds of other unsavoury habits. Also, I like it. I like the pure escapism of calling bullshit on some really bad writing or getting engrossed in some that's excellent. 

Recently I was on a bit of a marathon watching Scandal and Homeland. Both shows have strong, yet flawed female characters as protagonists and anti-heroes. Both shows have a feminist edge, which I both respect and relate to. However, the one thing that shows like this get wrong, for all the progress that's been made for women on television, is the sex. 

There is a fair amount of sex in Homeland and more than a fair amount in Scandal. I LOVE that these intense characters enjoy their sexuality, but I do wonder how much they would enjoy braking free of the missionary marathon. I give Kerry Washington and Clare Danes HUGE props for not embodying to the whimpering, submissive trope we're all so familiar seeing, whom I can't identify with at all. However, I'd still really, really like to see a woman on television have some sex that doesn't end in a joint climax with each character breathing into the other's mouth. This is not to say that this is unrealistic for all women, but only 1/3 of women come from penetrative sex and I am not one of them. 

That's not to say it's sour grapes from me, but I feel that we still have a long way to go when it comes to exploring the complexities of sexuality on television. The most realistic depictions I have seen of sex have been in shows featuring same-sex relationships. Remember Queer as Folk? Damn, that was some fucking hot sex. Transparent? The women in that show who are having sex with other women are truly winning. The heteros? Not so much. So why is it OK to present gay or bisexual sex as nuanced and varied, but not for us breeders? 

You might be thinking to yourself, why the fuck does this even matter? Well it matters because it sets up an unrealistic standard for 2/3 of the world's women. I remember being with my first boyfriend and howling and panting like an idiot because that's what I thought I was supposed to do. Most of the time, when he came the show was over. Closed for business. I was growing equally frustrated in our relationship, often heading to the toilet to finish the job myself. This was not his fault, but for a very long time I thought there was something wrong with me. 

We are very quick to blame pornography for setting up women to be failures to their lovers, but I blame my failures completely on Beverly Hills 90210. I actually find a lot of pornography more palatable than mainstream portrayals of sex. At least you're more likely to see a tongue or a finger near some female genitals. 

I’m sure you can think of instances where I am completely wrong, but the two shows I am referencing, one on ABC and one on Showtime, both very different in premise and characters are not doing us ladies justice when it comes to showing us the kind of sex we’d like to be having and that creates a huge disconnect for me. Everything else about these shows, which are showing women as diverse and complicated characters is fantastic, but I want to see some face sitting on their part.

Just to conclude, here is a man fingering some fruit. Because yes. Take note, President Fitzgerald Grant.

Gunning for Change

I want to talk about guns. I want to talk about them because I want to understand the people who own them. I want to better understand the people who, despite tragedy after tragedy being caused by a gun, are adamant that the problem is not the guns.

It is the guns. I know this because I have lived in a country where there is easy access to firearms and one where there is not. Less people die here.  Less people die here because there are less people here, but also because there are less guns.

I’ve been asked, “but how will you defend yourself if someone breaks into your house?” Well I’ll tell you. I’ll fight the fucker and one of us will win, and maybe it will be him and he’ll take all my shit, but no one will die because neither of us will have a gun.

Riddle me this – is it really worth murdering someone for the shit you have in your house? Is it worth taking the life of someone who is taking your TV? I say “no.” Let the fucker have it and call your fucking insurance company and replace the goddamned TV. The overwhelming probability is that the person breaking into your house does not want to kill your family. So what you’re actually defending with your gun is your shit and I say no amount of shit is worth a life. Any life.

America runs on fear. It’s fear that makes people think they need a gun and it’s fear that causes people to use it. Kill or be killed, right? But who is trying to kill you? Who is this invisible, omnipresent threat to your safety and security?

I left the USA in 2003. I had moved to NYC the year before, shortly after 9/11, and seeing policemen wielding weapons half the size of their bodies at each of the subway stations freaked me the fuck out. At least it did at first. After a few months I became desensitized to it and it became normal. It also became commonplace for them to dig around in my bag before finally letting me run down the stairs to catch my train. National security and all that.

Nothing happened to make me leave. No incident that forced me to flee the country. I just decided that being that close to so many people on such high alert all armed to the teeth was not the best place for me to be. The energy in NYC is contagious and sometimes that’s not a good thing.

I love America and I love Americans. That is, until something like the most recent shooting happens in Oregon and I realize that many Americans genuinely feel like it's OK to shoot someone over a TV and that it’s actually their right to do so. People who I know are kind and decent and moral are more concerned with someone taking their guns away than they are preventing another tragedy like America’s 45^th mass shooting this year. Phrases like MY guns and MY rights littered the Internet in the aftermath of this most recent tragedy. But what about what’s best for the country as a whole? What about OUR gun problem and OUR safety and the safety of OUR children?

This chart, published by the Guardian newspaper, illustrates the 994 shootings in America in the last 1,004 days. It made my jaw and heart drop and sent a shiver down my spine.  All of these people are victims of America’s selfishness and America’s reluctance to acknowledge that they have a very real problem and a problem unique to America.

In the chart below (2007), you can see the number of guns owned per 100 people per country and you can see that America is not the only country that allows guns to be in the hands of many of its citizens.

However look at this chart (224-2010). Despite other countries owning nearly as many guns, America’s guns seem to cause the most deaths. This is terrifying to the rest of the world. Why, instead of joining us in reprehension, does America instead meet this data with attitude and arrogance? Why, when more innocent people have again lost their lives to such senseless violence does America hold not their children closer, but their guns instead?

I was moved by President Obama's speech after the Oregon murders; when he said that our reaction to this tragedy would be routine, he was correct. When he said that we've become numb, he was also completely accurate. However, I can't help but feel that's just not good enough. To acknowledge that the nation's reaction won't be proportionate to the tragedy itself is a cop-out. We deserve better, but we have to demand better. 

America has been bullied by the NRA for far too long. Regulate the fucking guns. Take the fucking guns away. Remember when states decided to tell us we couldn't smoke inside any more? Recall how outraged we thought people would be and how no one would comply? Well lo and behold, people did as they were told and as a result, fewer people are smoking cigarettes! Ta Dah! Why can't we do the same with guns? Restrict what kind of guns you can buy and who can buy them and see what happens? I bet the fucking earth won't implode and I bet a whole shitload less Americans will die. 

I'm no fucking scientist and this is just my humble opinion, but I'd like a more intelligent response about why guns are so ingrained in American culture than, "because Second Amendment." The belligerence is infuriating.  What is your gun is actually contributing to your life? If it's nothing, then why are you holding onto it? Why is your gun so important to you? I genuinely want to know. Because in the wake of this latest tragedy, I've had enough and I can't help but wonder how the right to own a gun is valued higher than the right to life.