Here is the deal: I'm probably about to offend every third female that reads this post. But, it's not my job to please you all. Keep in mind that I strongly advocate an incredibly free media and an open flow of information. However, certain magazines and television shows are getting ridiculous, and it's sending Americans down a subconscious and unforgiving spiral. Cable and pay television stations and magazine owners have every right to choose, produce, and censor their own respective content, but when this content becomes overwhelmingly uncompassionate toward S-E-X, someone has to question how further generations will respect love and relationships. Allow me to question. The following is a blueprint, of sorts, to a short paper I actually ended up writing for a class. The decision for Americans, then, is "Sex and the City" or Cinderella?
I am no Sarah Jessica Parker. I am no Rachel or Ross on “Friends.” All I had to do was overhear the conversing, evening-wear-clad females in the corner, and I had found the wannabe Sarah Jessica Parkers and Rachels. “I (insert edited – ask me for the actual dialogue, if desired – comment here) last night!” one of them exclaimed, continuing to sip her five-dollar strawberry Boone’s out of a “glass” goblet she probably got at Hardee’s. The others listened in admiration, while my jeans, t-shirt and I sank back into the couch, wondering when we were heading out. I knew what the night would bring – more girls like this – but I secretly wished to find one female that might like Monday Night Football instead.
What “Sex and the City” and other popular shows have done to the female population on this campus is unprecedented, and it is merely the tip of the iceberg. It is comparable to watching five-year-old girls act like princesses after watching Cinderella. In the girls’ defense, the fault lies not within them, but within various popular media – magazines like Cosmopolitan included.
These magazines and television shows contribute to a growing ignorance toward traditional notions of relationships and sex. The standards to which major media and Internet content abide are dissolving. This lack of concern for acts and beliefs longtime held sacred is molding Americans into unfeeling, unthinking drones, of sorts, acting upon self-important desires and motivations. This media type is filled with ways to never achieve true happiness in sex or in relationships, and topics rarely emphasize the long-term. That would be bad business practice, since people in long-term, happy, satisfying relationships know how to be “happy.” The target demographic would disappear. The unsatisfied person might flip through a magazine like Cosmopolitan, or even Maxim, always searching for the next “best” or most “thrilling” way to achieve some temporary satisfaction. It’s like a drug addict – always searching for that next high, one that is better than any of the previous. Once it wears off, it’s time for another hit.
Obviously, these are generalizations. You aren't a druggy if you read Cosmo, and I'm sure millions of well-rounded people, as well as those in relationships, still read the magazine. No harm done. It just seems that the focus rests in self-interest and self-pleasure, rather than an embracing of and/or furthering of the reflective love shared between a couple.
Thus, the sacredness of sexual intercourse fizzles. As citizens in this nation, all (at a certain legal age, of course) have the right to engage in sexual intercourse with whomever and (for the most part) however they please. If one so chooses to have sex before marriage, he/she is entitled to that natural right. Sex is one of the most sacred, special, and unbelievably unique acts in which a man and a woman can engage. For me, it is an act meant for procreation and for displaying a married couple’s undying love.
But this is too much to ask for many of American society’s modeled characters, institutions, and media (Internet included). These entities are not required to hold to any certain standard except their own, and they should not be. But the values expressed have become especially irresponsible and unfeeling. When flipping through magazines like Cosmopolitan and catching snippets of “Sex and the City” and even “Friends,” the central message is promiscuity, promiscuity, promiscuity. The unloving and fake manner in which sex is represented tears down healthy and passionate approaches to relationships.
The public controls media much more than it believes. Media relay images of what it assumes the public is thinking and doing, and television shows and magazines take control. Much good exists in media, but this good is overshadowed by the more visually appealing and stimulating sexual promiscuity. There is an inherent excitability that comes from the “other” and the “different,” and media know this and spoon-feed it. Unfortunately, there is little choice but to devour it.
There you have it. Maybe I'm generalizing too much, but I see what I see. Now, a change of subject.
Here is a list (chronological AND alphabetical) stemming from an age-old question:
DCharlesIU (12:42:44 AM): why does Purdue sucks so bad, Dan?
After pouring over historical documents, university records, student interviews, and not being retarded, Dave and I have exacted an answer. Enjoy.
- Astronauts are overrated. They sent monkeys first, then Purdue grads – a kind of natural progression.
- Ball sacks are everywhere.
- Crappy campus.
- Dan and Dave don't go there.
- Engineers are for trains.
- F*** Purdue.
- Gay mascot.
- Hoes – wait, they don't have those.
- Incredibly gay mascot?
- Janitors in their union are probably assholes.
- Kelley over Krannert, any day.
- Losing football record.
- Masturbation rampant, considering disproportionate wang-to-tang ratio.
- Not enough poon.
- 0 = NCAA Championships
- Purdue? Pur-haps you should have delivered my pizza on time.
- Queers – they're not accepting of them, but they secretly all are them.
- Repulsive turd smell (of both fesces and students alike).
- Sphincters, and the male students who enjoy them (and are them).
- Toupee = unfortunate unanswered prayer for Mr. Keady.
- Ugly girls – nuff said.
- Vaginas? Haha
- World's biggest drum – more like world biggest stupid piece of worthless shit (but Ben is still an awesome guy).
- X-ray vision tells me those girls don't shave enough.
- Y chromosomes.
- Zenophobia – wait, you don't know what that means, Purdue student, but I bet you can tell me how to grow beets – wait, I don't care.
So, given the information I've presented, here is a small photographic representation of my overall arguments:
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Well, that's all for now. I hope to have some pictures of certain events (Oregon Trail '05, etc.) up at some point, but I'll let you all stew over this post for now. Take it easy.