Oceania A rant about sex and violence in movies and tv

Do you ever dream Loopster?
Those amazing, horrible dreams in which something terrible happens, and then when you awake, you still feel affected by it? Say, someone in the dream has done something to you and then you see them in real life and it takes a while for you to be comfortable around them in person?


I remember having a nightmare that my pet dog attacked me. I woke up, I knew it was only a dream. Yet for about 4 or 5 days later, I could not go anywhere near my dog, because I kept getting feelings of wariness and fear.

It's the same type of thing.

You subconsious mind can completely override your conscious mind if it is strong stimuli.

 

Yes, of course.

No, never happened to me.

During a film, yes you can submit to the fantasy of the film. Suspension of disbelief. Is the subconcious mind taking over though or are you simply ignoring the blatant bad effects, shocking plotholes and the rest of your surroundings?

 

There are bad special effects and plotholes in my dreams now?
Well, that's just not cricket.
*starts a protest against her brain, for better effects, better plotlines and higher wages*


I am speaking in terms of all other stimuli here, not just film. Dreams are a perfect example though, thus why I mentioned my own experience.

?..the cinematographic technique is the only one that makes possible a succession of images rapid enough to roughly correspond to our faculty for producing mental images.?
Jean-Louis Baudry, 'The Apparatus: Metapsychological approaches to the impression of reality in the cinema'


Dreams are exactly this; a rapid succession of mental images. However, it is your subconscious mind that produces them during slumber, as your concious mind is at that point out of action.


Yes, there is a suspension of disbelief during the event itself (ie seeing the movie, reading the book, having the dream).

But, it is possible for this suspension to carry over. Not necessarily every time, to every one, but it is definitely feasible.

Why on earth did I feel so much fear being around my own pet, who I had loved and spent much time with for years before, simply because of a dream? It felt, to my mind, completely irrational; I knew there was nothing to fear, yet there I was feeling the fear anyway.

It is because the subconscious mind was stimulated by the dream, even though it was completely fictitious. It triggered one of the most inner, subconscious, primitive modes of thought: self preservation. I had been posed a threat within the fiction, so even though it wasn't real, I was on alert without realising it.

As such, if dreams have the ability to trigger these types of primitive reactions in a person, it is possible for cinema to do it to people also. It just depends on the person, and their own experiences; the fact that people can cry over a film reflects this. They're not crying over what is actually happening on screen; somehow it relates personally to them (not necessarily consciously) and triggers an emotional response. It's actually this universal nature, and the ability for the viewer to personally relate to it, within film that makes cinema function as an emotive medium at all.

Basically: If the movie holds the ability to suck you in, get you excited, happy, sad etc, it has already influenced your emotions and triggered your primitive buttons.

And it's those primitive buttons that can make sensible people do really stupid things..

 

Loopster, the problem is, your thinking in conscious terms.

You're trying to impose conscious thought on the unconscious mind. But it doesn't work like that.

Your unconscious mind does not know who Tom Cruise is.


It knows that your visual cortex has registered a pattern of neurons firing that are consistent with something that it recognises as a group of objects that together are consistent with a 'person' object. And that's the extremely simple version.


But this is getting way way off track.


The bottom line is: your unconscious mind sees people in any context and experiences them without distinguishing whether they are right in front of you, on a stage, on tv, on a cinema screen, or in a dream. And whether you convince yourself that it's "real" or not, what you have seen becomes part of your life experience, and no amount of conscious control can change the initial experience. You can re-evaluate your experience of it, but that becomes a separate experience in itself. It doesn't change the original experience.

 

so lets just hope that most people's conscious mind has enough control to override the feelings anr urges of teh unconscious as to NOT start a BS like those two australians

-Mel

 

Sorry, but I just don't believe that. Sounds like theory to me.

 

Oz, I had always been under the impression that the link between violence and media was, although positive, weak at best. Can you show us some journal articles supporting your statements so we can see the evidence?

E_S

 

Loopster: a theory supported by evidence, accepted by the scientific community, which you reject simply because you don't believe it. i can see no point discussing it any further, since you seem determined not to believe it.

E_S: Do you think i'm saying violence in films causes violence in society ..? Because that's not what i'm saying at all. my point is that experiencing violence in cinema etc is the same as experiencing violence in real life, that we are exposing ourselves to unnecessary and senseless violence.

 

Well I'd rather be exposed to Sin City than Meg Ryan or any other romantic comedy clone.

 

Oz: Sorry, I meant including the perception of real and simulated violence too. Are there any journal articles I can check on this?

E_S

 

I should be the one dismissing you, you totally ignore my questioning your ideas.

Well, I didn't want to say it but PPOR.

You haven't shown any scientific evidence at all.

Show me then I'll listen, until then I don't believe it.

 

Crayons taste like purple.

 

Ender_Sai: I won't pretend I wasn't lazy with this (and I'm at home with a 26k dialup, so my resources are a little limited...). It's not close to being definitive, but hopefully gives you an idea ...

(BTW, am I the only poster on FF that has been required to actually provide references to prove that they know the field in which they have professional qualifications? And is this a precedent?)
(Not directed at you, E_S)


The classic studies were by Bandura et al (e.g. Bandura, Ross & Ross, 1963) which looked at the effects of violence on viewer behaviour. During the study, children who watched aggresive adult behaviour acted more aggressively than children who watched non-aggressive adult behaviour. They then compared children exposed to 'live' aggressive adult behaviour with filmed aggressive adult behaviour and found no difference (both acted more aggressively). These results have been replicated with children and adults.

Current consensus:-

Short-term effects: physiological arousal with a greater probability of behaving violently (Zillmann, 1971, 1991).

Long-term effects: constant exposure to graphic violence socialises viewers that violence is normal and that it is a successful method of conflict resolution (Huesmann, 1986; Huesmann et al., 1984).
This effect is greater when violence is:
* performed by someone attractive, e.g. heroes (Bandura, 1994)
* shown as justified (Berkowitz & Geen, 1967; Hoyt, 1970)
* performed with weapons (Berkowitz & LePage, 1967; Caprara, Renzi, Amolini, D'Imperio, & Travaglia, 1984; Frodi, 1975; Leyens, Cisneros, & Hossay, 1976; Page & O'Neal, 1977; Turner, Layton, & Simons, 1975)
* performed with guns (Berkowitz, 1990)
* not punished (Bandura, 1965)
* is performed with humour (Mueller & Donnerstein, 1977)
* shown to have no consequences (.e.g pain or suffering) (Baron, 1971 a, 1971 b,1979; Berkowitz & Rawlings, 1963; Cantor & Hoffner, 1990; Cantor & Sparks, 1984; Comstock, et al., 1978; Dubanoski & Kong, 1977; Sparks, 1986).

---

Dubanoski, R. A., & Kong, C. (1977). The effects of pain cues on the behavior of high and low aggressive boys. Social Behavior and Personality, 5, 273-279.

Comstock, G., Chaffee, S., Katzman, N., McCombs, M., & Roberts, D. (1978). Television and human behavior. New York: Columbia University Press.

Cantor, J., Hoffner, C. (1990). Children's fear reactions to a televised film as a function of perceived immediacy of depicted threat. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 34, 421-442.

Cantor, )., & Sparks, G. C. (1984). Children's fear responses to mass media: Testing some Piagetian predictions. Journal of Communication, 34(2), 90-103.

Berkowitz, L., & Rawlings, E. (1963). Effects of film violence on inhibitions against subsequent aggression. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 66(5), 405-412.

Baron, R. A. (1979). Effects of victim's pain cues, victim's race, and level of prior instigation upon physical aggression. Journal ofApplied Social Psychology 9(2), 103-114.

Baron, R. A. (1971 a). Magnitude of victim's pain cues and level of prior anger arousal as determinants of adult aggressive behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 17(3) 236-243.

Baron, R. A. (19716). Aggression as a function of magnitude of victim's pain cues, level of prior anger arousal, and aggressor-victim similarity. Journal for Personality and Social Psychology 18(1 ), 48-54.

Mueller, C. & Donnerstein, E. (1977). The effects of humor-induced arousal upon aggressive behavior. Journal of Research in Personality, 11, 73- 82.

Bandura, A. (1965). Influence of models' reinforcement contingencies on the acquisition of imitative responses. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, l, 589-95.

Thomas, M. H., & Tell, P. M. (1974). Effects of viewing real versus fantasy violence upon interpersonal aggression. Journal of Research in Personality, 8, 153-160.

Turner, C. W., Layton, J. F., & Simons, L. S. (1975). Naturalistic studies of aggressive behavior: Aggressive stimuli, victim visibility, and horn

 

Not at all, I get it al the time despite being postgrad qualified as a polisci analyist.

E_S

 

well thats probably why the brainwashing method works so effectively. making someone stare at violent scenes without them being able to avert their eyes

-Mel

 

I think you'll find the subjects of the tests were not strapped down..

 

thats not what I was trying to say..........

I meant that what was stated above explains why THAT method so effectively works to program people

-Mel

 

Ahhh, gotcha

 

That's a lot of references, Ozhaggis. And here I was thinking you were bluffing.

 

I'm sure there are a lot of Intelligent people out here on the boards that will enjoy a movie with violence, but not FOR the violence.

In most films it's a dramatic tool now! like crying!!!

 

Hmmm...I saw Sin City last night. And I don't know what to think...quite a disturbing film, with too much violence (too much senseless violence). And if the violence wasn't there to contribute to the plot line, or to the art form, then why was it there? The word "excessive" comes to mind...

 

But the fact that the violence is excessive and bordering on absurd is the whole point- it is a tribute to the genre of detective comics in the 50's that went over the top and overly stylized.

It was such a corrupt, dangerous and sensational world... like tatooine but with less desert and more rain!

 

Yeah...I understand that, but if you're an audience member who does not understand that then it all seems pointlessly (and excessively) violent. I don't know if too many people will know that it's alluding to the 50s film noir/crime fic comics.

 

is anyone in here who has actually read some of the graphic novels by frank miller?

-Mel

 

Yes, we realise that the movie is graphic because the comics are graphic, and the comics are graphic because they are supposedly a homage to some genre of 50s comics etc etc and it wouldn't have been an accurate movie adaptation if it wasn't just as graphic as the comics etc etc

The source of the violence is not the issue.

The issue is whether we need a movie containing this level of violence, what it is doing to us, and what it says about us.

Some argue that it is harmless entertainment, and others (like myself) say that it is not harmless and shouldn't be entertainment.