Let's Blog About Sex
Last Saturday, Jackspatula and I finally managed to leave the house on a weekend night and go see "Kinsey," which finally opened in Columbus after playing for weeks in New York. (I've never understood that system, but whatever.) I've wanted to see it ever since seeing previews for it back in August, and after a bunch of right-wing groups starting protesting it, I wanted to see it even more. All I can say is, it was worth the wait.
I won’t go on and on about the charm and wittiness of the movie, of the fantastic character portrayals by Liam Neeson, Laura Linney, and others, of the utter believability of the situations and dialogue. I also won’t summarize the plot. You’ll have to see it for yourself. The politics, of course, are what fascinated me the most.This movie is not for everyone. Also, I wouldn't go see it with your parents. Its subtitle is "Let's Talk About Sex," and for two straight hours that's pretty much what they do. I consider myself a fairly enlightened, open-minded person on the subject, but there were times when even I was thinking, "Can you please just change the subject for one minute? Can you please not talk about masturbation with your children over the supper table, just this once?" But the fact that the focus is never taken off the subject is key to understanding the movie and, I think, the man. Kinsey was obsessed, and it just happens that the subject he was obsessed with makes a lot of people uncomfortable. His obsession, however, did not stem from perversion, as some would believe--as a scientist, he was simply dumbfounded by the misinformation and utter ignorance floating around in the world at large and either ignored or perpetuated by his fellow scientists. He also recognized the problems this ignorance caused for people, the fear, the unhappiness, the ruined relationships, the sometimes devastating consequences of not understanding a very basic facet of human existence. Once he recognized this problem, he had to do as much as he could to enlighten and hopefully help people. At least, that's the way the movie portrays him, and that's the story I'm buying. The controversy over this movie, as far as I can tell, stems from claims the right-wingers make that are simply false or really don't matter in the big picture. Let’s break down some of the big ones, shall we? (I’ll try not to give too much away.)
1. Sugarcoating. The right-wingers’ core complaint is that the movie sugarcoats Kinsey and holds him up as a hero while ignoring controversial aspects of his life and research methods. Keep in mind, the vast majority of these people did not actually see the movie, and I can assure you, anyone who has seen it can attest that there was no sugarcoating going on. It was all pretty much laid out there, especially inasmuch as Kinsey, his wife, and his research team were themselves subjects as well as researchers over the course of their projects. Everyone has his or her own line to establish, along with their partner, on the subject of sex, and whether or not lines were crossed is a matter of interpretation. Many in the audience no doubt felt that lines were crossed—and that’s certainly their right to feel that way. However, we need to keep in mind that we’re talking about the behavior of consenting adults, which brings us to . . .
2. Ignoring issues of alleged child molestation. I’ve done a lot of research (that is, Web surfing) on the widespread claims of right-wingers regarding Kinsey using children in his studies—and not only in the interview format. From what I can tell, it’s a bunch of bunk. Everything Kinsey published dealt with adult sexuality, and his formal research consisted of interviews only. Granted, it’s difficult to find the truth when there is so much information out there defending each side, but I couldn’t find any hard evidence put forth by Kinsey’s accusers on this subject. It’s far more likely that the fundies took a line or two Kinsey may have written dealing with child sexuality and blew it way out of proportion in an effort to try to discredit him.
3. The 10% Issue. Many people have heard of the Kinsey scale. If you haven’t, you can check it out here. It’s not surprising to me that right-wingers are offended by the idea that most people are not exclusively heterosexual or homosexual. (Anyone who doubts this should sit in with my group of friends at the lunch table on any given day.) What really steams the fundies, though, is that Kinsey was one of the first scientists to publicly validate homosexuality and bisexuality as legitimate orientations rather than horrible diseases from which one might (and probably should) spontaneously die at any moment. What they have fixated on in this whole debate, however, is the famous “10% figure.” Somewhere in Kinsey’s research, apparently, he quoted 10% as the percentage of the population that is gay, based on what he derived from his studies. Right-wingers love to toss out this figure, claim it is way too high, and then use that claim to call into question the reliability of ALL of Kinsey’s research. Where did this figure come from, originally? Was Kinsey including people who merely fantasized about homosexual encounters without actually engaging in them? Was his figure too high because he concentrated his studies in urban areas? Was he factoring in folks who had had homosexual encounters in the past but now lived as heterosexuals? Would this number actually be accurate if people were honest with interviewers? Since I don’t know where to find the original reference to this number, I simply don’t know, and maybe this was one facet of his work where Kinsey could have been clearer. To me, the most important question is, WHO CARES??? Who cares if the figure is 10% (probably a bit high), 2% as claimed by the right-wingers (definitely too low), or 7-8% (probably pretty close). Should the percentage total of a minority population determine how many rights the minority is granted? If African Americans made up 2% of the population instead of 12%, should their rights be scaled back? O.K., I’m digressing here. The point is, Kinsey’s detractors take this one part of his research (which hasn’t even been definitively disproved) and use it to discredit basically everything he’s done.
Let’s just say, in sum, that if you hate sex, you’ll hate this movie. If you wish that everyone in the world still believed that masturbation will kill you, you’ll hate this movie. If you believe that it’s best for human beings to live in ignorance and never ask questions, you’ll hate this movie. If you believe that homosexuality is a “disease” that can be “cured,” you’ll hate this movie.
Everyone else will love it.
I won’t go on and on about the charm and wittiness of the movie, of the fantastic character portrayals by Liam Neeson, Laura Linney, and others, of the utter believability of the situations and dialogue. I also won’t summarize the plot. You’ll have to see it for yourself. The politics, of course, are what fascinated me the most.This movie is not for everyone. Also, I wouldn't go see it with your parents. Its subtitle is "Let's Talk About Sex," and for two straight hours that's pretty much what they do. I consider myself a fairly enlightened, open-minded person on the subject, but there were times when even I was thinking, "Can you please just change the subject for one minute? Can you please not talk about masturbation with your children over the supper table, just this once?" But the fact that the focus is never taken off the subject is key to understanding the movie and, I think, the man. Kinsey was obsessed, and it just happens that the subject he was obsessed with makes a lot of people uncomfortable. His obsession, however, did not stem from perversion, as some would believe--as a scientist, he was simply dumbfounded by the misinformation and utter ignorance floating around in the world at large and either ignored or perpetuated by his fellow scientists. He also recognized the problems this ignorance caused for people, the fear, the unhappiness, the ruined relationships, the sometimes devastating consequences of not understanding a very basic facet of human existence. Once he recognized this problem, he had to do as much as he could to enlighten and hopefully help people. At least, that's the way the movie portrays him, and that's the story I'm buying. The controversy over this movie, as far as I can tell, stems from claims the right-wingers make that are simply false or really don't matter in the big picture. Let’s break down some of the big ones, shall we? (I’ll try not to give too much away.)
1. Sugarcoating. The right-wingers’ core complaint is that the movie sugarcoats Kinsey and holds him up as a hero while ignoring controversial aspects of his life and research methods. Keep in mind, the vast majority of these people did not actually see the movie, and I can assure you, anyone who has seen it can attest that there was no sugarcoating going on. It was all pretty much laid out there, especially inasmuch as Kinsey, his wife, and his research team were themselves subjects as well as researchers over the course of their projects. Everyone has his or her own line to establish, along with their partner, on the subject of sex, and whether or not lines were crossed is a matter of interpretation. Many in the audience no doubt felt that lines were crossed—and that’s certainly their right to feel that way. However, we need to keep in mind that we’re talking about the behavior of consenting adults, which brings us to . . .
2. Ignoring issues of alleged child molestation. I’ve done a lot of research (that is, Web surfing) on the widespread claims of right-wingers regarding Kinsey using children in his studies—and not only in the interview format. From what I can tell, it’s a bunch of bunk. Everything Kinsey published dealt with adult sexuality, and his formal research consisted of interviews only. Granted, it’s difficult to find the truth when there is so much information out there defending each side, but I couldn’t find any hard evidence put forth by Kinsey’s accusers on this subject. It’s far more likely that the fundies took a line or two Kinsey may have written dealing with child sexuality and blew it way out of proportion in an effort to try to discredit him.
3. The 10% Issue. Many people have heard of the Kinsey scale. If you haven’t, you can check it out here. It’s not surprising to me that right-wingers are offended by the idea that most people are not exclusively heterosexual or homosexual. (Anyone who doubts this should sit in with my group of friends at the lunch table on any given day.) What really steams the fundies, though, is that Kinsey was one of the first scientists to publicly validate homosexuality and bisexuality as legitimate orientations rather than horrible diseases from which one might (and probably should) spontaneously die at any moment. What they have fixated on in this whole debate, however, is the famous “10% figure.” Somewhere in Kinsey’s research, apparently, he quoted 10% as the percentage of the population that is gay, based on what he derived from his studies. Right-wingers love to toss out this figure, claim it is way too high, and then use that claim to call into question the reliability of ALL of Kinsey’s research. Where did this figure come from, originally? Was Kinsey including people who merely fantasized about homosexual encounters without actually engaging in them? Was his figure too high because he concentrated his studies in urban areas? Was he factoring in folks who had had homosexual encounters in the past but now lived as heterosexuals? Would this number actually be accurate if people were honest with interviewers? Since I don’t know where to find the original reference to this number, I simply don’t know, and maybe this was one facet of his work where Kinsey could have been clearer. To me, the most important question is, WHO CARES??? Who cares if the figure is 10% (probably a bit high), 2% as claimed by the right-wingers (definitely too low), or 7-8% (probably pretty close). Should the percentage total of a minority population determine how many rights the minority is granted? If African Americans made up 2% of the population instead of 12%, should their rights be scaled back? O.K., I’m digressing here. The point is, Kinsey’s detractors take this one part of his research (which hasn’t even been definitively disproved) and use it to discredit basically everything he’s done.
Let’s just say, in sum, that if you hate sex, you’ll hate this movie. If you wish that everyone in the world still believed that masturbation will kill you, you’ll hate this movie. If you believe that it’s best for human beings to live in ignorance and never ask questions, you’ll hate this movie. If you believe that homosexuality is a “disease” that can be “cured,” you’ll hate this movie.
Everyone else will love it.
posted by flipper at 11:30 AM
5 comments
5 Comments:
Hurray!
What a wonderful entry and so well written that I really want to see the movie now.
I was interested before, but this makes it sound like a real winner.
(Now if only I could find the time to actually go see it . . .)
Masturbation won't kill you?
Somebody get me some hand lotion...
There's lots of hand lotion in the stinky 3rd floor women's restroom. We have "sharing baskets" now. Isn't that nice?
As for me, I just finished watching the last 4 episodes of Sex and the City last night! I know it doesn't seem like a show that I would like, but I loved it!
Why does everything that I love end, yet Ashlee Simpson goes on?
Hmmm...I think the film briefly discussed the topic of "sharing baskets"? If I recall, the practice was discouraged unless using protection.
As always, your work has informed and entertained me, made me want to take action, and pulled me kicking and screaming into whatever century this is. I hated the previews, but I respect Liam Neeson and Laura Linney and your opinion, so Gven Golly and I should definitely see this film, but not at Easton, which can ruin any movie experience. Re: the 10 percent issue, I think their need to quantify and desire to minimize means the Religious Right is "winning" the culture war and has fewer degenerates to exterminate when they get permission to implement the final solution. Have a nice day.
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