Ask A Genius 560 – Knowledge of Sexual Behaviours and Sex
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner
Publication (Outlet/Website): Ask A Genius
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2020/06/25
[Beginning of recorded material]
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Are things better in terms of people’s knowledge of sex and sexual behaviour compared to when you were growing up in the ‘70s?
Rick Rosner: Yes, I think with MeToo and with knowledge in general. Things are generally better, but the whole culture is more perverse. Carole and I were just watching a documentary on the sexual abuse scandal in American gymnastics.
Where hundreds of girls were molested, one guy in particular. He was probably the most celebrated doctor, but there were others who were molesting these girls. Girls who were abused in a whole bunch of other ways too.
The model for gymnastics since Bella Caroli came over from Romania in the ‘80s has been to be really mean and punitive. That is the way it is thought to win gold medals. On the document, it was hundreds getting abused.
Just looking at the rest of the Netflix and HBO lineup, the stories we watch now are all fucked up.
Jacobsen: Is it SNAFU central?
Rosner: Just the perverse and the dark, and embracing all the nasty details of life, where compare what we watch now to Magnum P.I. or Starsky and Hutch, or the Partridge Family, the nasty realities of life were kept hidden from T.V. and in life.
People had no idea as to the level of rapey and abusive behaviour that went on and people were more tolerant of sexually abusive and harassing behaviour. We made a deal where it is the Garden of Eden.
We made a deal to know more, which brings a measure of improvement in people’s lives because it is harder for abusers to get away with stuff. Because people are more aware of the potential for abuse and are less willing to hide it.
But the other half of the deal is that we’re less innocent. We accept that everything and everybody are fucked up. That’s all I have to say. It makes for better stories, more entertaining stories. It’s still possible for a shitty production team to make a shitty show.
There are plenty of shitty shows that are gritty and employ all the nasty details of humanity. I stopped watching this one show called Marcella out of England. It is hacky because it makes everybody the worst person possible.
You know the worst thing that can happen, will happen. There was a kid in the show who has a bunch of pet mice. I figured at some point in the story that the kid would crush one of the mice because it is that type of show. He did. I decided that show had nothing original to say and decided to stop watching.
Anyway, we live in a fallen world, which is, to some extent, the price of knowledge.
[End of recorded material]
License
In-Sight Publishing by Scott Douglas Jacobsen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Based on a work at www.in-sightpublishing.com.
Copyright
© Scott Douglas Jacobsen and In-Sight Publishing 2012-Present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Scott Douglas Jacobsen and In-Sight Publishing with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. All interviewees and authors co-copyright their material and may disseminate for their independent purposes.
In-Sight Publishing 