American Nudity & Violence

American Nudity and Violence

By Alex Vidiani

To begin with, I have two questions: when is the last time you saw someone’s genitals on TV? When is the last time you saw someone murdered on TV? I think most people would agree that the latter far surpasses the former in frequency. It seems that violence is almost glorified, as it appears daily in film, TV, and even sports.

This is old news now, but let’s take a look back to 2004’s “Nipplegate,” or the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show. To recap, Justin Timberlake ripped part of Janet Jackson’s clothing off to expose her “nipple-shielded” breast. The American populace was shocked. One second of partial nudity during live TV? Utterly appalling. Shocking! Disgusting even. It was as if nobody had ever seen a breast before. But what most people did not raise arms about was the violent and borderline chauvinistic nature of this act (yes, it was rehearsed, but I’m proving a point here). Public outrage over this flashing far surpassed that of the violence, of any violence for that matter, including the countless murders, fights, etc. that appear daily on TV and that children rapidly grow desensitized to.

At age five, I was terrified of the T-Rex in “Jurassic Park.” Five years later, and I could watch that lawyer get eaten and not bat an eyelid. But nudity on the other hand, that was terrifying. These feelings of discomfort towards nudity stem from the way many American children are raised, where showing off part of your body isn’t curious, it is a sign of sexual deviancy and should be shunned. In a way, we have slipped back into the old fire and brimstone Puritan ways. Even a child saying words like “penis” or “vagina” is stonewalled by the parent(s), because that is inappropriate, especially at that age. Or is it?

Curiosity about one’s body is a natural stage of development, and blocking this curiosity can have disastrous effects for the child’s image of their body and others’. If American society continues to abhor nudity, this may lead to even more insecurity and shame for bodily images along with guilt at showing more than what is socially acceptable, even if it is in a completely non-sexual setting. Meanwhile, violence continues to claw its way into prevalence, allowing people to believe this is normal (however tragic or terrifying), while their own bodies are not.

I am not saying we should all get naked and run free against the tyranny of clothing (except on May Day), but we need to address the issue that violence receives far less of a negative reaction than even a hint of nudity. There is a line between sexually deviant acts, such as public exposure, and acceptable nudity. But if we do not address this, nudity will remain taboo and will always shock an audience far more than any act of violence. Look at movies like “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” where everyone probably remembers seeing Jason Segel’s penis in the first scene far better than seeing him punched in the face later in the movie. Or how the film “Gia” became “that movie where Angelina Jolie is naked half the time,” not “that movie where the main character dies of AIDS.”

I realize that some people would rather talk about nudity in cinema and TV due to it being a far lighter topic than violence and death, but some people may have just stopped caring or even noticing the violence. This may lead to apathy towards actual violence in the world, whether it is somebody being mugged a block away or thousands being killed over oil disputes.

To combat this will not be a short process, but we can start by accepting the fact that the human body is a complex, beautiful machine and should be respected. By addressing our own self-doubts concerning bodily image while simultaneously encouraging respect towards other peoples’ body well-being, we can effectively take on two related topics at once. Realistically, violence and nudity will always be aspects of life. But it is possible to sway the balance of prevalence in favor of what is good and natural, such as the beauty of human biology. Ultimately, however, it will take time for people to even accept the fact that we are all naked beneath our clothing, which is something many try to forget, it seems.