Media and Cultural Influences on Sexual Orientation

The authors of the textbook indicate that religion, science, and media all influence the way we think about sexuality. Which of these three influences you the most? How do they influence you? Is it a positive or negative influence? What kinds of sexual values in television programs have the greatest influence upon you?

Interestingly, statistics show that the mothers’ side of the family has a greater influence on gender orientation rather than the fathers. Also noted that over 65% of the candidates who identified as homosexual, their mothers either had none or only one live brother. (4) Comparing myself to this, my mother only has one brother!

The stereotypical romantic scripts found in the media such as the classic Disney representations of romance, create a circumscribed view of romance and sexuality that does not equally represent the population of the individuals that it reaches. This concoction of heteronormativity perpetuates the normative view of romance and sexuality as being white, heterosexual, and virginal.

Twenty years ago, 42 million viewers watched the sitcom Ellen, featuring Ellen DeGeneres, and the now famous Puppy episode. That night Ellen had admitted to the world that she was gay. The backlash to her coming out was vicious, boycotts and protests towards the sitcom seemed neverending and when the ABC network made the decision to renew the show for another season, they went to the extent of putting a “parental advisory” warning at the beginning of each episode. Shortly after, it was cancelled for being criticised as “too gay.” Fast forward 20 years later, Ellen DeGeneres was given the Medal of Freedom by former President of the United States, Barack Obama who said, “It’s easy to forget now just how much courage was required for Ellen to come out on the most public of stages 20 years ago.” This event has been marked as a milestone referring to the world of entertainment for the LGBTQ community.

The existing studies have indicated the gay male adults are more likely to develop body image dissatisfaction than other male populations due to variety of social and culture elements—particularly in media. Lanzieri and Hildebrand argued that gay media sources had produced the ideal male physique that negatively impact on its audiences. They had conducted a research to study the impact between media imageries and its audience’s perceptional change in body image by utilizing objectification theory. The result suggested that the media imageries were internalized by gay men which negatively affect their body image.

For quite a long time, it’s been said that men and ladies impart so naturally diversely they should be from inverse planets and having their own particular societies, without a doubt we have all experienced childhood with the same planet, and cooperate with one another in diverse routes every day. While we can't yet end up being genuine, studies do show distinctive behavioral examples concerning sexual orientation and communication. All in all terms, men consider communication a genuinely clear, straightforward undertaking that includes clear thought processes. At the end of the day, they let it know like they see it. Ladies, then again, have a tendency to be more mindful about saying straightforwardly what they're supposing and regularly utilize

The depictions of lesbians throughout the TV industry and other forms of media is often used to increase ratings, sexually titillate men and for entertainment purposes. The problem the culture encounters is the stereotypes are widely agreed upon and thought to be right. Many media outlets have made the distinction that attractive women kissing equal to ratings. For example, the kiss between Sarah Michelle Gellar and Selma Blair during the movie Cruel Intentions was widely talked about in the media and amongst the movies target audience. The scene featured two young attractive females engaging in a 10 second kiss. Although

After reading the final chapters of 7 through 10 of the book, Cultural Theory and Popular Culture, I came up with a number of speculative questions about what John Storey had discoursed:

Lilly discovers that she has an erotic and emotional connection to women as opposed to men. However, she does not want to reveal her sexual orientation to the society, rather makes it a secret affair. Because she was scared she will be outcast from society. In school, she continues to study like any normal student, but she separated her school life from her night live. She opts to live two lives; one that is known to the majority of the society and another that is a secret to her and friends. She is not willing to make her sexual orientation known to the people for fear of victimization by the society members.

Sexual orientation, media and governmental issues are constantly tangled together framing an extremely complex issue; it is all due to the sex inclination related inside of the fields of force. Media is a capable device in passing on and spreading messages to the general public and it is the most helpful and snappy system for people in general to get data, particularly political data. Media is inescapable as are the negative cliché messages it conveys. Female government officials in the US have dependably been underrepresented and distorted in ways that makes them less suitable for political picture in correlation to male lawmakers. The inquiries are, why is it that with all these human rights made, not everybody is dealt with just as? Why

I enjoyed reading your post and your prospect about cultural influences on sexuality. I agree with you when you stated that, a person’s culture will make a difference in how they express their sexuality. The African- American community is viewed by many gay and lesbian members as extremely homophobic, generating the pressure to remain closeted (Gallor & Fassinger, 2010). There is more support within the gay and lesbian social group that there is in their culture. I remember growing up in the 80’s and having a neighbor who was gay. I‘ve never noticed him hang out with anyone who was not in his gay community. I often hear others in the neighborhood call him faggots or sissies. I was too young to understand why he would keep his distance

Where does sexual orientation come from? Sexual orientation is about who you are attracted to and want to have an intimate relationship with. This involves automatic physiological and emotional responses, and is not the result of conscious choices. Sexual orientation appears to be determined early in life, perhaps from birth. Each of us are born with a biological predisposition to orient in a certain way, heterosexual, bisexual or homosexual. Within time this sexual ordination is influenced by social and cultural forces. Being straight, gay, or bisexual is not something that a person can’t choose or that can’t be changed.

As this article points out sexual trends among young adults is rising, and our society has many influences that perpetuate this notion. For that reason this article topic and sources are relevant and current, which helps to validate the need for research on this particular topic (Pyrczak, 2008). In addition, the researchers are thorough and give critical insight into the issues surrounding negotiating sexual scripts and potential effects that media have on influencing sex. They use several sources to explain the importance of consent and how it can be manipulated and taken advantage of if not addressed. They not only look at magazines however they connect the information they provide to all facets of life that can have a potential effect

Over the years our society has developed into a world in which revolves around sex. Media has exposed children to sexual images, behaviors and even language, at any early stage in their development. All that is occurring quickly and they aren’t developmentally qualified to handle these situations. Acknowledging sexuality is a part of life and everyone has or will experience this in their lifetime. By an early age children should understand how their bodies will begin to change because there isn’t a concrete time to when this will happen. Throughout the years programs have been evaluated to determine when a child should begin to learn about sex and what would be the most effective way but society has not yet come to a conclusion on this matter.

Within my life, I’ve consumed a substantial amount of gay media ranging from the arthouse films to pornography. I’ve also participated in the gay hook-up culture and in both I’ve noticed a pervasive interest, and to a degree, a fertilization of youth. Specifically homosexual dynamics that rely heavily on age difference, like ‘daddy-son’ seek to sexualize age-gaps. These same relationships are also present, if not amplified, in heteronormative culture. There is an infantilization of the female gender role in the modern beauty standards and cultural discourse (Sullivan 3). Homosexual media doesn’t necessarily need interact with these gendered dynamics because it can exist in a single gender, making a gay fetishization of youth more specifically age based. Although unsavory there is a fundamental difference between cultural sexualization of youth and pedophillia. The youth is not specifically adolescent or pre adolescent and can be considered a physical indicator of virality and good health. Relationships under such pretense are knowingly entered and beneficial for both parties unlike pedophilic ones. In the past, homosexuality and pedophillia shared a similar arena. Both were viewed as mental illnesses and criminalized in most of the western world. It’s important to note that pedophilia is in no way integral to homosexuality. Pedophilia, even in highly romanticized literature, exemplifies highly predatory aspects of sexuality. The Pedophilic Poetry of John Gambril illustrates