I prefer to see modestly dressed women. Let the inner beauty shine. Here is a nice modest CD cover:
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Sexualisation of women in the classical music industry
Time and time again people have certainly opined on the presentation of female performers, wether it be Yuja Wang's dress, Lara St. John's CD covers or Anne Sofie Mutter's pose (recently those violinists were pointed out in the worst cd covers thread). Each of these cases, according to different people, have come down to a general conclusion that sexist inclinations of today have influenced their physical appearance (on varying levels). Even on this site there have been debates as to modesty on stage, the importance of appearance, wether women should conduct an orchestra and so on, which all end up boiling down to the same (if not a similar) debate.
What say you, TC, on the topic of sexualisation of women in the classical music industry?
What say you, TC, on the topic of sexualisation of women in the classical music industry?
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With your current avatar you ought to hit 10,000 posts real soon.Why are all the cable news broadcasters extremely good-looking? Don't even apply if you aren't.
Good looking people ALWAYS have a huge advantage in society where success is concerned.
Could I have over 8900 posts if I was ugly?
I am sure J.S. Bach would be horrified to know that his name is on these lewd CD covers. It really is disrespectful of Bach.Lara St. John, posing on one CD cover as if she is in mid-orgasm and on another as if she's daring Daddy to take away her violin - and this in the name of J .S. Bach! - is a perfect representation of the sexualized young female in a culture where girls need to be learning that their self-worth and achievement should have nothing to do with sexual appeal and should not need to be bought with it.
Actually, the Laura St John Bach Sontastas and Partitas, where she is naked holding a violin, is not sexy, nor provocative. It is just plain stupid.
Yeah, I was thinking similarly that there was something fishy looking about that cover.Nah! Nah! She looks like a freakin' mermaid here. Gimme a break!!
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Not only that. It's totally weird.I can't deal with it. Totally unsexy.
Now here is an example where a naked body is acceptable on a CD cover:
And here are some modest covers (that were hard to find on a Google Images search of violinist CD covers because so many were dressed inappropriately for viewing by other than their husband in private):
This one from Denmark. I find that interesting because I have heard that Denmark was very sexually uninhibited, and here we have a very modest album cover.
I have this one:
Aren't you glad I am not King of the World.And here are some modest covers (that were hard to find on a Google Images search of violinist CD covers because so many were dressed inappropriately for viewing by other than their husband in private)
So YOU make the determination as to what is "appropriate" dress for any woman appearing in public?
Look, even God, who laid down the moral law (and does have the right to decide anything for adults), does not force people to obey it.
My main concern is that I don't believe people who don't want that imagery should be exposed to it as they go about necessary daily business. For example, just look at the soft porn magazine covers in grocery store checkouts where kids stand in line with parents, curious eyes wide open. Kind of hard to avoid the grocery store, and it is not always convenient to not take the kids with you.
Major chain grocery stores. I consider a bikini soft porn. And speaking of bikinis here is an interesting video:My main concern is that I don't believe people who don't want that imagery should be exposed to it as they go about necessary daily business. For example, just look at the soft porn magazine covers in grocery store checkouts where kids stand in line with parents, curious eyes wide open. Kind of hard to avoid the grocery store, and it is not always convenient to not take the kids with you.
I guess you are going to the wrong grocery stores... or your definition of "porn" ("soft" of otherwise) is quite removed from what I know as "porn."
So long as wives read it and apply the advice with their husbands it is a good, no GREAT, thing.Yeah. My first wife subscribed to Cosmopolitan and thumbing through it, I found everything was geared toward young women having more sex. So damn self-centered!
And so long as your body is kept outside of my visual range.Absolutely.
Just so long as one's provincial, moribund, and reactionary dress codes for oneself are kept off of 'my' body. . . and Lara's. ;D
My wife and I achieved what you wish to achieve. It was not easy and I give credit to my wife for the most part. I gave her full control on raising the kids. I will tell you that you will have to home school the kids (which does not mean isolation as we participated in home school groups and found the other home schooled kids to be well behaved). You can't leave them at the church school because it is infected by those kids from families who do not control the inputs to their kids minds.I am looking forward to becoming a mother one day, however, I am scared to death thinking that every lesson about living I will ever give my children will be superceded by the notions that being a gangster is a glamorous lifestyle, that every problem can be solved with violence, that the entire range of human relationships can be reduced to sex, that a rich and carefree existence is life's ultimate purpose etc., coming out of music videos, Hollywood and other venues of popular culture.
We did not ever watch TV, we did not take the kids into many stores because of the pop music and suggestive magazines on the racks, we did not cater to Disney movies but watched movies and programs that the church had produced on a DVD player, we censored what they read, but they read a lot of books. My wife and I read all the books they were given to ensure they were okay and so we could share in them with the kids.
My daughter is 24 now, and my son 20. Neither are into pop culture. Both are independent thinkers. A huge advantage in homeschooling is that you avoid having them be affected by peer pressure. It is an extremely difficult task and requires the mother to not have to hold a job. It is very rewarding and my wife would do it again in a minute.
As for home schooling, there are those who school at home, which is to replicate the classroom in every detail down to the desks and books. We did something more like unschooling where they spend maybe 2 hours a day in active classroom type activity and the rest of the day learning by doing and playing. We took many field trips and held museum memberships so we could frequently visit. The idea is to have them learn while having fun, let them wiggle and run around, let them run with a subject when they are engaged (rather than the bell rings and you have to switch subjects). There is much more I can tell you including some books that will give you a start in understanding the best ways to home school. PM me if you wish.
Yes I am afraid I pulled it a bit off topic, but I guess the original topic had pretty much been exhausted or bypassed anyway. Yes, Germany presents a problem for home schooling and there was a recent case of a German family who took refuge in the USA, the Romeike family. Things were much the same in the USA not that long ago. It was a case in a nearby city, Livonia Michigan, in the early 90s that resulted in the right to home school. We came into it at just the right time. I wonder if Germany would let you home school if you are a certified teacher like they used to do in Michigan. That would certainly be an option.Florestan, you seem to have done a great job. However, in the country where (if all goes well) my kids will come to the world and whose culture I am going to teach them to love and value, homeschooling is officially forbidden. Even if they lived on a farm in Bavaria, they would still go to school. This fact has good sides and bad ones, but that is how it is, and I do not really have a right to complain. So, I will have to find some other way. But I am not even on the way to having a child, so I still have a lot of time to think about that.
I should add that the way we did it is not necessarily the only way. We do see many kids come through the school systems and turn out okay. It will take intensive parental involvement, getting your nose into their books, talking to them about their lessons, and most important giving them good instruction in what you believe, the values you hold, while exhibiting those values in daily living. You can do it. But I do believe the generation gap is a direct effect of mass education. The peer pressure causes an alignment with their age mates as they are age segregated into classrooms. This separates them from adults in seeking role models. In home schooling the kids are exposed to people of all ages and never get the impression that someone else is too old or too young to be playing with. Neither do they get the impression that they are too big to play with a particular toy. But many good things, like doing things with your parents, become uncool because the age-mates say so.
I would like to see some statistics on the life history of rapists. I suspect that a large component in rape is a man who progressed though many stages of pornography addiction, likely beginning as a boy. I think if the data were available, we would see a strong correlation.I wholeheartedly agree. Rape is one of the most, if not the most disgusting act that a human can engage in. People prone to commit this heinous crime need only the opportunity. Even when foreign substances are involved in the act, the perpetrator still has the capacity to act on their impulses. There aren't "fringe rapists" who's decision to act is based on the dress/appearance of the victim. I'm certain there are people with the capacity to commit this act, yet never do out of fear. There is a sickness one must possess to even consider rape an option, regardless if the victim is dressed for the beach or an igloo.
Not to say that every pornography addicted man is going to be a rapist, but as DrMike posted on Page 24,
But one thing for sure, if they are not physically raping women, they are mentally raping women they pass by on the street, at the store, at the office. Some of it leads to sexual harassment, and if caught, loss of employment. It also wreaks havoc on marriages.It starts with the light stuff, and escalates. Where once a Victoria's Secret catalog would do it for them, it then requires Playboy, and then more degrading stuff. And almost without fail, it started when they were young - even before puberty. No - after seeing what it did to these guys, and how it could tear apart families, I don't think my description is stretching beyond reasonable limits.
Well I was trying not to say that pornography causes rape, just that it fuels the desire when present.I don't see how it is a chicken and egg question at all. Teenagers watch porn...they don't turn into rapists because of that. I have heard a case of a youngish child/teenager being exposed to violent porn and he then went on to rape women, whilst he was still very young. So yes it happens, but that's rare.
You might as well say that exposure to horror films or violent movies turns kids into serial killers. If someone blames their crime on a movie...well they were probably going to do it anyway and have a mental disorder.
The second part of your first sentence I agree with, but not the first half. And why stop with men? Women do watch it too.
I focused my post on men because being a man I understand men far, far more than I understand women. I know that some women are disgusted at pornography, yet other seem to like it, else the magazine Playgirl would not exist.
I'd like to point out that almost no-one here had aparently seen the LSJ cover before this thread.
And likely no one who has been following this thread will ever forget it given how many times (ad nauseam) it has been posted.
If the OP starts the same thread in an applicable group (or even starts his own group) the interference will be limited to a great degree. (See Groups under the Community Tab on this site.)While I sympathize with you, I don't think you're going to get a significant change in the conversation at this point. We are at 32 pages. Nobody new is going to jump in now - it looks too daunting, and if they haven't joined by the 30th page, your odds of getting them to join in don't improve with each subsequent page. So you are left with the same people who have been on here for so long.
Didn't they have something like that in a Woody Allen movie in the 1970s? Think the machine was called the orgasmatron.Imagine what will happen when we learn to record and reproduce tactile sensations too. One will be able to enjoy simulated intimacy with any model, film star or other "ideal" one wants without ever having to meet a real human being. Then man will become completely autonomous, locked in his own little illusionary digital world.
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