Our PG-13 Culture

Not PG-13. At all.

Long ago, my brother sat down with my father on a visit to watch one of his favorite sitcoms at the time, Will & Grace. And it was then, with the focusing presence of our 80-year-old dad in the room, that he realized something: Will & Grace consists of absolutely nothing but wall-to-wall sex jokes. Mostly really dirty, crude sex jokes. My brother sat frozen, not knowing whether to white-knuckle it out or admit defeat and feign a pressing interest in PBS.

A lot of our culture is like Will & Grace. It's PG-13 culture, where everything is slightly vulgar and crude. It's every sex joke on The Big Bang Theory. Every "fuck" on The Daily Show. Every boob shot in movie comedies. Not really explicit but not really clean either. An endless landscape of tepid titillation. Are we really still laughing when Raj makes a faux pas that makes him sound gay? Still finding it delightfully bold when a late-night guest pulls out the F word? Still watching scenes of sexual menace and finding it dark and edgy?

Luckily, there are outliers. These outliers exist on both ends of the spectrum: the truly wholesome and the truly adult. The Irish immigration movie Brooklyn is not a kids movie but it's clean enough that I could probably take my 11-year-old niece to it. The Age of Adaline was grown-up but free of tawdry adornment. And then there's Outlander, which shows sex of nearly every single kind (I say "nearly" because, you know, no furry sex) and multiple shots of nearly every part of the body, male and female. Repeatedly. Often. Sometimes for no good reason. It's the best show on TV.

We need both more G and more NC-17 in our art. PG-13 culture can be great, but it's hegemony is infantilizing for adults, corrupting for kids, and just boring for everyone.  G culture requires wonder, creativity, and sweetness. Adult culture requires daring, care, and beauty. This is good stuff, just waiting for expression.