That was fucking beautiful

I think my parents would've probably been shocked and horrified by the Berserk poster and have some serious talk with me if I'm okay or have something to discuss. The boobs... Well, I think they would still diapprove. My dad sort of... Awkwardly and my mom with a "this is really not something you should hang on your wall, what will other people think of you?" kind of thing. Altho I think they'd be way less upset about the boobs, to be fair. ^^

Sounds about right.

Hmm...

If I did it now with my current age, regardless of poster, they'd maybe be surprised or just make a comment on it but not much else.

If I did it when younger?
Well if a kid with the lady they'd tell me not and likely take it down while they'd have the other poster up and be more surprised about my choice still over anything.
If a teenager they would still be surprised but let both posters stay up.

I tend to surprised my parents quite a bit with some of my choices. Because they don't think I will do this or have that, simply because they do not really know me.
They know some of what I like, either because it's very apperant or I have talked with them about it either indirectly because of asking about something related or, well, catching me in the act so to speak.

They'd probably be surprised I actually found wall space to even put a poster, for starters... but as to the contents, I don't think they'd be overly bothered with either one. My parents were generally hands-off when it came to the stuff I saw, provided I kept my grades up and didn't rack up too much of a phone bill with the modem.

Humans are the epitome of hypocrisy.
We judge things we don't understand to feel like we belong.
And as a result, we become self-conscious about society accepting us.
Even though we're told all our lives to be ourselves.
We know as adults that society would reject us if we all truly were.
Hypocrisy runs us.

my mom has always been supportive of my art preferences. i could put on my walls what i wanted as long as it was 'decent' meaning no sexual acts. nudity has been normal in my household as i had to draw figures ( i studied fashion) in my education. so it was often that i was referencing nude bodies from a poster i hung on the wall for convience.

Shockingly, my mother would've been pretty much cool with both of them probably, as long as the lady was decently artistic. But mine was a fairly charmed relationship, my mother expected a degree of maturity from me and in exchange she wasn't surprised when I pursued interests with some meat to them. One of my favorite childhood memories is laying on my stomach on the carpet at about middle-school age, reading MAUS while she was cleaning her dresser, with Elvis Costello playing. I can even remember how the teardrop prism in the window caught the light and turned it into little rainbow shards around the room.

If I was raised by my dad though, I'd've definitely gotten more traditional upbringing, and probably a WHOOOLE lot of toxic masculinity given his overall personality.

Beautiful memory to have.

As some one who listens to death metal and has multiple body pillows with nudity, my parents would tell me what they need and walk out.

This is an interesting thought.

If I was the parent, the Guts poster would be fine with me because (berserk is awesome)and our society has always been violent so, I'm kinda immune to it. I know that's kind of weird to say but, I grew up in the city. There was a murder 4 blocks from my house when I was 6. We heard gunshots sometimes. Yelling. Screaming. Fights broke out at the neighbors whenever the mother drank. My father was an avid action movie lover and we always watched films together growing up. He didn't care if I was 8. I have never grown up in an environment where I haven't seen some kind of violence or disturbing behavior before I was 14. I was never abused, but I did feel my parents were kinda used to how shitty life was and tried to make the best of it. They drank and smoked, told dirty jokes when the kids were around, worked long hours and cussed about it at home; just so they could buy my brother and I more presents on Christmas.

We eventually moved out after getting our home broken into 4 times in a month. Moved to a more suburban area in New Jersey and, I'll be honest, life got fuckin dull after that. It was peaceful, safe, few troubles except nosy bears and people, but I felt I was in a time loop. Like, nothing changed. I had trouble sleeping in highschool because I couldn't hear the city noise anymore. It was like living in a twilight zone episode with long minutes of silence (except chirping of birds and such) before you saw a glimpse of a person. Usually, with a creepy forced smile on their face. (People like their privacy here and didn't want to be disturbed.) Life went normally, I grew up, moved away, but still, my childhood felt boring and forgettable after that.

The nude lady is questionable. Now lets put this in a scenario: the kid is 14 and the poster is Windowmaker from overwatch, she is naked, her back to the audience, and laying in a field; covering the bottom half of her ass and feet. I consider this art instead of porn. Why? She's not showing her bits. And I have no problem my 14 year old having that. He's going through puberty, let him have the innocent poster. Full nudity the child will find on his own, we don't need to advertise it on his bedroom wall. Ya dig?

These are just my thoughts on the subject.

Quite the story.

Growing up in a suburban neighborhood, north of Detroit, I can second that uneasy feeling of every day's the same, stuck in a time loop. The movie Groundhog Day was nightmare fuel.

(It wasn't always that way, but the wooded areas I played in as a kid with my brother - because our parents felt wilderness was less dangerous than the city and people around here - were all bulldozed for cement parking lots and manicured lawns, and it all became sterile.)

Well. It's kind of hard to answer this question, since it's all just speculation. Unless you've been in this situation already. But for me, I think my father would tell me that the poster from Berserk it isn't good for me. That it would only poison my heart and soul. When it comes to boobs... well... that's a really hard one for me. My mother is pretty open minded about things, while my father only wants to protect me. So I have no Idea how they would react to it. Of course they would notice and ask me about it and all that. But that would be about it I guess.

When it comes to underaged people, I just don't let anyone who's underaged in my room. And since there's nobody living in this house that is underaged it isn't much of a problem.

Last but not least. What others might think of you. In this case it comes down to how you wish to see things and how to react in different situations. I as an example stay true to myself. I'm open and honest about most things and have no problem with people knowing about something like my sexual interests. I have no problem with people disagreeing with me when it comes to stuff like that, as long as they can respect that this is what I like and want. People who can't even respect who I basically am have no place in my life and I avoid any contact with them unless it really is neccessary.

What I'm basically saying is that nobody should let others or even society prevent them from doing what they like. As long as nobody comes to any harm through it.

But so much for that.

I wish everyone to have a great life and be happy about themself.

This is your friendly grass snake signing out.
Have a nice day.

So, about 8 or 9 years back in secondary school, I'd received a "Drop Dead" poster, based from Oli Sykes' clothing line, him being the lead singer of Bring me the horizon if you haven't heard of him. The poster being a male and female stood side by side, blood splattered along the back drop, covering their chests and necks with the words "Drop Dead" in large letters next to them. My mum's initial reaction when she opened this poster I had received via mail being to phone me up tlaking about how I'd received "A letter telling me to drop dead with a violent image over it, signed by someone named Oli". She's never really shifted form that kind of mentallity, but tends to be more open so long as It isn't around my younger siblings.

My parents didn't allow any kind of pictures on the walls because a probable damage on the wallpapers. Also, who would be stupid enough to show his interrests so openly?

Violence is thoroughly accepted, and there's many outlets for exploration and expression in regards to that; there's plenty of games and activities that are accepted that involve combat and violence. So people learn pretty quickly of where they sit in relation to that concept.

Sexuality? There's virtually nothing there that's out in the open. Most of it is secretive, not really something you can talk about in an open conversation with anyone. There's still too much puritanism around the topic to change the culture.

I'm kind of an odd reversal of this issue, because I was raised by an ex-hippie librarian who fought against censorship and insisted her children learn about art at an early age.

In my case, I had a love of horror films from a young age. She always said that she realized that I "knew [my] own mind" when I devoured a collection of H.P. Lovecraft stories at the age of 10, and recognized that I had no problem figuring out my limits. There were things forbidden to me, of course, but she was more lenient on my limitations (and for comparison's sake, my older brother wasn't allowed to watch pretty much anything I liked because he had absolutely no tolerance and was a jerk about denying his fears).

She was always about teaching me context. I wasn't allowed to buy Fangoria from the local bookshop because she read it and felt it was more about the gore and aesthetics, and lacked any value as a magazine. When they started carrying Rue Morgue, she would fight me for the new issue because she saw it as a magazine that as focused on the love of horror old and new, gruesome in places but carrying what she saw as worthwhile reading (I was older when RM came about, but she claims that she wishes it had been around when I was younger, as it would have been a good alternative).

The same applied to sexuality. She bought me my first Playboy because she recognized why I wanted to read it (there was a new Chuck Palahniuk story in it; I was a fan at the time, and a year and a half too young to buy it), and she thought the nude photography was tasteful and harmless. When I was old enough and bought Hustler she was upset with it because I hadn't realized there would be a difference; I ended up throwing that one out, because I found the content was repulsive (and frankly, rather misogynistic). She didn't deny my right to read it, just had to be sure I knew what I was looking at. Similarly, she let me hang a classic porn movie poster (for an odd film called 'Nightdreams') in my room because she recognized I liked it for the camp value more than the nudity (she's said before that she never understood how I can watch old porn movies in the same nerdy way I watch old movies, but she chalks that up as 'to each their own').

In the end I think it all comes down to context. In the hypothetical situation she would have been disgusted by the Berserk poster because it was gruesome without purpose, horrific for the sake of being gruesome. The nude woman... well, that's all about context. If it were just a poster of a nude woman she wouldn't like it, but wouldn't have too big a problem (since it would be my room and so few people would see it).

Like I said, my own experience would be pretty different than anyone else's, I suspect. But I take a certain amount of pride being raised with understanding and acceptance by a mother who recognized the differences and tried to raise me in the same way.

To answer your question: Greed and Status. In all our great waxing philosophic and masturbatory celebration of our supposed uniquely monolithic intellect among all the beasts that have or do grace this world we call home; we often forget that we are still an animal. I see so many people who suffer so needlessly because they are driven to follow their built in programming and instincts but refuse to acknowledge that this is what drives them and in failing to accept this truth they lose the ability to control it.

We allow real clinic Psychopaths to rule over the rest of us because they have unwavering confidence and do not care about what they do to others. They live in a world that is all them and nothing but them as if they were a hero character in a video game. We mistakenly associate this way of existing with them being superior due to their confidence but they are not superior. They are damaged humans and we feed their damaged world view instead of helping to fix it.

So these rulers gladly do everything in their power to make sure they have everything and everyone else has nothing. Thus the system we are currently living in exists. They must control everything and the last thing they need is for the most powerful motivators to be out of their control. Moreover, they do not WANT a unified feeling amongst the people because once they all realize they are a group of friends and family that should do what is best for them as a whole then they tend to depose these Psychopathic Tyrants.

This. It's makes that whole line of when you meet a celeb and 'I'm just a normal guy..." seem so much more applicable

Indeed. Celebrities have their particular talents but we all have our particular talents. It does not make them inherently superior in every way. At the end of the day they are people and so are we and we all eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, and seek pleasure. This is why racism never really made any sense to me. The differences between races are so insignificant that they are irrelevant. They are still people and still do all the people things.

Something interesting i've heard recently is that we are all the hopes and dreams of our parents, we are an investment of our parents failures and struggles, and so we are expected to be a certain way or to appreciate the struggle, so its selfish to do otherwise than what the wishes of what they dictate or what society dictates, because parents are the foundation. although I don't believe in this I just thought it was something interesting to think about.

It's a case of preconditioned responses to certain stimuli. A combination of how you grew up, and the particular social circles that you will have a natural proclivity towards, based on that home environment. The same would apply for the parents, as well. Were it my own parents, they'd have likely taken both posters off my wall and thrown them in the trash, thinking them equally wrong and insidious. Intrinsically, there's nothing wrong with either poster in their own right. It's down to the individual's interpretation of them. It's along the same lines as people thinking that Volkswagen, and their car, the Beetle, are evil because the Beetle was designed by Hitler's army. It's just a car, and it's just a car manufacturer, but people will absolutely have their own opinion of whether or not it's right/wrong.

I could get lost in the psychological explanations of the whithertos and why fors of this, but in the interest of keeping this concise and readable, I'll say this: speaking from the stance of a prospective parent, I wouldn't have an issue with either poster. I would have done my best to teach my children to have a rational and logical consideration for the effects and consequences of their actions and words, so as to develop a sense of what's right and wrong. I may have a conversation with them to make sure that they have a good understanding of that from time to time, but otherwise, neither poster would bother me in the slightest.

when growing up I was always told to do what makes you happy by parental figures. And thus I did.
When I was a kid I did exactly what made me happy and as I found other things that made me happy I did those things as well. And thus my happines and enjoyment in those things grew.
But now as an adult you have people going, "Well you can't do that because it doesn't make me happy."
Now why does your happiness suddenly dictate what I can and can't do when all my life you've told me to do what makes me happy?
As Carbonklex said above "Humans are the epitome of hypocrisy"

Not completely sure if I missed the point of this journal but this was my experience with parental figures growing up through the years.
My point through all this is just do what makes you happy. Don't let others let you think otherwise. As long as it's harmless fun go ahead and make your life enjoyable.

The problem, while although I agree with the general idea, is that people take "do what makes you happy, even if others don't like it" to the narcissistic extreme. They will do things that, maybe indirectly, harm another person or even a whole community.

And that's why I said "As long as it's harmless fun" because something that does directly harm someone is something you shouldn't do.

Irregardless of your specific example, a viewpoint is not necessarily correct just because it opposes an "outdated" view.
Which is to say, change for the sake of change is not quite always (albeit usually) a good thing.

As of current age, i think they'd probably not think much of it.

If i was say in my teens, they'd probably not be too shocked about the berserk poster (i used to watch lots of horror movies, gory splattery ones especially and go on and on about them with my dad). With the topless lady, for starters, they'd find it amusing to have such contrasting posters next to eachothers. They could be curious of either of them, and would let me explain, if they even demanded an explanation.

I'm incredibly lucky to have such good parents though, they don't really care what i like or what i'm into, as long i have things good for me and i'm feeling happy. They've been very supportive even in more "out there" -ideas i've had.

With a younger sibling.. i honestly don't know. Never had one. Maybe they'd be more open minded about it, atleast from what i've seen from younger generation, they tend to be much more open minded in general, than my generation ever was.

Ofcourse all this is probably relative to where you live.

Only poster i have on the wall of my room is my old Indiana Jones poster. Idk, i've never felt like decorating my room too much with things i like. I've been thinking of making some pencil drawings and putting them on walls, but i've been too busy with other projects.

i'm glad i am following you,

Why can't I fav journal entries T.=.T

This is largely how I lived my life back in college, and kinda lost touch with it along the way. I've wanted to re-kindle that lifestyle but couldn't put my finger on what I was doing different. You just gave me the words I'd been looking for, thank you very much.

My parents are both in their middle age, mom being 64 and my dad 58. So they’ve been around a long time and we’ve seen countless movies of various things, so my mom would question the Beserk poster (nicely, not with rage) and my dad would make a joke of me killing him in a similar way. (He’s always done jokes that either are dumb or inappropriate to the situation.)

With the nude poster, considering that I’m going to be 21 this year I think they wouldn’t mind, granted there are more worse posters out there that are more sexual and graphic. Just saying.

Oh, Castle Anthrax is the best part... Except the Killer Rabbit.

I appreciate this journal quite a bit. Honestly, I was about 20 before something like the gore was relatively ok. A nude poster, depends on the context. My dad bought a framed Flaming June; and her nipples are visible through her dress. My parents both appreciate the art itself though, especially my mother, who's relaxed a lot more recently.

Flaming June By Sir Frederic Leighton: https://images.icanvas.com/2d/1397.jpg

Well, my mom would probably give the Berserk poster an odd look because she finds violence distasteful, and would be confused as to why I have a naked lady on my wall because I'm so gay I don't even drive straight. (I just drive forward.)

Dad wouldn't give a shit either way. XD

Go against the grain, but don't deny science and substitute reality for your own is all I've got to say. Many things such as this which I find hilarious and yet people are still volatile discussing even just humans, let alone what we do or how people function.

Cheers and happy times.

Well then... I figured my parents would be an oddity, but am pleasantly surprised to find that isn't entirely the case. My parents probably would have been the ones helping me find such things (Heavy Metal anyone). Admittedly, my grandmother would have disapproved of both, but would just ignore it if they were in my room.

The perception of society is often rather skewed. Not just that society can and sometimes does conflict with the ethics of the individual, but that the constituent members of that society may have a private opinion or viewpoint that they feel would result in consequences were it revealed publicly. Further, they also suspect that, were they to avoid reacting negatively as they feel society expects them to, they would be ostracized.

Reminds me of a game (economic definition, not entertainment) wherein a group of people attempt to decide on an activity. Each person secretly wants to do activity A or B, but believes that the others do not. As they avoid their preferred option due to their aversion to being singled out as the group deviant, they look for the option they suspect will be most palatable to the group: option C. Now, no one actually preferrs C, but they are not averse to C. Therefore, the result is that no one ends up doing what they prefer, even if their hidden preference had been the majority.

Group dynamics are odd, no?

Fuck it. I was going to post this big fucking thing about how I grew up, how I view society, etc, etc, try put down the point that society is a shitfest, but I'd just be wasting your time. You probably don't want a stranger rambling so I'll just throw down the cliff notes:

My childhood was shit. My parents never fed me bullshit cos one was a lazy cunt and the other knew life was a shitfest and didn't need to teach me that cos I lived it. My society wishes me dead because I'm from a poor background. In the process of making me distrusting, non-feeling and psychopathic (among other things), it made me a monster. I'm what you call Ming Dynasty jaded. There's a statue of a wolf somewhere in China flipping off the world that hasn't been discovered yet.

Simply put, society and humanity are two of the many things I view as toxic and corrupted waste. If I had my way, I'd have no part of either. Not unless both were purified and that would need literal divine intervention to do. So I protect what I can and keep the world far, far away from me as much as possible.

So, I apologize if I ranted despite trying not to, and if I got your point wrong, but that's my view on it all. Sorry if you were expecting something more positive, but I'm one bad day away from trying to kill the batman.

I have no idea who "Guts" is, nor do I know what "Berserk" is, but I imagine that they're probably a character from an anime. Nevertheless, I believe the description is vivid enough for me to get a good idea in my mind's eye.

Taking the two posters together, my parents would probably not openly express an opinion on the matter. And that silence is, to me, a willful act of following Thumper's Rule: If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all. I suspect my brother would be the same way. But I do not believe that my brother would approve of either poster if he was bringing his young daughter's along for the visit.

Admittedly, it has been a long time since I have been in the home of someone who was not a family member, but I can say with near certainty that in none of those houses would I find either poster decorating a wall. I suspect however, that people coming into one's home for the first time will, out of politeness, not say anything negative about art on the walls, unless the art is overtly obscene. Yet, if I were to visit someone's house and found such artwork on the wall, I would immediately think, "This person is not like the people I typically know. They decorate their home not with art of traditional landscapes or portraits, but of something that clearly they find beautiful, and obviously feel comfortable enough to share that belief with me, since they have invited me inside."

Why are the things society has set upon us become something that dictates our life into something that refuses to let our humanity experience happiness?

Unless one is 100% selfish and self-serving, the opinions of their peers, colleagues, and neighbours (and, for the sake of efficiency, I shall use this term collectively from here on out) matter. Few are the people who are able to exist and survive without interacting with their neighbours. It is not necessary to involve ourselves deeply with our neighbours, but it is necessary to be able to involve ourselves with them enough that we can all get what we want from one another. I don't have to know the life story of the cashier at Safeway, but I do need to be able to socialize just enough to be able to answer basic questions pertaining to the purpose of my being there. In spite of my fan of anthropomorphic animals, it would be very awkward for them if I were to answer "Murry purry, I'm a furry!" and make cat sounds when they asked me "Cash or credit?"

Secondly, it is insufficient to simply exist. Collectively, we have a responsibility to procreate and ensure the continuation of the species. Within our culture, this is done by making use of the family unit, where a mother and a father conceive children, the mother gives birth, and the two of them raise their children into adulthood and groom them to become independent neighbours, so that they too may continue the cycle. Because of our culture's adherence to the family unit, coupled with the advances in equal opportunity self-determination, we select our romantic partners out of love rather than a combination of necessity and availability. And both procreating genders have a minimum set of marketable standards for one another when it comes to selecting a mate.

To get back to your question, what makes one happy may not make others happy, and I don't think any sensible person would want to voluntarily enter into a committed relationship for the purpose of procreation with someone who does not make them happy. For people who find love and happiness with another due to mutual interests, goals, and desires, this is a simple matter to overcome. They pair off and galavant on with their lives happy and making babies. But the remaining people, it's not so easy. For whatever the reason might be, they were unable to conventionally find a mate to pair off with and galavant. Maybe the timing is wrong, maybe the would-be perfect couple just missed one-another as they were moving their way through the crowd of single, available people, but nevertheless, they are still single at the end of the day. And maybe what makes them happy as individuals is unique to them within their pool of neighbours. Perhaps nobody else in the pool of single people wants to share in the activities that makes them happy. And what one is left with is individual happiness, but simultaneous loneliness. It is an extremely rare person that completely indulges in that which makes them happy and does not lament being lonely, but much more common is the person who sacrifices that which makes them happy for a life wherein they share love with another neighbour in order to escape a life of loneliness.

Don't strike out and do something that would disrupt others view of the world-- but in your own internalized minds - the universe that is your existence - question what you were told by those who had outdated ignorant views...

I did this years ago, and I've been paying the price for it for years. That which makes me happy as an individual has alienated me from my neighbours in my immediate surroundings. Attempts to find love and friendship have been largely unsuccessful as of late, in spite of a very fruitful and bountiful late teens/early twenties. I would need to hop on a jet to spend time with any of the people I consider a friend, because in my local area all I have are chums/acquaintances.

The way I see it, unless I can find a partner who is made happy by the same things that make me happy (of which, I believe, there are very few), I am doomed to live a life where I either have my individual desires fulfilled, or my romantic desires fulfilled. It feels like I cannot have both.

Imagine the perspective of the world in other views... Regardless of if a view seems too easy or pleasing and you think it's too good to be true, try it out... It is possible to be too cynical and shut the world out from moments that are truly happy.

I have just one thing to say about that: Once bitten, twice shy.

regardless of if you know who my examples were, the tldr version is - if you had two posters, one of a big manly man killing demons with violence and another poster of a beautiful girl showing off her body, which would cause your parents to freak out more...

And despite the responses I see -- my own personal fucked up life was that not only my parents, but my school and family would not only disown, but try to kill me if they saw me trying to enjoy sexuality... Violence was TOTALLY okay.

And I loathed that idea. It fueled my drive to keep being a better artist hidden away from them all.

It wasn't until my foster father sadly passed away from cancer that I realized I was living a lie and was only existing online as Gami...

Knowing my parents, they'd probably find both posters distasteful. They would probably express their objection, but leave it to me ultimately to decide what I would do with that knowledge.

However, as a host it behooves me to be aware of my guest's comfort level. Being conscientious of that, with advance notice of their arrival, I could (and have, in the past) taken erotic posters off my walls before they walk through the door. For their sake. If posters hanging from my walls makes them uncomfortable, they'll be hesitant to accept future invitations.

By your accounts, those closest to you would have reacted very negatively in the presence of sexuality. That is unfortunate. I wish you had a better co-habiting experience.

I don't think your personal experience was much different than what most people's would have been.

A poster of violence, maybe not to the level you described, would be more acceptable than a pin-up when I lived with my parents.
The same thing could be said about video games and other media too. Violent video games? No problem. But oh boy did I get an awkward talk when my dad saw me playing one of those lewd flash games.

I think a lot of it had to do with an age thing. If I was in high school and some action movie was out, well sure, that's fine, why not? But at the same age, nude pictures of women?!? Egads!

There are plenty of well thought out responses here, so I'll keep mine short.

As a society we are taught that death and killing MUST happen (executing criminals, martyrdom, religious persecution, war, genocide) but that nudity is the same as sex which is a SIN, therefore violence is tolerated or even praised while at the same time innocent nudity is demonized and even natural acts such as sex are vilified. From a young age we are taught this because long ago someone said it was so and nobody questioned it. You will see brains blown out on cable TV but a sexual act is beyond an R rating.

There are so many atrocities that we allow or promote simply because "it has always been that way." People fear change.

But the second you put one thought into it, regardless of how long we all thought of it, it doesn't make any damn sense... how is going down on a friend, making her orgasm from giving her oral attention between her legs -- and her almost crushing your head like a melon anywhere near close to someone causing physical harm or acting with the intent to harm to another human?!?!

Men who lay with other men shall be killed -- Sure, because wanting to make someone you love feel like they're worth something and are loved by someone else is totally answerable by ending the existence of one of the most beautiful creations of the universe -- a Human Life.

I never claimed it made sense. It's cruel at best. Caring, compassionate people have been put to tortured, ostrasized, and put to death for loving another human being in one way or another. Some people are hypocritical monsters. That is one reason despite battling with depression and suicidal thoughts for years, I feel obligated to stay around. It is the responsibility of those who understand that these things ARE atrocities and inhumane to say so and to support each other. We make safe places for one another so that we can live without persecution, even if only in the sanctuary of "behind closed doors."

my folks are strict on both. mother more than father but even then your point rings true. puritanical societies love to promote the violence over the love.

then again, one can definitely go their entire life without ever finding pleasure, pain is an inevitability

mom and dad both took to similar views of how to raise kids.though that was when they had their first, my oldest sister who they tried to nurture like they thought they should have. rules, discipline, not beatings but the occasional spanking and stern talk (you know back when kids couldn't tune their parents out with music or thinking of a game to play later.)
when my second sister came around they realized that it would be better to lighten up, raise them how they wanted to be raised, but still maintaining a strict budget for things. (at the time we were the upper class of the lower class) and while less strict there were many rules still to be followed.
finally i came around and first half of my life they didn't really change much. hell if anything i was the tag on while they raised my sisters most of the time (i think one year they forgot my birthday, but we were moving into a new "house" at the time so i can see how that got missed in the confusion.) but then a few things health, social, education, and mental wise happened, and i noticed a very big change in myself. happy little boy afraid of everything turned into "hey watch this and go ahead call the ambulance". at they point i lost touch of my parents i think.


long story short: mom would probably look at it, give me a look or ask me where i got it what's it from, and then change the subject. and dad if he liked it would just say "Cool!" or if he didn't really care just say "interesting.."

They would have a problem with both. For Beserk they would wonder where my fascination in this came from and tell me to put it away so it doesn't scare my siblings. For the naked woman, my mom would scream throw that away while my step dad would laugh proudly, but they would have preferred that to my true sexuality.

...I...honestly don't know how to reply...my view of things has been distorted so much by upbringing that it has been a hellish trial to break out of the numerous shells I created out of self preservation.

I've been on both sides. Oppressed and Oppressor; more the former than the later though. Proabably why I struggle with the entire concept of "master-pet/slave/toy/ecetra".

The violence wouldn't bother them. At all. The demons would (like you, my family was almost fanatically religious along with being EXTREMELY gullible..), and the naked gal wouldn't even make it inside the house.

Granted, at my age of 36, you'd think I'd be free of my family. But a mixture of a multitude of things has stymied my personal growth severely.

Factors that I'm not comfortable sharing in the open. If you're curious, I can open the flood gates in a private note. But you have been warned.

Best way to sum it up? I have walked dark, bleak paths almost all my life, each one set before me not by my own hand, but by those around me.

It hasn't killed me yet, and tempered me to be emotionally and mentally strong enough to survive. But damned if I'm not exhausted.

keep this in mind, is your life, do what makes you happy, sexuality... dont give a fuck about it, is natural thing in anyway but ppl while every year are being a bit more open minded (atleast i believe) treat it worse than violence somehow.
as for your room example. is your room, where you can be you the most. we all are just like a porn site, if they agree to the content inside us they can get in (as long as we allow it) and if not they can just leave.
Family... this gets a bit tricky in each individual; you can love anyone as much as you want but the one that you should love the most is yourself (even if is just slightly more).
This is just my point of view, ofcourse you are the one that lead your own life.

The US has always had a bit of a Puritan tinge. We don't bat an eye about violence, yet show a tit or a dick and people go nuts. Europe seems to be the other way around on this. And to be honest, I think that makes more sense. Why sensor sex when it's the violence that kills?

As someone who has grown up in Greece I may not be the prime candidate to respond to this but in my experience it hasn't been the other way around, at least not in the way I perceive your sentence. Violence in artistic mediums is not damned as much as I think you think it is, it's pretty on par with the US where most people don't really care and some are really weird about it. It is however, true that Europe is way more liberated on the issue of sex. If I had to guess as to why it'd probably be because of European countries' faster secular shift / focus away from dogmatic religious views but I'm not expert, it's just a guess haha

Honestly I think modern society needs to go through a stage of sexual liberation. Sex is a normal part of life and a normal human activity. We should celebrate our bodies and what we can do with them and encourage exploration and experimentation (with caution of course), the idea of sex being taboo is extremely silly in my opinion. In my life I try to preach happiness, acceptance and empathetic understanding, not judging someone is a core part of that philosophy, and sexual liberation in as well since love and all its aspects and forms are something I believe should be praised.

We can make ourselves and more importantly other people we care about feel good, that should be considered a good thing whether it's done physically or emotionally.

PS there are probably plenty of holes in my text, I apologize if I wasn't entirely clear on my view or they seem unfinished as I sort of jut wrote what was on my mind. Feel free to get a conversation starting!

My family is interesting.

My dad and step-mom has been religious for a long time and for a while I had been - for lack of a better term - tricked/forced into believing the same stuff they did. I guess “guilted” would be the right term, but I digress. Sex, alcohol, violence: it was all as you might expect.

My mom, sister, and step-dad, on the other hand, while not as “positive” as I am, are incredibly accepting of people regardless of their sexuality, interests, etc. As long as they were kind and helped others, who you were or what you were into didn’t matter to them. When I was still discovering my sexuality for myself, my mom was the first one I talked to, because I knew it wouldn’t change her opinion of me. Sure, she had questions, but she didn’t see me any differently.

I guess the long and short of it is it comes down to background and beliefs. Being of a younger generation and being exposed to many different mindsets has helped me be more accepting in general, but being sheltered for those few years did certainly cause problems in the long run. My family didn’t have the same level of exposure and end up hiding from the stuff they don’t like as a result, especially on my dad’s end. My mom’s side has been super cool and accepting too. My mom made my first tail. :3

Your question has parallels with other parts of society, at least one in the USA where violence is glorified by many and even the slightest hint at nudity and/or sexuality and those same people would be very upset. For instance, movie posters displayed in public that show people wielding weapons might get away with no comment or very little comment but if anything even shows as much as a nipple or be suggestive even if the figure is clothed gets huge backlash.

My parents wouldn't have minded either picture. Both my parents WERE gamers when games started to come home. A lot of the old NES games were pretty violent. Not blood and guts, but still violent for the time. Not to mention, my mother bought Mortal Kombat 2 for me and my brother well before we were 18. Also, the topless woman wouldn't have been an issue. We had a painting of a completely naked woman on our wall growing up. I, coincidentally enough, was the one who was uncomfortable with it.

I don't entirely know how to answer your question. I do know that I would have been far more uncomfortable if my parents saw the topless poster as opposed to the Guts one. That being said, when I was in my teens, my parents caught me printing off pictures of nude women from the internet. I got in a little trouble for wasting paper, but they later bought me a book of cheesecake art by Olivia.

That's hard to answer. I don't really like hanging posters in my room, as I'm more inclined towards painted art on a canvas than I am posters. Though I'd have to say, if I was young, my dad would likely have a problem with both of them, but rather than yell at me, he'd sit me down and have a talk. My mom, on the other hand, would take down the nude poster until I was older than 16. After that point, I know enough and there's no use restricting that.

Now though? Let us say that the posters were actually paintings made by a local artist I saw hanging in a restaurant. I had bought them and hung them up, as these paintings were very high-quality paintings. Now, my dad would ask me to take them down for the sake of my younger siblings. My mother, on the other hand, would compliment them.

The reason I have to speak for each of my parents separately, is because they are divorced. I grew up in a biblically influenced house when with my father, and a more liberal house with my mother. To this day, that still holds up, and nothing has really changed in either of them.

Violence and sex are two things that are as much a part of human nature as love and kindness. We cannot escape one just as much as we cannot escape the other. To glorify one and put down the other is just wrong.

Long ago, the powerful elite learned that it's much easier to control people who are miserable than people who are content.

Can't sell someone the promise of a better life, if they like the one they already have.

I really wish you were not right about that... but that's exactly how it is...
It's so fucking sick.

Once you can see the game that's being played, you can break the rules of it willfully.
You can refuse to conform. Drawing sexual imagery rather than violent imagery is my way of resisting.
Viva la resistance.

my folks would have had a much stronger negative reaction to the violent poster than the nudity one.

My mom was always a clothing optional kind of person and taught me right from the get-go that a body is just a body and so long as you aren't breaking any laws or hurting anyone you should be as comfortable as you want. However, she was very anti-violence and wouldn't even let me watch TMNT as a kid.

Dad followed her rules.... when she was around. When she went to Bingo for the evening, we had some daddy/daughter time watching wrestling where he could teach me the difference between violence for the sake of fun and violence that actually hurt people.

It always alarms me these days to see people who grew up in the other direction, where you could let your 6-year-old play GTA where they could murder and rape prostitutes but the instant your child saw an exposed nipple they were ruined. It may just be because of how I grew up but it always felt so backwards to me.

That's really heartwarming -- imagining a father and daughter watching old school WWF and laying the foundation for a healthy understanding of reality...
That was beautiful

My daddy was the best ^_^
I learned a lot from him as a kid!

That sounds like an amazing upbringing. :D

When I was a kid, my Mom didn't want me to watch WWF, but I would sneak off to the TV. She always caught me and I never saw how the fights ended. Because I didn't know how a wresting match began or ended, I had some crazy ideas, like I thought they fought to the death. Nothing you needed to know. :p

It's good that you had a family enjoyable to be around.

to be honest, some of those fights practically WERE to the death.
Every now and then either something would go wrong with the choreography or someone would get a little too into their role and blood would be shed. SO MUCH BLOOD. I remember a fight where one guy got his head cracked open by a chain and the ring looked like a murder scene.
It may be mostly faked but some of those fights were not.

These days I still watch it with dad sometimes, though now its more for the dance. You can easily pick out the points where they check with each other to make sure the punches are landed right and the throws are balanced properly so as to not break any bones, and some of the smaller guys are so agile that watching them move is absolute poetry!

It all boils down to the tastes people have and develop; be it right, wrong, or whatever in between.

I like looking at big muscular men (anthropomorphic or otherwise) and it's all the better to my eyes if they are wrestlers or wrestling. This is obviously not everyone's cup of tea but that's OK!
Sure, I'd LIKE more people to enjoy this sort of thing but I know better than to stuff it down people's throats.

I know my parents would have told me to take both posters down. They wouldn't talk about it because they never did but they would require both to be removed lol

If you're happy and you know it, then our capitalist overlords can't sell you piles of crap - why would you need it, if you're already happy? So, to maximize profits, the customer base must be made miserable just short of the point of suicide - and then, via advertising/propaganda convinced if they buy "X" product(s), they'll finally be happy.

...and don't forget to buy some afterlife insurance at your local church. Remember that every dollar you spend in this lifetime goes towards your condo fees in heaven.

My parents might raise an eyebrow at the Black Swordsman poster, although I doubt they would have made a fuss. They didn’t want my brother and I getting exposed to too much violence when we were little, but they also understood that imagination ≠ reality. A fictitious hero chopping up zombies probably would have been okay. The other poster would have been a non-issue. My parents are very sex-positive, and we actually did have art featuring tasteful nudity in the house when I was growing up.

I’m a lucky guy. No one gets to choose their parents, so I feel fortunate that mine are pretty chill.

I don't think they would have minded either, too much. It depends on how young I was at the time. I'm not really entirely sure if they would find one worse than the other.

Well put.

I would say it's an evolutionary adaptation. Think of it. We killed for food on a nearly daily basis and had to get over any trauma it caused. Gutting Bambi's whole family was a way of life.

Unchecked reproduction was actually threatening to resource-starved societies and it's still threatening today.

It's also what we're instinctively wired to want to do thus we pit our survival instincts against our need to shag which results in a really strong fear reaction and as a species that fear reaction expands to other peoples' lives.

We've grown into a modern society where we artificially isolate ourselves into these tiny core family pods, but that's not how humans have worked until very recently in our history.

*Shrug.*

Suppose it depends on which poster you get caught masturbating to.

This is the best response I've seen so far.

Look, it's my duty as a knight to sample as much peril as I can.

Well, let me have just a little bit of peril?

This reminds me of something George Carlin once said, and I'm sure this isn't 100% spot on, but bear with me, "I would rather my kids see two people f*&$ing than killing each other." I never did understand why it's perfectly okay to show the hero mowing people down in droves because they are 'bad' but everyone freaks out if there is a boob. :p

...and, just to lighten the mood, another quote from the man.

"Now we're gonna f*&k you, sheriff. We're gonna f*&k you slow!"

Humans have always been, are now, continue to be, and will always be incapable of rational morality.

When I was a teenager, I covered an entire wall of my room with printouts of my favorite furry porn. Most of it being extremely explicit.

One day, my mother saw - her reaction was to point out a few of the pieces that she thought looked especially nice.

She also let me hang up IN THE LIVING ROOM a watercolor painting I'd commissioned of one of my characters... That had bare breasts.

I want to comment here.... but I also don't think what I'm feel like I'm going to say is going to be heard or accepted. So I'll keep my thoughts to myself, I think.

Somewhat unwilling to throw myself in the *particular* fire, but just wanted to say the concept sparked a reaction, so well played.

Well, for the poster department, it would depend on when they're looking at either of the said posters.
When I was a little troglodyte, I started getting my own money from a paper round at the age of around 13 or 14; I don't think my mother would allow either of said posters. My dad wouldn't have had any say in the matter, since I was raising by only my mum. But if he did, he would've been more tolerant but I doubt he would let me have them either (Thought a part of me isn't completely sure).

Now, if I had my own place, I don't think either of them would be in any position to say anything. A raised eyebrow from mother and a pat on the back from my dad would probably happen.. Well, if the nude poster were female. I don't know how he'd react if it were male. I don't think I want to know what would happen if my dad found out about my.. inclinations.

I think the problem that society faces, is the occasional inability to recognize perspective. They look at the popular opinion, and naturally assume it fits everyone.
Parents are responsible for how the world should be seen for the child, which is a responsibility which is often forgotten.

If I ever have the fortune of raising my own child, I'll probably take down posters that they're too young for, they can start putting up bare tits and bloodied corpses when they're a teen.
Or at least that's what I would do.

I have a funny feeling my mom would have a subconscious sigh of relief if I had a nudie woman on my wall XD my mom does love me and wants me to be happy with myself, but she'd probably be happier I wasn't the way I am.

That being said, yes, the nudie would be removed from my wall before the splatterfest mostly due to the fact I grew up in a family that watched and reveled in horror/slasher flicks. I guess it's a more socially acceptable thing to talk about horror over sex. Sex makes people uncomfortable in more ways than one, whether it be because of Biblical reasons or otherwise. Rather sad that a more natural thing is looked down upon, considered taboo even.

Anything fun is looked down upon, really: games, movies, books, music especially, etc.

My parents were hippies but mother was a lapsed catholic. Neither would be ok.

Hrmmm


Where you live and the beliefs of local society or family will dictate which of the two images you described would be tolerable and / or frowned upon.

As you know, the US casually displays graphic violence and war imagery on the evening news and no one bats an eye. Have a " wardrobe malfunction " during a televised event, however, and people absolutely lose their f***ing minds. The torches and pitchforks come out of storage and everyone runs in little circles for a week or two demanding that someone " DO SOMETHING ! "

Until the new season of $favorite_show starts back up or some other scandalous event happens and everyone forgets about everything.

Were my family ( whom also registers fairly high on the religious-o-meter ) to learn of the artwork I collect and or some of the animations I've done, I'm pretty sure I would be disbarred and they would simply refuse to acknowledge I even exist at all. Thus, I typically work on things in secret ( at work or late at night ) and even post some of those under a second pseudonym.

As a result, the artwork I display in my room that is visible to the public is very much of the SFW variety while some of the more eye opening ( and interesting ) furry stuff is safely locked away in a heavily encrypted file folder.

I suppose I could just say " the hell with it " and just do whatever, but I find life in general to be far less annoying if I don't have to answer a whole lot of questions about what and why because my answers would just invite even more questions ( that they didn't know about like how religious I'm not ) and the whole thing would eventually devolve into something akin of the Spanish Inquisition.

Hell, my heathenistic view on religion would be enough for the family to summon the local exorcist to cast out the demons who most certainly have taken up residence within my body, thus do I just smile and nod my head when such questions are brought up.

Probably not the most satisfying way to live, but certainly a calmer / quieter and drama free one :D

I never had a problem with my parents, i had really grim dark posters and i had pretty nsfw posters, yeah actual sexual content, my mother often even liked the art as they where well drawen artowrks, and my father didn't really care as it was my room and my taste, so its my right to hang whatever i want on my walls...
But my parents where pretty awesom in that time of my life anyway!

My mom would probably be more grossed out and upset about the Berserk one. She doesn't like violence in stuff. So much that she won't watch movies or TV shows or anything that focus on fighting or violence.

Funny, cuz she loves Batman, but won't watch any batman movie.

Move to Europe. They are much cooler about nudity in media, but much more strict about violence.

"Why are the things society has set upon us become something that dictates our life into something that refuses to let our humanity experience happiness?"

Capitalism. Engaging one behavior means your money spent going into the "correct" pockets (which is to say, money to the ruling class), engaging in the other behavior means your money spent going to the "incorrect" pockets, if money ends up being spent AT ALL, which is even worse than giving money to bad people!

You want to know why society is fucked? It has nothing to do with an inherent flaw in humanity, it has nothing to do with us all being garbage... It has everything to do with the people in power putting us into a system where we tolerate, and promote, and live by, the commodification and cheapening of what makes us human.

I think that in a way it might be how “decency” is see throughout the different generations, its ok to enjoy certain artwork or movies, but when it comes to say, putting up a nude print we bought from here, we might not want it up when neighbors are over or hide it, we may like it but we still sense that line of decency and restrain ourselves, I don’t think its bad but i do see it and do question it, but i feel my own decency won’t let me change it, its weird that feeling of self restraint.

Sorry if it doesn’t make sense ^^;

Late to the party, so I'll just say it's instincts. Take chimpanzee behavior, plug a big honking associative forebrain on it - kind of like running an outdated operating system on a new CPU - power through the Errors^(TM), it'll be alright, right?

It's no accident we're like "...violence? ...meh", because casual violence is how primate bands keep order. Well, chimp-style primates, bonobos use casual sex to keep order. The Black Swordsman is an alpha male, we're programmed to feel his dominance through violence is right. Secondary instincts to hunt "monsters" who would otherwise hunt us, and protect our tribe's territory - the Art of such a poster is in plucking the raw template for a "predator" out of our brains - claws, teeth, horns, but no specific species - and drawing it directly - a "demon".

It's also no accident we're "S-s-sex??? WUAAAAAAAHHH!!!!!" *spazzout* We are chimp-style primates who have alpha males dominate the females... until they skulk in the bushes with the beta male, while the alpha is busy with some omega female. We're programmed to go crazy with rage at others sex, but also wanting some ourselves, to optimize this #FaithfulNotFaithful mating strategy. That the mere sight of a female of our species can give us such strong reactions, is proof enough.


Personally, I find violence disturbing, and nudity beautiful, but I'm over myself. I'm not one to judge someone for a poster on the wall - if I'm asking it's because I want you to tell me why you love the things you love.

I'm going to guess you grew up in the US? I know we have wildly messed up 'values' regarding nudity, sex and violence.

I grew up in a mormon household, and I remember Violence and nudity being despised. My mother hated and still hates horror movies and overly violent action movies.