Conservatives protest Kinsey film biography: Sex researcher blamed for AIDS and divorce rate
He found pedophiles all over the country, sought them out and encouraged them to engage in sex with children and report on it to him. The film effectively treats Kinsey as a tragic hero, a scientist — a wacko scientist, perhaps, but a scientist. Kinsey was never a scientist. He was a change agent — the most significant agent of change in American cultural life in the 20th century. The consequences of this sexual adventurism include AIDS, sexually transmitted diseases, child sexual abuse, incest and pornography.
- Judith Reisman
This controversy might seem at first glance to be just another attempt by those afraid of sex to drag us kicking and screaming back to the 17th century. Unfortunately, you’d be dangerously wrong if you were to ignore the threat posed by these moralizers.
With national political power firmly in the hand of Conservative Republicans, it does not take an abundance of imagination to see these troglodytes legislating us back something akin to Pleasantville.
While I can understand and respect the difference in opinion, I wonder how many of the folks protesting Kinsey have even bothered to see the movie? I’d hazard a guess that the fact the movie is about sex was enough to trigger this organized outrage and that precious few of them know ANYTHING about the movie other than it’s “about sex”.
Conservative Christian groups nationwide are protesting a film about sex researcher Alfred Kinsey, calling it a Hollywood whitewash of the man they hold largely responsible for the sexual revolution and a panoply of related ills, from high divorce rates to AIDS and child abuse….
“For those who think of people of faith as poor, uneducated and easy to command, I’m sure it would be amusing to see people praying outside of theaters,” Focus on the Family spokeswoman Kristi Hamrick said. “But we want to have a serious intellectual conversation about who Kinsey was and what he did.”
Robert Knight, director of the conservative Culture and Family Institute in Washington, said evangelical Christian and Roman Catholic groups also want to bring to bear the political clout they demonstrated in the presidential election.
“Just as Reagan was not content to contain communism but announced a rollback, pro-family organizations are not content to protest the latest outrage anymore, but will seek legislation and will punish sponsors of lewd entertainment,” he said.
Knight acknowledged, however, that some opponents of the Kinsey film may be reluctant to try to punish its distributor, Fox Searchlight, owned by conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch.
But of course…Murdoch is one of their own, so he should be immune from any “punishment”. If the distributor had been a Liberal Democrat, the response would have been CRY HAVOC AND LET LOOSE THE DOGS OF WAR. This attitude ought to be, if nothing else, taken as an example of the hypocrisy involved in this argument. In the end, this argument has little to do with morality and everything to do with political power.
Given that the film seems to have a frank and open discussion of sex as a central theme, I can see where Conservatives may feel they have a legitimate gripe. How many of these folks will even bother to see the film? Or is the fact that Kinsey is largely about sex enough to earn their condemnation?
There really is a very simple solution to this problem. Let the marketplace work it’s magic. If you think that you might find Kinsey objectionable, DON’T SEE IT. If enough people who think like you stay away, the film will have a short run in theaters and will end up dying quietly on video. The more noise Conservatives make, the more free publicity Kinsey gets, and the more people who will see the movie just to find out what all the fuss is about. Is that really what you’re after?
As far as I’m concerned, I seriously doubt I’ll see Kinsey. It’s not that I have a problem with the subject matter. I’m actually interested in the movie, but not so much so that I want to pay $7 in order to see it.
Memo to those who would waste much time and energy protesting Kinsey: if you’re opposed to this film, stay home. No one is forcing you to see something that you are morally opposed to. Given that we live in a free country, though, how about letting the rest of us make our own decisions for our own reasons? If you want to legislate morality, move to Iran.
So you wouldn't protest a movie about that heroic medical researcher, Dr. Mengele, just because he used a few unwilling Jews for his research. I mean after all, what do the lives of these few mean in the face of the benefits of Mengele's quest to help humanity?
Kinsey used a known pedophile, who then went out and kept copious notes on victims he selected to meet Kinsey's specifications, to gather data on child sexuality. He didn't just protect the pervert, he paid and sponsored him. This movie glosses over the evil perpetrated by Kinsey in order to lionize his results -- results that are now often questioned by researchers in the field itself.
Kinsey was no hero -- he was a monster.
You know, Greg, you have an unfailingly ingenious way of twisting my words and completely missing the meaning of what I have written. What you are talking about is not even an apples-to-apples comparison. I cannot even imagine how you can make this comparison with a straight face. It's absurd on it's face and not even worthy of pursuing.
Come back when you've actually read what I have to say and can discuss it objectively without contorting into something virtually unrecognizable....
Actually, Jack, the problem is that you don't even understand what the protests are about.
Would you advise Jewish groups to "Let the marketplace work it’s magic" in the case of the Mengele film I suggested? Would you suggest that the rabbis move to Iran for wanting to "legislate morality" when they protested the glorification of an evil man?
Not having seen the documentary, and having no interest in doing so, I cannot comment as to its content. What concerns me most is this statement:
> "Just as Reagan was not content to contain communism but announced a rollback, pro-family organizations are not content to protest the latest outrage anymore, but will seek legislation and will punish sponsors of lewd entertainment,"
This is legislating morality, plain and simple. It is an attempt to thrust that moral point of view on people attempting to exercise their first amendment rights.
And coming from organizations that embarked on knee-jerk protests against _The Last Temptation of Christ_, I do not have confidence that they will stop with documentaries that are in any way comparable with bad documentaries that extol the virtues of Dr. Mengele. While I would understand the need to ban such a documentary, this is a very slippery slope to be strapping skis on beside, and my bias, and I think all of our biases should be against legislative action.
The only proper response when you are confronted with something you don't like is to say _why_ you don't like it, to put out your counterpoints and show why whats-his-name was a monster, and how the documentarian is covering up or glossing over those flaws. Anything beyond that is dangerous to democracy.
Now the problem with saying that passing a law to do X is wrong because it legislates morality is that:
A) Some 90% of legislation is intended to legislate morality ("X is bad, therefore it must be banned/reduced", or "X is good, therefore it must be mandated/encouraged.");
B) The very statement that legislating morality is wrong is, in and of itself, a statement of moral judgement.
Greg, do you have to work to be this dense?
It's a film. It's intended to make money. If it doesn't make money other films like it won't get made.
If it generates controversy and thus gains free PR and a bigger audience, it will make money. Every film that makes money spawns legions of imitators.
Now, if you want to make your documentary about Mengele, go ahead. My protest won't take the form of wanting to jail you for advocating his work, nor will I seek to outlaw the showing of your documentary. I will, however, want to point out not just the historical context of Mengele's work but the overweening evil of the system in which he was able to do his work.
Kinsey may have been a monster; I've no idea, and frankly I don't care. I saw ads for the movie and thought it would be stupid. (Doesn't surprise me that the Religious Right wants it banned: it shows that their perfect world of the 1950s wasn't perfect at all!)
But there may be somebody out there whose curiosity is piqued -- and that person might learn something, or enjoy the film.
So who am I, or who are you, to deny them?
Because what they might learn from your documentary of Mengele is that the ends don't justify the means? Or because what they might enjoy about your documentary of Mengele is that justice does exist, and the truly malevolent meet it eventually despite all the power and bluster they can call to arms to protect them?