Wednesday, December 29, 2004
I want my word back!
Anything labelled “Adult” has come to mean “erotic”. As if childhood is a walled garden of innocence, protected from and oblivious to all sexuality with adulthood an endless round of orgies and sex-toys, swinging and pornography. This distinction must be broken down. Physical attraction exists between children, and although an important part of adult life, sex is by no means the defining characteristic of maturity. I can live with “erotic” - even if that which proclaims itself as such tends to be anything but - but an “adult” entertainment could as easily be concerned with house prices, ethics, ageing and vanishing dreams – anything complex enough to lose a child’s interest. This post was provoked by my girlfriend’s Dad giving her a book entitled, “Adult Origami”. He thought that the title was to demonstrate that it was difficult, but actually… you’ve guessed the rest. (And no, I’m not quite sure how he managed to make the mistake either.) I was talking about it with Marty yesterday. He described it as (and here I put words in his mouth) a piece of officially sanctioned naughtiness, akin to those soul-destroying “cheeky” Christmas presents. From there we went on to the crushing conformism of Cambridge graduates, their need to have their fun officially stamped and their terror of simply existing, outside of structures, ladders and well defined roads to achievement; stiflingly rigid in approach to career, life and personal relationships (incidentally, this includes those well-worn “alternative” routes) there is a terror of improvisation – they can’t dig on Bird. But that, my friends, is another post altogether! Hope you’re all enjoying your holidays, sooner or later I’ll start working through the backlog of notes I’ve taken over the last week. Bet you can’t wait.
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Anything labelled “Adult” has come to mean “erotic”. As if childhood is a walled garden of innocence, protected from and oblivious to all sexuality with adulthood an endless round of orgies and sex-toys, swinging and pornography. This distinction must be broken down. Physical attraction exists between children, and although an important part of adult life, sex is by no means the defining characteristic of maturity. I can live with “erotic” - even if that which proclaims itself as such tends to be anything but - but an “adult” entertainment could as easily be concerned with house prices, ethics, ageing and vanishing dreams – anything complex enough to lose a child’s interest. This post was provoked by my girlfriend’s Dad giving her a book entitled, “Adult Origami”. He thought that the title was to demonstrate that it was difficult, but actually… you’ve guessed the rest. (And no, I’m not quite sure how he managed to make the mistake either.) I was talking about it with Marty yesterday. He described it as (and here I put words in his mouth) a piece of officially sanctioned naughtiness, akin to those soul-destroying “cheeky” Christmas presents. From there we went on to the crushing conformism of Cambridge graduates, their need to have their fun officially stamped and their terror of simply existing, outside of structures, ladders and well defined roads to achievement; stiflingly rigid in approach to career, life and personal relationships (incidentally, this includes those well-worn “alternative” routes) there is a terror of improvisation – they can’t dig on Bird. But that, my friends, is another post altogether! Hope you’re all enjoying your holidays, sooner or later I’ll start working through the backlog of notes I’ve taken over the last week. Bet you can’t wait.
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