Would you rather feel the result of a hand job or a hand grenade?  Given the obvious answer, one would think that sex would be less taboo than violence in this country.

But the late great George Carlin once said, “America was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free.”

And this double standard has continued throughout American history all the way from Thomas Jefferson’s penning of the Declaration of Independence to President Barack Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech where he defended the war in Afghanistan.  Our country acting against its own best interest is not limited to just politics either.  It exists in entertainment too.  Violence is seemingly more accepted than sex in American culture.

Pornography is perceived as a vice.  But the same activities captured on film or in print in that industry are some of the most pleasurable experiences people can share.  And yet, violence, a crime and the deliberate harm of others, fuels music, games, film, television and literature like gasoline to a fire.

I spoke to a few individuals in the sex and entertainment industries about this odd dichotomy.

“Because people are actually having sex on camera, that takes the expression of sexuality to another level,” Joanne Cachapero, the Membership Director of the Free Speech Coalition, said.  “It’s confusing.  Why is it okay for actors to have actual sex in John Cameron Mitchell’s mainstream film Short Bus, but not in a title like Big Booty Busters #19?”

Nevertheless, according to a report CNBC did in 2009, every second over $3,000 dollars is being spent on the porn business and 28,000 Internet users are viewing it.  Also, every thirty-nine minutes a pornographic film is being produced in the United States.  Therefore, there is clearly a high supply and demand for the adult entertainment industry.

I asked Brittany Clapper, an actress on the short-lived NBC show The Playboy Club, for her thoughts on the matter.

Brittany Clapper

“I suppose that people are uncomfortable with their sexuality,” she replied.  “However, if I had children I would much rather them see a little cleavage and an implied sexual situation than to have them watching people shooting at each other, blood splattering everywhere and dying.”

Joanne expressed similar sentiments to me as well.

“In our society, violence may be more acceptable because most people will never commit an act of extreme violence in their life.  But sexual behavior is much more difficult to control, and so, much more potentially subversive and ‘dangerous.’  First, everyone has sex.  And everyone has hang- ups around sex so the line is not as clear-cut.”

Award-winning adult film actress and September 2008 Penthouse Pet Kayden Kross shared with me a slightly different perspective.

September 2008 Penthouse Pet Kayden Kross

“I think the most inappropriate thing you can do to sex is put it in a narrow box that very few people can comfortably fit inside of.”

When it comes to sex, to each his or her own I say.  All I know is that I would rather get calluses from pulling back the foreskin on my penis than the hammer on a gun anytime.

Words: Shad Reed [SReed0508@gmail.com]

Photographs: courtesy of Brittany Clapper and Kayden Kross