Are Sex and Nudity Bad?
Sex and nudity are strange concepts in western society. This is especially true for women – regarding nudity, a woman’s clothing choices are up for public debate her entire life. Like, school dress codes have long perpetuated the idea that her clothing choices somehow dictate her value as a person. School officials often monitor things as irrelevant as tank tops with thin straps, which sends a powerful message on how girls need to dress performatively, i.e., they need to acclimate themselves to society, or else there will be consequences.
In America, this concept of monitoring how women dress echoes our wholly unproductive approach to sex education… and calling it “sex education” is a stretch. It’s more like, “if you have sex before marriage, terrible things happen” education. The Journal of Adolescent Health published a study focusing on the effectiveness of abstinence-only education, and the findings are (not) shocking: it doesn’t work (Santelli et al., 2017). And while it doesn’t work, that doesn’t mean it isn’t ineffective; it’s just effective in the wrong ways.
By teaching abstinence, we vilify the act itself. This creates an environment where sex cannot be discussed openly or safely, which opens the floodgates for ill-informed, secretive actions. Needless to say, these teachings follow us into adulthood. People often think that talking about sex is taboo, and many shy away from it. Certain religions (not naming any names, but you know) commonly promote the idea that sex before marriage is sacrilegious and is a surefire way to pave your path toward The Dark Side. So, while we may be years past the “sexed education” we had to sit through in middle school, we are still plagued by conflicting, confusing messages about nudity and sex.
With all of that said, sex and nudity sell. The pornography industry takes in anywhere from $15 billion to $97 billion a year (Naughton, 2018). Outside of adult videos, industries like clothing, self-care, and (not inherently sexual) entertainment like music, television, films, and more all utilize sex-appeal and partial or full nudity to sell their products or services. People want to consume sex and nudity. Yet, for some reason, there’s a huge disconnect between public opinion and how we allow ourselves to consume it.
So, this begs the question: are sex and nudity bad? If our society both demonizes and values it, how can we possibly navigate a sex saturated world without getting a big, throbbing headache?
The answer is pretty simple: sex and nudity aren’t actually bad. They’re natural – like, none of us would be here without sex and nudity. Because, you know, one can’t happen without the other. It should be completely normal to discuss sex among consenting adults like we would discuss our favorite morning coffee or our preference of movie genre. Sex and nudity are a natural part of life. The more we can talk about it, the healthier a relationship we will have with it.
Regarding Video Games…
Obviously, there’s a reason that we’re talking about this. House Party, our player-choice game, has moments of sex and nudity. Because, well, what’s a good house party without those things? While the game focuses on comedy and storytelling, House Party has nonetheless gained a reputation as a sex game or an explicit game. We’re even banned from Twitch because the game contains options for (if you pay for the explicit content add-on) graphic sexual encounters. Mind you, the encounters are always enthusiastically consensual, and you have to work your a** off to achieve them.
But yeah, there’s sex in our game. There’s comedy and pranks and puzzles to solve and stories to hear and relationships to make or break. And sex. We made a game all about having fun at a party. We’ve heard sex is fun… so we focus on sex positivity.
Our game rewards “good” decisions like supporting, empathizing, or assisting NPCs and penalizes “bad” ones like being misogynistic, hurtful, or dishonest. It’s designed to encourage goofy creativity and make you laugh. Sex and nudity are a bonus to hard work and dedication to tasks, so if you don’t want to see them, you do not have to go down those paths.
That said, if you do want to see them, see them! Sex is not bad, and neither is nudity. Don’t get lost in the sex scenes, though – there are still lots of debaucherous shenanigans to get into, like saving Lety from Leah’s sales pitch for a personal defense studio or helping Amy complete her sorority’s scavenger hunt so she can make more friends.
And, if you’re interested in House Party now… you can buy it on Steam, EPIC Games, and GOG.
References:
Naughton, J. (2018, December 30). Growth of internet porn tells us more about ourselves than technology | John Naughton. The Guardian. Retrieved November 7, 2022, from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/30/internet-porn-says-more-about-ourselves-than-technology
Santelli, J. S., Grilo, S. A., Lindberg, L. D., Speizer, I. I. S., Schalet, A., Heitel, J., Kantor, L. M., McGovern, T., Ott, M. A., Lyon, M. E., Rogers, J., Heck, C. J., & Mason-Jones, A. J. (2017, September 1). Abstinence-only-until-marriage policies and programs: An updated position paper of the Society for Adolescent Health and medicine. Journal of Adolescent Health. Retrieved November 7, 2022, from https://www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(17)30297-5/fulltext
