In my Imperium no one gives a **** about anyone's sexuality because honestly it doesn't mater. What maters is that they pay their tithe, have faith in the Emperor, and don't consort with their enemies. Sure they're are plenty of prejudiced people/governments out there, but as long as they follow the golden three above the Imperium lets them do what they will.

Ok let me answer your question with another question.

If your character human? If yes then that's all that matters if no then prepare to burn filthy xeno scum. The Imperium of Man is just that an empire built on the divine right of the Emperor to rule the Universe. Long as your not praising Slannesh there won't be a problem as things like Racisim, Sexisim are long gone by the year 40,000 its all about Humanity vs the Alien, the Heretic and the Muant

Sexuality is never going to be dealt with in any depth by Games Workshop. Its a game aimed primarily at teens and young adults, and as such GW are never going to put themselves in a position where any aspect of sexuality or even race, colour, creed etc will be portrayed negatively or even brought up at such a formative point in the lives of its consumers, where they may be confused or forming their own opinions on these matters. The novels aimed at a more literate/fantacial audeince may mention it in passing but again are unlikely to dwell on such issues for long.

'In universe' this creates a rough hole of non-discussion where any 'isms' might have been. Now given the vastness of the Imperium, its huge cultural differences, and its crushing oppression is it reasonable to think that there is no persecution of minority groups? The joy of DH is you can get past the broad strokes and create your own detail. Whether sexuality is interesting to you as a GM and your players can only really be dealt with by each group indivdually.

For my own view the Imperium obviously persecutes minorities, as they represent difference, which is bad (to the Imperium). I base this off of the fact that several groups are mentioned as being held in suspicion (mutants, psykers, offworlders, voidborn..) which may result in persecution depending on the world. There is no reason, that I can see, that this persecution would not extend to others that display difference in more minor ways, such as skin colour, height or sexual oreintation (all of which could be viewed as mutations). Obviously the extent of persecution varies depending on the world and how much it knows about the greater Imperium. Seeing something 'different' would lead many of us to feel curiousity. The Imperium teaches that an 'open mind is a castle with its gates open and unbarred' and to 'trust in your fear'.

Obviously because the Imperium is so vast what is 'different' varies greatly from world to world. There are worlds populated entirely by short people, others with hair all over, others where over population has caused homosexuality to become law.

Whatever keeps the backdrop interesting, rather than just a generic planet with added dystopia but I recognise that dealing with uncomfortable situations may not be everyones idea of fun.

DivinatorVictus said:

Excuse me... you're talking about a game that has the Choas God of BDSM with his/her/its multi-breasted daemonettes and, on the Imperial side, half naked nuns running across the battlefield carrying chainsaws... and those are just the examples I can think of off the top of my head. Meanwhile, both Eisenhorn and Ravenor series of novels discuss sexuality in simple, clear, mature terms. To say that GW doesn't deal with sexuality is to ignore the source material entirely.

the way GW discusses sex is anything but mature. While there are extremely rare instances of sex, they always happen off camera and are rarely referenced (the Black Library Writers' Guidelines are very clear on this). Just because they made the concession of getting Eisenhorn laid (once, off camera) doesn't make it mature or anything resembling mature. Sadly it's more like the James bond movies in terms of sexual content (vs te books). It's assumed the average GW readership is about 12: They're ready to hear sex happens, but not hear about it.

For what it's worth, homosexuality, in my view, would never be illegal within the imperium, but you'd probably find some who stigmatise it socially. A dispassionate, calculating Hereticus inquisitor might consider it noteworthy in a small way, believing sexual deviants are more likely to succumb to outright heresy, but even then in a way that's not stronger than say, modern racial profiling.

Locque said:

I would agree that naked nuns, BDSM gods and multi-breasted demons do not represent a mature handing of sex. I disagree that sex happening off camera do not represent a mature handling of sex. Often, in my experience, sex happening off camera represents a much more mature handling of the topic then explicate sex on camera.

Locque said:

... So your idea of "mature handling" is having a full blown pornographic scene?

If that's the case, then I couldn't disagree with you more. A mature author knows that a full blown, in-detail sex scene doesn't provide anything at all for the story. And most mature readers will realize that inclusions of such scenes i mostly capitalizing and gimmicky in nature, where the author hopes to evoke thinking along with the: "ohh, them's getting they freak on in tihs book, im goings to get a boner and them magazines will write stuf abouts this stuff too" - line of thought.

Pornography has never been mature, even if the censor ratings require that you are of a mature age to watch it (or read about it in some countries). It's about as mature as watching teletubbies, because it evokes equally advanced lines of thinking (in other words, not very advanced at all).

So off-camera sex, is quite frankly, the mature way to go...

Varnias Tybalt said:

Did I say, or imply that a full-blown "pornographic" scene is mature?

Quite the straw man you've constructed for yourself there.

Mature is dealing with it in a grownup manner without using the word "bosoms". And frankly, it's quite possible to be explicit without being pornographic, especially given all GW literature is already pornography, albeit not sexual in nature. There's a hilarious double standard there between sex and the full blown adolescent violent fantasy that is GW literature, and the idea of bowing to the prevailing taste concensus that violence is okay and sex is wrong only reinforces this. The problem you've highlighted-that sex included in a book will seem gimmicky and capitalising, is a problem with the readership, not with the books in question. While some things are simply a matter of taste (I find the "camera fade" technique unbearably corny, like old james bond films. You obviously don't. that's fine, it's about taste, I guess) But there is one thing that you've said that is utterly, indisputably and completely wrong: that a graphic sex scene doesn't provide anything for the story. I'm waiting for some of our better read forumites to flood in and back me up on this. A sex scene can, in the hands of a writer of any actual skill, tell you just as much about the character or story as any other scene, be it a battle scene, dream sequence, drinking tea, investigation, arguing, any activity you care to mention.

On another note, GW has stepped back from its more mature elements. Anyone remember when daemonettes had six nipples? Not anymore. I personally had no problems whatsoever with a BDSM bisexual hermaphroditic deity of evil, it's just disappointing that this was the only representation of sexuality of any kind that GW had. All of the very best fantasy worlds are all-encompassing and complete. GW has furnished us with tonnes of material for all aspects of 40k, although some have more attention lavished upon them than others.

Locque said:

Really? The new daemonette model on my shelf has ... wait, let me count... oh, you're right, she only has four nipples.

Locque said:

I am one of those forumites, thank you very much. And I don't agree with you at all in this matter. Hopefully you won't demand me to prove myself, because a ****-measuring contest of how many books you've read would not be a very mature way of handling things, now would it?

So instead of just conforming to a majority and hoping that the majority will "back you up". Why not defend your argument yourself? Are you unable to do so, or is there another reason?

Please, do explain why you feel that graphic sex scenes provides anything to the story. I have yet to see one or read about one that have been anything but a gimmick that was blatantly intended to appeal to my sexual parts of the brain and hopefully hypnotize me into thinking that the book or movie is better than it actually is. THAT! My friend, is corniest of the corny...

Varnias Tybalt said:

While I, personally, have no particular interest in seeing sexualy explicite scenes in a 40k book (or neccessarily any fantasy novel ... there is some very well written erotica on the market for those who are interested in such) I will have to disagree with the assertion that sex scenes in novels are always meant to be gimmicky and nothing more. The "Song of Ice and Fire" series had a couple sex scenes which did add something to the narative ... though it also had a couple which added nothing ... my point being, the author tackled the subject of sex in a dark and gritty world in a fairly mature and unashamed manner.

And I feel that is how the matter should be addressed, be it in your game or the products: mature and unashamed. I feel part of what makes the issue so difficult to discuss in a gaming book is the perception that speaking of sex is something shameful and taboo - and that ends up carrying over in the writing.

Jack of Tears said:

You mean kind of the same way that the PC game "The Witcher" handled the subject of sex in a "dark and gritty" manner?

.. Im sorry, I just felt too compelled to joke about it... And it'll probably happen again but I'll try not to.

Jack of Tears said:

Oh yes, shame and taboo are not personal turn-on's of mine (DAMNIT! I said I was gonna try not to be witty about it and look how long that lasted! )

It's just that, why does off camera sex have to be an indication of taboo or shame? Can it not be more about skipping past the net average a "sesion of f**ing" (I don't like to self-censor but apparently the internet has taught me that replacing a few letters with the " * "-sign will make the word more kid-friendly) usually takes in order to move on to the more interesting parts of the story?

I mean, we're all adults here (I hope), and we have all been told about the "flowers and the bee's" and im going to assume that all of us have experienced it for ourselves (if some of you haven't then you are not obligated to tell us, and even if you do I for one would not snicker and respect you any less).

Basically, we all know how it works and what it does to people. How much "new" and "story driven" material could you possibly add to the subject other than: "this man and woman, or woman and woman, or man and man, or man, woman and woman... (lucky bastard!) Fancies eachother or just feel a bit horny and want's to get eachother off and they proceed to do so in their preferable way" ? Not very much.

You can just as unashamedly and taboo-lessly say: "They f*ck..." and most of us will have a more or less "rough idea" of what it entails, without any interjected purple prose or other excessively overly-romantic hollywood bull where a man and a woman are "ever so gently" rubbing against eachother in a blue or red or pink backlight to the tunes of some sappy song playing in the background.

Remember that sugar-coating it can be just as indicative of feelings of shame or taboo than a camera-fade out. Sort of like a nerotic writer or director going:

Oh no! This depiction is just "too rough" and "unromantic". We have to add some backlight of an exotic colour and have the actors move a lot slower as not to look like humping animals, and also we have to have some sappy song playing in the background, and remember to add a lot of lit candles to the props in the background. And for GOD's SAKE people, we can't have any nipples showing or being described, lest we taint another generation with smut and sin!

You know what I mean?

It's such a mundane subject that there is pretty much nothing you can do as a writer or director to make it more interesting than it already is. It's like trying to go into great detail of how taking a **** in on the toilet feels like, or how drinking a glass of water feels like and at the same time "mysteriously" transform it into something that drives the story ahead...

Varnias Tybalt said:

Oh the reason I'm not doing it myself is because I'm A: not very literate, B: an intellectual dwarf, and C: in-between movies in a zombie movie marathon with my girlfriend, who's visiting from overseas. But for the record, Shakespeare included sex (though not sex scenes) in his plays, to surprisingly little furore, but texts like the graphic novel Watchmen have used sex to further the story without resorting to outright titillation, not to mention Hellblazer, V for Vendetta... What's that? you can't hear me with alan Moore's **** in my mouth? Fine. Those are my examples. What makes you think sex can't be used to further a story. How you have sex can say as much or more about your character (and set the tone of a story) just as much as how someone is or isn't killed, how they speak, how they comport themselves in social situations etc. It's simply a natural part of life, and I don't see why it needs to be so clumsily excised so often. This isn't to say that every tale of the Grey Knights involves a blow by blow account (pardon the expression) of what the Slaaneshi cultists are up to. Now, not all GW has been as twee or childish as Eisenhorn or Ravenor about it (my favourite BI novels, incidentally). C.L. Werner's Witch Hunter series, which I'm in the middle of, has actually managed to treat sex with some modicum of maturity (apart from Streng's cartoonish womanising). While my above examples of sexuality being used intelligently in a narrative are all graphic novels, you'll find sex being used intelligently in a lot of media. The play Equus (if you've seen it and not just read about Daniel radcliffe's nudity), Oedipus, Movies like Secretary, Irreversible, Fight Club, Basic Instinct, have all used sex at some point to further the narrative, while Steven Erikson's Malazan book of the Fallen, and the Song of Ice and Fire series have both had sex scenes that, while not absolutely integral to the plot, did further the story or characters without being gratuitous. Why is it you think appealing to the "sexual parts of the brain" is different in any way to appealing to the violent parts? As I stated above, GW literature is already pornography in the literal sense, so it's not like any of its dubious artistic merit would be stained.

Locque, I think I largely agree with you (and that Varnias is misrepresenting or misunderstanding what you're getting at). If I might try to restate the point in a more concillatory manner:

- Well written scenes can contain explicit sex.

That is: They don't need to, nor do they need not to, but they can. Containing explicit sex doesn't make a chapter any less or more 'good' on that alone, or at least I don't see literature and fiction in that manner. In essence: A well written piece is a well written piece. If its content is warporn as we're used to, fine. If it's a touching soliloquary from an endearing character, hooray. If it's a three-person psy-**** and induced vision between G'kar and Molari (and Kosh), then also hooray.

That is: If someone feels they can develop a character (or pair [or more]) by having a sex scene, fine. I've no interest in reading porn or erotica, but graphic or explicit sex needn't be necessarily porn or erotica. It can, afterall, just be a section in a SF or Fantasy novel.

With that in mind, it's worth putting that 40k is very tolerant of tons of deviancy, but also intolerant of other deviancy. Frivolous sex might be in one story reprehensible, but in the next the norm. Similarly this applies to monogamy, personal sexuality, social customs, norms, daemon-assaults etc. It changes from topic to topic and place to place. A sensible outlook on it, IMO, would be one which permits a broad spectrum of sexuality 'in line with human nature'. One would assume that as science progresses it is evident what optimal formats for entire societies are. As massive organisms themselves, it is possible that Imperial science (in places) is able to recognise optimum configurations of people, places, jobs, industries, municipal facilities and so forth for optimum setups. This similarly applies to crime, 'black market' endeavours so forth. They might be able to make sensible judgements as to 'what is the recommended policy' (e.g. don't steal, be gay, be whatever you like, obey the law, be productive), but recognise there will be some deviance from the mean (or other statistical indicators).

Having recognised this possibility, they might then realise that humans aren't exactly a homogenous bunch and that there is a wide and complicated (but still describable [and indeed, possibly, a controllable/prescribable]) variety of things at work. Most of your 'standard' sexualities will be recognised, as with psych profiles and psychic-registers and so forth. It's big, it's complicated...but the information's there surely. They just need to examine it.

If, in writing, they note that such societies have these ideas ("it's likely that about 6% will be homosexual, with a seperate division of ~40% of the entire population being unfaithful to their partners at some point, but 92% of partnerships leading to essentially stable relationships anyway..."), they'll only react to it as 'deviancy' if it radically changes from what they expect. (If they disover a massive homosexual only-coven that involves every single breeding human on the planet...)

Putting it in this way permits the regulation of the societies to go forth in an informative way.

However

There's also likely to be tons of stupid ideas, ill-formed ideas, mistaken thoughts and generally misleading information. It's similarly possible that somewhere there's a large population who believe anyone who has sex after their second conception is a sinner in the eyes of the Emperor, or that procreating within the same city is reprehensible folly (by way of execution, if discovered!). There's tons of room for legislated idiocy, common buffoonery and casual bigottry. It strikes me that the 'horrific ideas' come from topics less mad than sexuality. Excess, fanaticism, ignorance are all bigger and more fundamental issues within the Imperium. Picking a topic is only the first step!

Also, one of the most accurate depictions for many of the scenes in BLP novels is 'Warporn'. There's massive battles and so forth which, for me, are little more than graphic descriptions of stuff going 'boom'. Often they're populated with things which make my brain go "That's not right" or "That's just silly" (much in the same way that reverse cow-girl is common in pornography to the almost complete exclusion of missionary, yet in reality one would infer that missionary is much more common). It really depends on what you're reading for. For my part, I gloss over most of the battle scenes, they're just not that interesting to me and yet I imagine many folks out there love it. (Though I doubt people react to warporn in the same way as regular porn: I don't imagine it engenders sexual stimulation)

Xisor said:

Probably not in most cases, but it's still stimulation in a similar manner, I would think. I've seen people looking up fight scenes from movies on youtube and watching them in a similar fashion to the way I've seen people consume pornography that's sexual in nature. It's all porn, one way or another.

Locque said:

... Okay, if you say so!

Locque said:

Excuse me if im not very receptive to Shakespeare being used as an example, but I've always found the man to be a mediocre hack. But then again that has always been a "problem" of mine, that I have the balls to speak out against what I think is bad, despite some works being so academically canonized and so far up the poser-intellectuals rear ends that they tend to be a bit snippy when I have to pull those works out and show them just how bad they are.

Bringing up Shakespeare in a litterature debate is like bringing up Hitler and the Third Reich in a political debate.

Locque said:

Now we're talking!

Please take out a measuring stick and compare exactly how much Nite Ow'ls fumbly, oafish attempts in the sack or Walter Kovac's mom being a ***** contributed to the story in comparison to Dr Manhattan being ripped to his bare atoms due to a science experiment going wrong, and Ozymandias pretty much exterminating the people of New York and unleashing the carcass of a giant alien horror (im not going to use the ending of the movie but the comicbook here).

And then ask yourself: which contributed the most in furthering the overall story? Which of them carried the most awe-inspiring aspects with them?

I don't know about you, but seeing Nite Owl being pretty fumbly in the sack wasn't exactly a jaw-dropping moment for me. In fact, it could be seen miles away before it even happened. It didn't develop or "evolve" his character at all, all it did was to provide a rather self-explanatory and obvious aspect of his character. But then again, I might be superhuman for predicting that was how he'd "preform"?

But trying to get Alan Moore taking out sex-scenes of his personal works is pretty hard. He seems to be a rather rooted humanist-anarchist and because of that he's bound to include such mundane things, no matter how obvious and self-explanatory these scenes will be to the overall story.

But personally I can stomach it, because the overall story he creates is always most satisfactory, which means I can overlook these minor flaws.

Locque said:

I think I explained that in a response to Jack of all Tears. But if there are any more specific questions you have then don't refrain from asking them.

Locque said:

I disagree. How a person has sex doesn't have to describe what kind of a person you are, despite what that hack and pseudo-scientist Freud might have tried to teach people.

You might as well try to convince me that how a person eats Oreo cookies can tell you what kind of a person you are. I prefer to just eat the whole cookie without pulling it apart and doing some other obscure stuff to it, does that mean I have undisclosed isues with my mother?

Locque said:

First of all I'd like to say that I have never once said that GW haven't used violence in their fiction in a pornographic manner.

Second, most of the works you mention (even if I haven't consumed them all. There's always something you haven't seen or read) didn't need graphic sex scenes to further the story.

However I would like to separate Irreversible from the rest, because that movie didn't include much sex, it included **** and the two are very different in motivation and nature. And as awful as graphic **** scenes can be, they tend to serve a more advanced purpose that graphic sex scenes do which is why I can accept them to a further extent than I can with sex scenes...

Locque said:

Just out of curiosity:

Would you consider the audience watching dancers or figure-skaters watching a sort of "porn-act" as well?

Is everything that stimulates you in a way "pornographic" in nature? Is shooting heroin a pornographic action?

Im not trying to say that your analogy is completely inappropriate, im just saying that the reasons people look things up are not always the reasons oune would think, regardless if it is fight scenes, sex scenes, recorded dance acts, figure-skaters or just shooting heroin.

Varnias Tybalt said:

There is something you said in an earlier post:

"Remember that sugar-coating it can be just as indicative of feelings of shame or taboo than a camera-fade out. Sort of like a nerotic writer or director going:

Oh no! This depiction is just "too rough" and "unromantic". We have to add some backlight of an exotic colour and have the actors move a lot slower as not to look like humping animals, and also we have to have some sappy song playing in the background, and remember to add a lot of lit candles to the props in the background. And for GOD's SAKE people, we can't have any nipples showing or being described, lest we taint another generation with smut and sin!"

Herein seems to be the crux of the matter, I have no problems with au natural depictions of sex, which have not been "sexed up" in any way, if you'll pardon the expression, but I appreciate that in texts of any kind, EVERYTHING is sexed up. Fighting with your hands does not look like that, nor does it work like that. Gun battles don't work like that. Arguments aren't like that in real life, so why should sex be any different in receiving its spray-polish and shrink-wrap? The act of sex is not, as you claim, as "mundane" as "taking a **** in the toilet" ("paging doktor Freud, paging doktor Freud...")

People won't pay money to **** in someone else's toilet, nor are there entire black market industries built around this. People won't break the law to **** publically and risk jail for the rest of their lives. there are not billion dollar industries around catering to the defecatory needs and desires of various niche groups of people and their bathroom preferences. While I'm being humorous, I think it's very obvious that sex is an extremely powerful human motivator, and few would debate that it's also an act of enormous, naked honesty, vulnerability, and imtimacy. How often have you learned something about a person in real life by having sex with them?

Regarding your most recent question I use the word "pornography" to describe something of dubious or no artistic merit, used gratuitously and designed purely for the gratification of the viewer.

In a world where the approved 'norm' of the Imperium is broad enough to include trillions of people, grotesquely misshapen Ogryns, plants and planets that attack people, and the kind of steampunk cybergear that is poured onto the characters, I can't imagine the gender of a sexual partner being of the smallest significance to anyone of rank in the Ecclesiarchy. Sexuality, and sex as a whole, is only a serious issue for us because we live in a world that is incredibly boring compared the that of the 40k universe, and so we focus on minutia. Control and monitoring of anything less than sex and/or breeding with xenos would be a complete waste of resources and energy.

If we are going to go down the 'sex scenes add nothing to the story' route, reading about how mighty brother bob exploded his hundredth cultist's head doesn't add anything to the story either. The majority of BL fiction is nothing but gratuitous descriptions of how one mighty warrior destroyed another mighty warrior and his dozen mooks. They are pure violent porn.

If I were writing about any normal person in a relationship, I couldn't really avoid sex without it looking obvious. Physical intimacy between lovers happens even when they aren't having sex. Jokes about sex are made, inuendo slung back and forth etc. If that's not how 'real' people act then call me a wierdo.

The simple fact is that removing elements that are common to any normal human's life from a story takes AWAY from the story. SImilarly, people swear far more than books describe. You can really see the differnce in speech in written text because very few people write the accents in either.

Hellebore

Firstly, I would like to point out that there actually are reasons why homosexuality might evolve. One the most compelling theories (and baesd on information concerning homosexual behaviour in the animal kingdom), is that it evolved as a social stabilizer, particularly in species where male would compete for breeding rights over a large number of females. Homosexual behaviour allows the other males (the ones left out out in the cold, so to speak) to placate their male aggression. It has also been noted (based on observation of primate species) that homosexual behaviour is common among the patriarchal communities. In species where only a small number of organisms breed, imagine the benefit brought on by having many members of the species have the close bond resulting from sex. The last thing in regrard to this that you have to remember is that evolution (which would have kled to the rise of homosexuality) is all about populations, not individuals, so even if the homosexual individuals don't reproduce, they have contributed to making other more fit, thus insuring that this trait is passed on.

Second, Locque, I have to disagree with you that how a person has sex doesn't tell you anything about them. The comparison between sex and eating oreos is terrible. Sex is possibley the most intimate act that we as living beings will ever perform, and that intimacy is what reveals so much about the person.

lastly, getting back to point of this thread: i think that as with many parts of life, you can as the gm can ignore completely unless you want to make life interesting or difficult for your players. I think that by-and-large people wouldn't really care, but you should feel free to have individuals, organizations, even entire city or planet cultures be homophobic to vbarying degrees. Thie important question you should always ask yourself is, will this make the game/story/scenario better?

The reason we all like to run around in the Grim-Dark-Future is that its unremitting visceral and spiritual horror is still preferable to the unremitting banality of our actual existence. I'd like to put sex/gender/sexuality distinctions and discrimination under the category of 'Banal' and treat it like Abnett does, with a casual and disinterested flick of the pen (as with Tobias Maxilla or Carl Thonius). As someone astutely pointed out above, these are daily concerns for us because life on earth is dull and absurd. This discussion is a bit like discussing what kind of Health Care Plan or Insurance providers are available to the Citizens of Scintilla. Its something we don't agonize over because its boring.

There may be an endless cavalcade of galaxy-consuming horror to keep a man up at night in the Imperium of Man, but at least he doesn't have to care about this kind of crap...IMHO...

That is why some folks in here are quickly resorting to discussing real-world attitudes towards sex/gender/sexuality rather than 40k attitudes...

And, speaking to the other argument, the way folks behave in bed is completely revealing of their character. In my experience, of course. And people's romantic lives (or lack thereof) are huge determiners of their behavior outside of the bedroom.

The Oreo reveals all, for a man with the eyes to see it...Somthing Freud (despite the protestations of his 'post modern' detractors -who never read him, incidentally) knew all too well.

Varnias Tybalt said:

And just who is Shakespear hacking, might I ask? The man has been dead for 400 years and his plays are still performed regularly, movies are based on them, books embrace their themes, people strive to emulate him. Saying you don't like Shakespear does not make you braver than anyone else, in fact I would say it makes you look like a pretentious prick (not calling you names, just telling you what it looks like) who believes denouncing something everyone else recognizes as genious will make him seem hip and academically "dangerous". The material can be difficult to read, especially if you haven't been taught how, (at least until you get into the rhythm) and some of the jokes are certainly dated, but he had a brilliant grasp of language, poetic imagery, and tongue in cheek wordplay. Without looking it up on the internet tell me the name of another 16th century playwrite. Only the ancient greeks - Sophocles, Euripides - can compete with him for the immortality of their works.

(note: Or, I suppose Gilgamesh, which is 2500 years older than the bible and still in print. Incidentally, I performed this epic a couple years ago and it was an intense experience ... I encourage anyone and everyone to read it.)

Varnias Tybalt said:

Not remotely like that, actually. He used sexual scenes to set up the relationship dynamics between certain characters, which went on to reflect in the story as a whole.

Varnias Tybalt said:

You missed my point. I'm saying that, when depicted, this sense of shame colors sexual encounters by making them sound silly - using terminology no live person would consider in order to defuse the scene and make it "less sexual". Most of the time I would prefer the "fade to black" approach, unless it adds something to the story ... and that is an important note: Sexual scenes can add something to the tale, but unless they are doing so I don't see the need for them. At the same time, however, if a scene is set up and skipped over the preceding text should indicate your intent - was it violent? Make the couple sentances prior indicate this; romantic? Same thing. Unless you are trying to tell us that sex is meaningless for the characters involved, tell us what it meant even if you don't show it.

Ok Varnias Ill take your earlier explanation that you don't like sex scenes as you feel they don't 'add' anything to the narrative and that sex is such a mundane activity everyone knows what it is, at face value.

Nonetheless you must acknowledge there is a constant stream of people that wont have had sex yet, that have not explored their sexuality or are confused by it. Art, whether written, filmed or visual can enable people to explore their sexuality and make considerations based on what they read/see. Obviously being able to explore with a mature partner is the best way to go about it, but is not always possible during these formative years (rejection, so cruel). It is far better to have 'truer' representations of sex avaiable to the audience than just pornography, where only the act is important, not the surrounding circumstances.

Obviously there is a vast amount of 'pulp' fiction that is written sub-par throughout, where the sex scene willl be just as badly written. This is a problem with the abilities of the writer/director, not of the medium itself. A good creator can tell what their strenghts are and will play to them, avoiding devices and plot hooks that they wont be able to do service to. Narratives that deal with sexuality, in main or part, have to have the courage to show what they are talking about otherwise the exercise is somewhat pointless.

Sexual relationships have reprecussions and these should be shown, not gratutiously though, otherwise its simply not a mature handling of the subject matter. Again to reference Watchmen, the scene in the owl ship with Nite Owl and Silk Spectre was completely mis-handled in the film, being gratutious and almost uncomfortble to watch, where the comic made it a touching scene, essential to the finale.Other films that would be incomplete without pivotal sex scenes include Blue Velvet, Secretary, Mulholand Drive, History of Violence, Dont Look Now.

Finally going back to what the OP originlly asked, I think its a GMs duty to run with and utilise such a piece of character background, though not necessarily in just having the player oppressed. Theres so many more creative options avavilable