I need your Opinion VGChartz: Artistic Integrity in different Mediums

[binary solo]

Necessity is all about intent. Is it necessary to depict a socially unacceptable behaviour in order to make an honest piece of art that looks at that socially unacceptable behaviour from some angle (whether it be from a good or bad angle is a different subject)? No, it's never actually necessary.

You don't need to show a sex scene in a movie for the peole watching the movie to know that the characters had sex, and the people watching the movie will also know the context in which the sex was being had (consensual/rape/sordid affair/one night stand/married couple).

So, what is the intent of the film maker in choosing to either show the characters having sex, or not show it and merely leaving it up to the imagination of the viewer? Well if you're making porno movies opting for the "leave to the imagination" approach is going to see you leave the industry rather quickly. If you're planning to make a family friendly movie, showing close-up shots of blow jobs is probably not going to get you very far in the movie business. The issue of integrity goes to whether making pornos has any artistic integrity to it, and indeed whether there's any artistic integrity in making vacuous crap for kids. There's plenty of stuff that has a great deal of integrity yet has all sorts of socially unacceptable behaviour in it. And there's plenty of stuff with no artistic integrity that is 100% socially acceptable behaviour from start to finish.

If you're making a zombie killing game, then you need to show zombies heads being blown off, chopped off and smashed to a bloody pulp. It's the nature of a zombie game. And if zombies were real that's exactly what I'd do with a zombie. The question of artistic integrity comes in with the subject material itself, and more importantly the context in which the subject material is presented. Some zombie games have a lot of artistic integrity, other zombie games have none whatsoever, and they can have equal levels of gore.

Questioning the necessity is really rather meaningless in a discussion of integrity. Because the real issue is whether the artist has any integrity in the way they are using the imagery.