Last night I was with my Mormon friends at an informal
discussion group – one of our other friends was talking to us about theater in
NYC and recommending shows, etc. One of
my friends lightheartedly mentioned an experimental show where there was a red
velvet cake representing someone’s dead bloody body and people started eating
it. I exclaimed my disgust. One thing about me – I can never hide my
emotions.
Everyone laughed at me and another friend mentioned a show
she had seen where someone smashed a pumpkin that was supposed to represent a
human head. “I can’t handle it!” I cried
and covered my ears. Again, everyone
laughed.
People think I’m just overreacting or being funny, but I
really cannot handle such gross depictions of violence to the human body, even
allegorical.
Then they started discussing the immersive theatre piece
“Sleep No More.” The girl who led the
discussion intoned in a very serious voice, “I have to warn you, there is
eroticism and sexual connotations.”
Another of my friends, who’d seen the show, agreed that there was
nudity, but she didn’t feel the scenes she saw were particularly erotic (since
the show is interactive, each person can see a different show, depending on which
character they follow, which rooms they end up in, etc.). They both thought the show was excellent but emphasized
that one should be prepared for the sexual inferences.
I remember reading about “Sleep No More” when it first came
out a couple years ago and was instantly intrigued. I still need to see it, but what will be
uncomfortable for me will be the violence, not the sex. This theatre discussion only reinforced to
me how different I am from my dear Mormon friends. I was dismayed, as I usually get, at hearing
my Mormon friends exercise caution in all matters sexual but think nothing of
violence.
My friends know I can’t handle violence. When we watch movies, they always tell me
when I need to cover my eyes and (sometimes ears). But when we’re choosing movies, if there is
too much hint of anything sexual, someone will invariably voice concern. But I feel like I am the only one who
protests at violence.
I will never understand the Mormon culture’s over-concern
with sex and under-concern with violence (I specify culture because our
doctrine is pretty clearly against violence).
Even my roommate has often complained that guys in New York are worse
than guys in California because they’ll cheat on their women (I could never
tell her the full story about my beloved married Robert Hannibal), and guys in
Cali are faithful, but they all have guns.
I didn’t press her on this because I didn’t want to get in an argument
with her, but I’m so tired of this kind of thinking.
At this theatre discussion, I remembered a meeting with my
bishop this past December. He was trying
to understand how I can have a testimony of the LDS church but not a testimony
of the law of chastity. He asked what I thought about the human
body and the sacred creation that it is and the sacred respect that we should
give the body. I told him I have so much
respect for the human body that it upsets me to watch any kind of violence and
I don't even like watching fights because I can't handle bodies getting hurt.
He seemed surprised and said it was commendable that I feel that way. But he said he wants me to work on getting a
testimony of the law of chastity.
I’m still trying. But I would like all Mormons to get a
testimony of the beauty and sacredness of the human body in the full sense, not
in their limited sex-outside-of marriage-is-bad sense.
