Practically living in The Sun
Anna Richardson and Sexperience
My next project, Sexperience (aka Sex Education), has sneaked out quietly into the world…
…in The Sun.
That’s two Sun spots in a couple of weeks (Osama Loves hit that august journal on 23rd July). It’s good to break out from the narrow confines of the broadsheet world from time to time and enjoy the super soaraway expanses of The Sun. Which reminds me, I’m off on hols at the end of the week so no action in these quarters for a couple of weeks.
Osama Loves in the Currant Bun
(Talking of wide expanses, Osama Loves made the evening TV news in Canada the day before yesterday)
Update 01.09.08:
Here’s the holding screen for Sexperience (including an indicative video clip) which launches tomorrow
and here’s a rather good mash-up of that Sexperience clip by Paul Carr, a man with delightfully too much time on his hands 😉
Currently reading Paul’s new book Bringing Nothing to the Party which won my Phrase of the Day the other day with: “the litigious little cunt” – not quite Swift but made me laugh out loud on the Tube in context
Simple Pleasures part 4 
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At last, a reader from Kyrgyzstan
Dear Anna,
I just watched last night on Channel 4 the first episode of the your series ‘The Sex Education Show’. To be honest, I hadn’t been too convinced by the presentation of it in the TV programme, but I thought I’d give it a go. And it paid off! Wonderfully made, dynamic, challenging and brutally, still deliciously honest!
I have to say am not a British. I come from a culture that is said to be much more straightforward in manners and expression than yours. When I settled down two years ago I was quite shocked to notice with how much people hide, dissimulate, keep everything for themselves here etc. I feel somehow that this extreme reservation blocks/ makes difficult an open and wholehearted communication process. I shamefully admit I didn’t see your previous productions, but from what I’ve seen last night I can tell you’re one of the most honest, non-fake and true TV presenters in this country.
Not only you speak you mind, but you also offer yourself to be tested and undergo difficult experiences in the name of truth. To me, this shows great courage, honour and professionalism!
I very much admire your ‘straight-talking’ way and I dare defy the hypocrisy, pretences, false prudishness and affectation that surround not only sensitive issues such as sex, but most of the public topics and debates in this country. Keep up the good work and hopefully you’ll make a difference, ArkAngel! I just hope that one day I will be myself given a chance to help moving forward stereotypes and prejudices here (I used to be a professional journalist too back in my home country).
With respect and admiration,
Luminita
Hi Luminita, thanks for your detailed feedback. What aspect of The Sex Education Show did you find “challenging and brutally, still deliciously honest” – the TV, the website or both? And in which country were you a journalist where ‘expression is more straightforward’ and people really talk about sex?
Well, I think on both the TV and website Anna scrutinised the topic in an open, aboveboard way. Why ‘deliciously honest’? Because it’s not often that one can see here such frank still creditable, decent approach on a sensitive subject.
I was born and bred in a much misjudged Eastern European country, that is the only one with a Latin heart amongst the other ex-communist countries – do you guess now which is it?:-).
Getting academic qualifications and then working as a broadcast journalist there was a rewarding job that taught me a lot about human psychology.
When I said that the culture I come from cultivates more open, sincere, straightforward relationships between people I didn’t mean that topics such sex and intimate life are necessarily discussed there without a sense of natural and understandable embarrassment and abashment. Not at all.
What I was trying to say was that people behave and express themselves there with more sincerity and frankness in a social, public context. They are not afraid to show their true feelings or verbalise their opinions. Bear also in mind that
after the fall of communism and after decades of generalised censorship, people finally felt free to enjoy showing up their personalities and the so long repressed emotions, feelings etc. Obviously, the communication in general benefited from it and became more open and relaxed, still decent.
Oh, I got lengthy again! Someone stooop meee! :-))
Luminita
Does it begin with R and end in “oumania”?
Yes, sir! 🙂
With a small correction, though: the correct, original spelling is without ‘u’ – Romania. Thank you.
Oops, sorry, have always been a rubbish speller.
Has the post-Communist effect on communication diminished at all over-time?
Hmm… At an interpersonal level I think we could say that indeed, the communication process managed to overcome the post-Communist effects due to the individuals’ huge desire for interaction and open communication (it being a suppressed need for such a long time). Nevertheless, at a macro-social level one can still find, occasionally, residues of the communist regime such as bureaucracy, power centralisation etc.
So to make it shorter, yes, after the Revolution there was an ‘explosion’ of freedom, a liberation and emancipation in terms of straightforwardness and unaffected communication. 🙂
Sorry, I wasn’t clear enough, what I meant was: has that openness lessened at all since the period immediately after the Revolution or is it as strong or even stronger than that immediate explosion?
I’m glad that my initial comment generated such an exciting follow-up! 😉
As any social process, the ‘openness’ tends to get ‘even’ after a while. It reached a more balanced level though during the last years I would say (bear in mind that the Revolution occurred 18 years ago). Considering that it took a few decades of generalised communist censorship to get people craving for communication, one can imply that the desire and need for free expression is still as strong now as it was after gaining democratic rights.
It will obviously lessen progressively, but this will probably occur on a scale of decades. It’s a historical process, after all, because it involves people’s mentality and attitudes towards communication. Well, this issue brings back memories of my early University years, when writing essays for the sociology course. 😉
uwanna embarrasses Georgia Tech
[…] Loves, as previously mentioned in this august organ (dontcha just love both those words?) , is a participative online documentary I commissioned last […]
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