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Controversial

Etymology: contra - version

Related: banned - censorship - offensive - opposition - public - shock value - succès de scandale - subversive - taboo - transgressive

Examples: sex in film - violent films

Contrast: mainstream - normal

Nothing is more usual than for philosophers to encroach on the province of grammarians, and to engage in disputes of words, while they imagine they are handling controversies of the deepest importance and concern. - David Hume

Definition

A dispute, especially a public one, between sides holding opposing views. Since the dispute is held in public, the controversial issue touches the mainstream, as when shown - in the case of film - to a general audience in a theatrical release --jahsonic, Aug 2004

A controversy is a contentious dispute, a disagreement over which parties are actively arguing. Controversies can range from private disputes between two individuals to large-scale social upheavals. It is the nature of controversies that they cannot be conclusively settled and may be accompanied by the disruption of peace and even quarreling. In some cases, this may be because what are putatively the two sides to a dispute aren't having the same argument.

Present day subjects of controversy include abortion, homosexuality, nudity, and pornography. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversy [Dec 2004]

Media controversy

Media controversy is controversy involving forms of media, especially electronic media. Certain forms of media such as computer and video games, television programs, motion pictures, theatrical plays, comics, books, magazines, music, concerts, and Web sites, have been subjects of frequent controversy, involving parents and legal guardians, religious figures, and politicians. It is usually aimed at violence, profanity, sexuality, nudity, human castration, capital punishment, horror, drug abuse, thematic elements, and other forms of objectionable or controversial content. Occultism and religious content are aimed only by certain restrictive religious organizations. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_controversy [May 2005]

see also: media

In advertising [...]

On the other hand, controversy is also used in advertising to try to draw attention to a product or idea by labeling it as controversial, even if the idea has become widely accepted to a given segment of the population. This strategy has been known to be especially successful in promoting books and films. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversy [Dec 2004]

In early Christianity

Many of the early Christian writers, among them Irenaeus, Athanasius, and Jerome, were famed as "controversialists"; they wrote works against perceived heresy or heretical individuals, works whose titles begin "Adversus..." such as Irenaeus' Adversus haeresis. The Christian writers inherited from the classical rhetors the conviction that controversial confrontations, even over trivial matters, were a demonstration of intellectual superiority. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversy [Dec 2004]

Controversial nudity in film [...]

Noteworthy films (more at Nudity film list) which garnered controversy at the time of their release due to nudity include:

--http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nude#Nudity_in_the_media, [Oct 2004]

Controversial non-fiction

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversial_books

Controversial Issues

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_controversial_issues

Controversial films

It seems that every year a French filmmaker sets out to scandalize us tired old film critics by releasing a work that guarantees controversy and media attention. Last year it was Virginie Despentes' dreary Baise-moi, and for two years running Catherine Breillat did her bit with Romance, starring porn star Rocco Siffredi, and the teen-sex picture Fat Girl which only recently was allowed to show theatrically in Ontario.

This year the honour goes to Gaspar Noe for his stomach-churning and brutally disturbing Irreversible which has had audiences walking out of the screenings. --Angela Baldassarre in http://entertainment.sympatico.ca/movies/features/irreversible.html

Articles in category "Controversial films"

--http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Controversial_films [Dec 2004]

Controversial books

banned books

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