Sex not in these Cities

What’s in a name … of a hit TV series turned blockbuster cinematic event?

There will be no public ads for the movie version of “Sex and the City” in two Israeli cities, Jerusalem and Petah Tikva. Why? Some folks who saw the ads didn’t like the use of the word “sex.”

Is this a sign that what some people call the lone democracy in the Middle East is using some most un-democratic censorship? Should we instead view it as behavior to emulate, given what neo-Puritans like myself see as an unbecoming American obsession with X-rated affairs?

I enjoyed what Vogue magazine called SATC:TM. It was great to see Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha return on the big screen. I give it two thumbs up … or, alternately, two Manolo Blahniks up.

I can also see how the movie’s depiction of sex would upset the haredim in Eretz Yisrael, as well as people across the US who are concerned with family values and their potential threat by risque behavior on the screen. Maybe the action of the two Israeli cities contains not just censorship, but courage.