There was a letter in today's 7Days (a daily freebie paper here in Dubai which, while poorly sub-edited, does have a habit of living up to its "a conversation on every page" motto). The letter was complaining about the bad language and violence in film The Departed, Martin Scorcese's latest flick. It's bloody good - and very bloody. It's a film about gangsters, for God's sake, so anyone who goes into the cinema expecting Sleepless In Seattle is an intellectual bankrupt. The language would doubtlessly cause my late godmother to have conniptions but it was no more or less shocking than the average Tarantino. The letter also pointed out that the film here is rated 15+ despite having an R-rating in other countries. And true enough, it's probably not the most wholesome viewing for the average 15-year-old, but it does illustrate the conundrum of film censorship here. A 15-year-old in Dubai can waltz in and enjoy plenty of rude words, especially from a spikily entertaining Mark Wahlberg, and plenty of grim ways to kill and maim, from execution-style shootings followed by dismemberment with a saw through to witnessing the full and splattery effect of a body falling off a tall building. But a film full of sex scenes, if indeed it even made it to the cinema, would be so heavily cut that it would probably stop making sense.

Sex and violence are urges that exist in us all to varying degrees. And, as Camille Paglia wrote, "anything that can be imagined should be depicted". It is, after all, only the limits of our imaginations that limit creativity, especially when it comes to film-making and writing. But this is a society where the stifling of sex and sexual expression is much more acceptable than the stifling of depictions of violence. This is a place where a 15-year-old can indeed watch a violent film like The Departed yet adults get berated for snogging in a taxi. This is a place that is by no means all bad, a place where expats like me can lead a nice life, but it is also a place with a lot of growing up to do.