Last week, lots of people tuned in to the Oscars telecast. If you did not, you missed a pretty funny bit: a song called "We Saw Your Boobs," in which many Hollywood starlets who have bared their breasts in the movies were cited. While certainly not side-splitting, it was amusing and lighthearted in spirit. As someone in possession of two breasts myself, I was not at all offended, however, many other women were, among them former film star Jane Fonda. She demanded to know why there was no similar outing of all the actors who have shown their penises in films, and cited the song as a putdown of women; nay, a hateful slur against all womankind! Many other women have since voiced their agreement.I started thinking about her complaint, and could not come up with one legitimate, non-porn movie in which I saw an actor's penis. Not even in "The Full Monty," which was all about men and their nakedness as a source of income for a group of five impoverished British blokes. I decided this is because breasts are more attractive body parts than penises, and more people will pay to see them. But is there another reason?
When I was an art student at NYU in the late 1960s, our life drawing class always had live nude models of both sexes. One day the professor announced that a new law had been passed in the state, and that male models would no longer be permitted to pose nude, but would have to cover their genitalia. Females could still pose completely nude. I found that odd, and almost all the way to offensive, but nobody raised an eyebrow. In class the next day, our male model came out wearing a bright red bow tied around his penis. I wonder what Jane would say to that.
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