Recently my employer, one of Taiwan’s largest tech companies, with a beautiful 23 floor HQ, has spruced up its spacious, marble floored lobby area with a display of a couple dozen sculptures each about 2 or 3 feet tall, all depicting naked ladies in various poses. In another common area, over a dozen pieces of art composed of flower petals also depict various naked ladies, breasts and pubes clearly displayed.
I think it’s great that the company is displaying art and the fact that the pieces depict naked ladies doesn’t bother me in the least. But the other day when I went down to greet a female visitor in the lobby and she was standing there perusing the nudes, it occurred to me: what if they were all sculptures of naked men? Would the company host a display of a few dozen sculptures of naked men, lying in various poses with their penises hanging this way or that? I seriously doubt it. If someone arranged for such a showing, would there be disparaging comments and complaints from visitors, employees or management? I wouldn’t be at all surprised. Is it possible they might even decide to cut the display short and take it down due to complaints? Possibly.
Throughout society, in the arts, entertainment and advertising, we see naked women all the time (pubes often, but not always, hidden from view); by comparison, we see only an infinitesimal display of naked men. As I said, I’m not complaining at all. I was just pondering the issue lately, as I walked past the nudes downstairs, and how it seems to be such a blatant double-standard.
Is it? Is it a double-standard that is near-universally accepted because men have more money and power than women and therefore make society’s rules; or are mens’ and womens’ bodies so fundamentally different that it is offensive to see depictions of a naked man, but not of a naked woman? Or is there some other explanation? What do you think?
Perhaps that the nude female body shows prominent features associated with birth and nursing whereas a nude male body prominently features an organ used primarily for sex and eliminating waste?
Which reminds me of top US lawyer, dickhead John Ashcroft, spending $8,000 of taxpayer money to hide the naked breast on this statue:
[quote]No longer will US Attorney General John Ashcroft appear in public with a semi-nude statue towering above him. The US Justice Department has spent $8,000 on curtains to hide the statue from the cameras.
The female, art-deco “Spirit of Justice” statue, with one breast exposed, is located on the podium in the department’s ornate Great Hall where news conferences are often held. One fully-exposed breast protrudes from her toga garment.
Her male counterpart, the “Majesty of Law”, is sculpted with a cloth strategically placed around his waist.
Photographers have gone to great lengths in the past to capture the scantily-clad female statue in the background as the Justice Department’s top brass addressed the world’s press.[/quote] news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1788845.stm
But Ashcroft is just one conservative prude. The fact remains that one sees thousands of naked breasts and vaginas for every penis in statues, paintings and the media. Is the woman’s body fundamentally different, as imaniou suggests – and less offensive – or is it simply a double standard?
[Incidentally, imaniou, you’re selling the male organ short; I use mine for all sorts of purposes besides just sex and the elimination of bodily waste. Heck, it’s a virtual swiss-army-knife in my drawers.]
