Beauty and the breast (Fenella Souter)
January 21st 2008 08:25
How does your body make you think and feel, how does this connect with your beliefs about what you're allowed to do and forbidden from doing, what are the meanings of nakedness, etc.
Here's some observations from an article on going topless (Fenella Souter, "Beauty and the beast", Good Weekend, 21-23 December 2007).
***
* Quoting a male friend: "I got to know a council lifeguard and I said to him one day, 'Do you ever, like, get sick of looking at breasts?' He said, 'Are you f...ing stupid?'"
* Quoting Simone de Beauvoir: "Men's stares flatter and hurt her simultaneously... eyes are always too penetrating. Hence the inconsistency that men find disconcerting... Masculine desire is as much an offence as it is a compliment."
* Quoting a middle-aged European woman whose view "is not a universal view, but some women must feel the same way": "'I don't want to be some lone pervert's entertainment,' she explains, 'but I can understand the thrill of exhibitionism... Well, now it is about tan lines, yes. But when I was younger it was to show off my breasts. I wasn't happy with other parts of my body but I was happy with my breasts and the beach was the one place where I could show them off. I was showing them off to my peers, I suppose, in the same way you might wear a flattering dress."
* On the forces that gave rise to topless bathing in the 60s and 70s, Souter cites: trends and celebrities in Europe; "the counter-culture, which promoted pride in one's body; earthmother-ism, a return to unfettered, undressed Nature, etc; and, to some degree, feminism: a woman's right to do as she wishes with her body".
* Souter notes that, outside the beach, bared breasts tend to be associated with males paying for the pleasure of looking. "Here on the beach, the rules are supposed to be different. The bleached light, the proximity to raw nature, puts everything at a remove. There is none of the furtive dimness or spangled artificiality that signals sleaze... Nakedness here becomes natural, healthy, liberating. It is to be regarded as sensual, not sexual".
* Souter discusses the legal situation in different places, and alludes to the Canadian incident when "topfree" activist Gwen Jacobs was charged for indecent exposure. Souter summarises the arguments of the Topfree Equal Rights Association as being "ease of breastfeeding, tanning, comfort and sexual equality".
* Souter notes that women as well as men steal glances -- "to admire, compare, perhaps despair. Breasts, in their infinite variety, their moulded, suspended, curved beaty, are extremely watchable."
* Souter mentions that in different parts of the world, people find different parts of the body the most attractive.
* Souter discusses various reasons not to do go topless, assuming you want to, including being ogled, sunburn, modesty, a feeling of vulnerability, fear of offending or embarrasing others, because your boyfriend doesn't like it, because you're "conservative", and because you might run into someone from work (which I find rather intriguing, because I think there's a lot of assumptions and beliefs to unpack behind the thinking here).
* "Another reason for some women, I suspect, is shame, and by that I mean women's fear that their bodies are not 'good enough' for public display... Talking about topless sunbathing with middle-aged women, a surprising number said, 'Well, I used to do it all the time, but I wouldn't do it now, with my body. Are you joking?'... 'When I was young,' said one beautiful woman, 'being naked was like being a tree, a young sapling. Now it's more like being a car wreck. Back then, you were just nude -- like a dog or a cat, not wearing clothes. When everything starts falling apart, you don't feel nude, you feel naked, embarrassed.'"
* Souter speaks of "unspoken rules of toplessness", including: that you must sit still, perhaps even in the same pose; that you must remain in the same place ("The topic of how far you can wear your cossies from the beach has been canvassed by others. But topless sunbathing has even stricter boundaries... It rarely moves beyond the sandy strip of the strand, or the even smaller principality of the towel"); that you may only do it in particular areas, perhaps particular ends of particular beaches; and that you may not swim or walk around topless.
* Souter quotes a male on controlling the meaning of toplessness: "'You watch these girls, you're perving at them,' he told me bluntly, 'and you'll see them go through this whole rigmarole. They will take their bra off through their T-shirt, then delicately put on their bikini top, through the same process, shielding themselves with their T-shirt. Then they'll lay out their towel, then they'll get out their book, then they'll put their mobile phone near to them. So they go through this whole palaver of not exposing their bra, not exposing their breasts while they change into their swimsuit, blah blah blah. Then they take their top off.'"
***
Notes
* Wikipedia has an entry on "topfreedom".
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Comment by Cibbuano
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"Back then, you were just nude -- like a dog or a cat, not wearing clothes. When everything starts falling apart, you don't feel nude, you feel naked, embarrassed."
and
"Nakedness here becomes natural, healthy, liberating. It is to be regarded as sensual, not sexual"
Comment by Miswanderlust
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Wonderful post! Yeehaw!
Mis
Comment by postmoderncritic
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Padsoc
Souter seems to have neglected to account for the 1 in 20 or so women who are lesbian, and many others (bisexual, curious) who are sexually attracted to women.
I don't sunbathe at all, so this isn't an issue for me...
I recommend Mr. Palomar by Italo Calvino, in which the protagonist encounters a woman sunbathing topless and is so conflicted as to how to respond that he deliberately walks by her over and over so as to get his response 'right'. The woman eventually gets sick of his presence and goes away. It's in the first chapter, and very amusing.