"I've seen more cotton in an aspirin bottle!"

by guest blogger, BroKen

Have you ever heard of Jessica Rey? She is an actress and entrepreneur with a line of swimwear. My daughter introduced me to a youtube video of hers called “The Evolution of the Swimsuit.” She begins with a line from a hit novelty song from the 60s called “Itsy Bitsy, Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini.” The line is, “She was afraid to come out of the locker” (the locker in which she had put on the little piece of swimwear.) Ms. Rey asks why she was afraid to come out in public wearing an itsy bitsy bikini.

Ms. Rey then runs quickly back in time showing the changes in swimwear for women all the way back to the turn of the century when women's swimwear was not the least bit revealing yet there were still mobile changing rooms which would follow women almost all the way to the water. Ms. Rey asks how we have come so far from wearing houses to wearing almost nothing. The answer is, of course, the sexual revolution of the 1960s and the “empowerment” of women to be free from the least hint of sexual repression. Ms. Rey wonders if the “power” granted women has been worth the cost.

The cost is the way men look at women who dress so immodestly. She cites a study in which men are shown pictures of women in bikinis while their brains are scanned. The parts of the brain which light up during the use of tools, become active when viewing the scantily clad women. The parts of the brain responsible for higher activities, some might even say the spiritual activities like compassion and empathy, shut down completely. The researchers say those parts of the brain responsible for compassion and empathy almost never go inactive like they did during the study.

The human male's brain seems to be almost hardwired to objectify women who expose their bodies. Clearly, an ability to turn men into beasts is a kind of power. But, like Ms. Rey, I don't think it was that kind of power being sought by the sexual revolutionaries. But many warned that turning human beings into animals would be the result of such sexual liberation. Sexual license results in slavery, not freedom.

Ms. Rey describes looking for modest swimwear for herself. When she couldn't find it, designed some of her own using Audrey Hepburn as inspiration. Many people asked her where she found her swimwear and her fashion line was born. If you think her designs are a throwback to the pantaloons of the turn of the century or the burkas of the Middle East, you'll be surprised. Audrey Hepburn was no prude. Neither is Ms. Rey. As another actress once said, “Your clothes should be tight enough to show you're a woman but loose enough to show you're a lady.”

Here is hoping her fashion line is highly successful and generates a new trend overshadowing the itsy bitsy teenie weenie bikini.

The video of Ms. Rey's presentation: 

Comments

[Morgan K Freeberg]

She hurt her credibility by citing that study...
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/02/19/women.bikinis.objects/

Not that I would question its measurements or findings. But I have a big problem with researchers trying to figure out how "men" relate to women by doing live brain scans on twenty-something male undergrad students, knowing what I know about myself at twenty-something (and what I know about college kids). And the idea that we can somehow reform men and force them to give women more respect, by taking away freedoms of women to buy the swimwear they want, and freedoms of men to look, is an old feminist hack-dream that hasn't done anything good for anybody anywhere. It fits into the old feminist trope about "all men are rapists." I'm completely done having any sympathy for that for obvious reasons.

Her hard evidence, from the study, is that when these twenty-something college males see a woman in a skimpy bathing suit, the part of the brain "associated with analyzing another person's thoughts, feelings and intentions" shuts down. Here's a new perspective: Like many men, I have interacted with women who lit up that part of my brain; I've interacted with women who had it sizzling like a flare, turning night into day, as I spun around in circles trying to figure out what they wanted. Nothing was made better by my interacting with those women, for anyone, I don't want to see or talk to those kinds of women ever again, I'd certainly much rather look at nice looking women in skimpy swimsuits. That's a perfectly natural and acceptable choice on my part. Visual pleasure versus mental frustration.

Now all that having been said, I do sympathize with the parents of girls, and the women themselves, who are trying to find more modest swimwear and for that reason I wish her luck in her enterprise. The dental-floss bikini look is something nobody should be trying to pull off if they don't want to, and nobody should be wanting to try it if they can't.

[BroKen]

Thanks for the comment, Morgan. Always good to hear from you! Sorry I've taken so long to respond.

I'm not sure why you bring up "All men are rapists" on a post about modesty. I'd say truth generally fits an exaggeration if there is any truth at all in the exaggeration (and there usually is some). That doesn't make the exaggeration true. Men tend to objectify women does not mean all men are rapists.

Here is a distinction which is often lost in discussions like this. When a man looks, is he just looking or lusting? Looking, appreciating the beauty, is fine but there is a line to cross into lust. How many of us can keep from being pulled across that line... often without even knowing we've crossed it?

Is the visual pleasure lust? Could be. Ultimately only the individual knows (and often even they don't know!). Is mental frustration love? Could be. As a culture we are so confused about love and lust. We conflate them to find agonizing misery. As a doctor says in the CNN article you link... "Many men make foolish choices because of sexual attraction,"

You want women to have the freedom to wear what they want and you want the freedom to look. OK, freedom is great. Nowadays about the only measure of indecency is a nipple or pubic hair. Should women (who want to) have the freedom to go nudist? If not, then we agree that there are some limits. We may disagree about where those limits are, but it seems that there are lines of common decency which should not be crossed.

We would be much better off as a people if young girls were encouraged to dress like ladies instead of tramps and if young boys were encouraged to treat even tramps like ladies. But boys like to look and girls are taught that attracting boys in whatever way is extremely valuable. And so we will continue to confuse love and lust and boys will be compelled to give their hearts to girls who trample on them... and girls will give their hearts to boys who can attract but do not love them. And so it goes.

Modesty is the acknowledgement that sex is very powerful and, like fire, should be kept in a controlled environment, or people get burned.

[Morgan K Freeberg]

Hi Broken,

Sorry, didn't see your comment. I bring up the "all men are rapists" because the study, from my point of view at least, is all about that; and, she brought up the study.

It all comes down to three words: Men make choices. Well that and, somehow, people like to forget that men make choices. Somehow we're drawn to all these excuses...your boyfriend is a creep, because the wrong parts of his brain are lit up, because the first time he saw you you were wearing that swimsuit. Such thoughts are comforting because they suggest a quick fix. But the people who think men are like light switches, seem to bear disproportionately the complaints about how some man has behaved.

Regarding the distinction you draw, I just don't accept it. I'll accept some men do bad things after they've selected a target visually -- but how does that help us? Can we really generalize about what that appearance is, and make use of such manufactured information so we can figure out what to ban, and thus stop bad things from happening forevermore? Seems to me we get to see our friends the liberals try that out on a daily basis, for a variety of things. And it further seems to me that, thanks to them, we can't even abandon it as we should. Maybe we can continue to monitor their struggles with it to see if it ever bears fruit.

Thus far, the only mark of success I've seen from it is when families say: "Cable teevee causes all sorts of problems, and we're not having it in our house." That works, I think, because it is a "ban" imposed by parents, on the culture in which kids are being raised -- they "own" the decision, and to whatever extent they're using that to mold and shape someone else's character, well that's in the job description of "parent." The same is not true of a girl covering up more so that she can change the guy. He is what he is.