Titty Flash!

I carefully considered whether or not to do another post about titties. But then I decided, hey, you can never have too many posts about titties.

My decision to do a follow-up started with an anonymous comment on my last post which pointed out that women in France don’t go topless everywhere - only on the beaches and not “on the sidewalks of Paris.”

I appreciate the comment, but I’m afraid that the commenter sorely underestimates the French in general - and the Parisians in particular - when it comes to their nonchalance over the public display of titties. Every summer since 2002, the French have poured patches of sand out along the banks of the Seine in order to construct a summertime attraction known as “Paris-Plage” or “Paris Beach.” However, the city of Paris had to enact a ban on topless sunbathing because “Parisians found it perfectly normal to disport themselves in the city center as if they were in St. Tropez.”

Ah, the French. They care so little about showing their titties that they have to enact laws reminding them that it’s not always the right time to show their titties.

I was further encouraged by an email I got from Jennifer over at Early Morning Fog, Partial Clearing. Jennifer not only has the world’s most awesome name, but she also has a fantastic blog, and it was she who alerted me to the latest titty controversy here in the good ol’ USA.

This controversy revolves around teenage girls wearing breast cancer-awareness bracelets to school that say, “I (heart) boobies.” The bracelets are sold through a group called Keep-A-Breast, whose goal is to raise cancer awareness among younger girls. Many people think that breast cancer is a disease that only affects older women, but breast cancer is the most deadly cancer among women under the age of forty. Keep-A-Breast takes an edgy, arty, more youth-oriented approach towards raising breast cancer awareness, and profits from the sale of these bracelets go to cancer research.

Sounds great, right? But everything comes to a screeching halt, apparently, once the word “boobies” is involved. School officials all over the nation are banning students from wearing the bracelet because of the offending word. Some school officials have said that the word “boobies” has a sexual connotation that is inappropriate for a school environment. Other school officials have said that female students wearing the bracelets leave themselves open to sexual harassment by male students.

Seriously? A boy sexually harasses a girl in school for wearing a cancer awareness bracelet, and our reaction is to tell the girl that she can’t wear the bracelet anymore? For reals? Whoa. Can you say mandatory sensitivity training?

But what about that “sexual connotation” bit? I had a conversation with a guy who said that he understood where the school officials were coming from. He said, “Breasts are sexual things. It might be tough for teenage boys to get past the fact that teenage girls are wearing bracelets that say ‘boobies’ on them, regardless of the context.”

Maybe men have a more difficult time understanding all of the complexities behind the female breast because their experience with female breasts is largely one-dimensional and revolves around sex. So while women understand that their breasts have requirements that go beyond the sexual - think breast feeding and mammograms - maybe the words “booby,” and “titty” only hit that one, sexy note for the men.

But this makes me wonder what words women are supposed to use when we want to talk about our breasts in a non-sexual, non-clinical way.

I thought a good benchmark might be whether or not you are allowed to say the word “boobies” or “titties” on television. I was somewhat surprised to learn that the FCC doesn’t have a list of words banned from the tube. George Carlin has a list of seven:

The FCC? Not so much. Their rules simply state that you can’t use words that “describe or depict sexual and excretory organs and activities.” However, if the word in question isn’t used in a sexual context, then it’s allowable. Thus, when Bono said on live TV that it was “fucking brilliant” to win a Golden Globe, the FCC didn’t fine him because the word “fuck” wasn’t meant sexually.

So by this standard, those “I (heart) boobies” bracelets should be okay, right? Because they’re talking about titties in a public health and awareness sort of way, not in a sexy sort of way.

So come on. Let those girls wear their bracelets, whydoncha?

Because I gotta say, there’s nothing very sexy about the words “booby” or “titty” anyway. These are whimsical words, not erotic ones.

But don’t take my word for it. Take the word of an expert:

Your Breast is Enough

Pablo Neruda

Your breast is enough for my heart,

and my wings for your freedom.

What was sleeping above your soul will rise

out of my mouth to heaven.

In you is the illusion of each day.

You arrive like the dew to the cupped flowers.

You undermine the horizon with your absence.

Eternally in flight like the wave.

I have said that you sang in the wind

like the pines and like the masts.

Like them you are tall and taciturn,

and you are sad, all at once, like a voyage.

You gather things to you like an old road.

You are peopled with echoes and nostalgic voices.

I awoke and at times birds fled and migrated

that had been sleeping in your soul.

Now that’s sexy.