Even
in this enlightened(?) age their remains an almost frenetic sense of propriety to
safeguard society from unseemly images or strong language, exposure to which
would no doubt irrecoverably corrupt those exposed to it. I initially referred
to this phenomenon in my March 8th 2011 blog “Bizarre Sense of Priorities”.
Whilst it might be justified in the more extreme examples, I wonder what it is
that the moral gatekeepers are hoping to achieve. For those charged with this
awesome responsibility, as an absolute minimum it should be expected that at
least there should be some consistency in deciding that which is acceptable
from that which is not.
For
example, the use of the word for liquid excrement has become acceptable whereas
the word for the solid variety has not. Thus one can be “pissed off” with
impunity but cannot describe their day as s—ty or this subject as complete
bulls—t. I add the hyphens to appease the blogging Gestapo and to do my share
in protecting any unsuspecting readers from possible moral turpitude. Similarly
the word “bitch” is quite in order to define the gender of a dog, but
unacceptable when used pejoratively as an assessment of a woman’s character –at
least sometimes, but not always. There are also a growing number of words involving
so called “political correctness” This is intended to convey the full meaning
without actually mouthing or writing the complete words of normal language and
offending the sensibilities. This is done by abbreviation as in f-word; b-word;
c-word; s-word; n-word; a-hole; etc. If this trend continues it will soon be
necessary to communicate in politically correct shorthand. “U r an a-hole &
full of s-word, so f-word off!” -and so on!
In the case of pictorial images there
are more inconsistencies. For some reason, the sight of certain parts of the
body is deemed to be so morally damaging that they must be covered –despite the
fact that 50% of the population possesses and unavoidably sees all of those
offensive parts on a daily basis! I remember way back in the ‘60’s the sight of
a female nipple in a publication was an offense, particularly amongst America’s
morally uprighteous. Despite this ban, one of the then fledging adult
publications, I think it was “Playboy”, within its pages deliberately included
an image of a breast, including the forbidden nipple. Predictably this produced the expected degree
of apoplexy amongst the self appointed up-tighteous custodians of morality. Representatives
of the magazine duly appeared at a subsequent hearing to justify such blatant disregard
of the rule. In their defense they showed the complete picture which turned out
to be that of Johnny Weissmuller in his cinematic role as Tarzan!
More
recently, the programme “Survivor” has achieved its success due at least in
part to the sight of scantily clad, attractive young people disporting
themselves in a variety of tropical settings. Here the public watchdogs have
generously permitted the sights of abundant mammary cleavage to remain intact -to
an arbitrary point, beyond which the offending area(s) are blurred out before
anything as inflammatory as a nipple surfaces. However, there is now a new
twist. During scenes where contestants are bending over, “bum cracks” now
receive the blurring treatment! This "crack down" is particularly inexplicable. With no risk of deadly
nipple exposure how on earth the mere sight of a portion of undulating anatomic
topography can possibly be considered to present any risk to the viewer is
beyond me.
The extraordinary and sustained furor
which erupted following Janet Jackson’s so called “wardrobe malfunction” at Superbowl XXXVII was
also inexplicable. She actually was wearing a small floral disc (I think the
correct term is “pastie”) to cover the demonic nipple so what was all the fuss
about? This is an example of the neurosis that seems to grip the US psyche and nourished
by the sensationalistic media. Just read the extent of the Wikipedia page on the subject:-
Happily
the rest of the world seems to be emerging from all this. Indeed there are an
increasing number of TV stations, which provided that the requisite “viewer
discretion” advisory precedes the transmission (-and which probably boosts
viewership!), are showing programmes with language and bodily exposure which
only a few years ago would have been out of the question.
I
conclude with a famous story from the Scottish comedian Billy Connolly which
gives some idea of how much more tolerent of Europe has become of "edgy" material. The joke was originally aired in the 1970’s when things were much more
restricted and there was much sucking of teeth and serious misgivings about how
it would be received. Nowadays it would be at worse considered to be in rather poor
taste.
Billy
recounted how a man confided to his friend in a pub that he had murdered his
wife. Not surprisingly the friend refused to believe him whereupon he was taken
to the man’s house where the dastardly deed took place. “I buried her in the
back garden” he announced and invited his friend to look at her grave. Sure
enough there was a mound of freshly dug earth but surprisingly the rear end of
the body was still sticking above the ground. “Why did you leave her bum
sticking out?” the friend exclaimed -to which the reply was. “Well, I needed
somewhere to park my bike!” See:-
