I ran across the following article over at linkfilter:
“My instant boob job from 36A to 36DD - and the effect it had on men (and women)”
As an experiment, a Brit named Clover Stroud had a makeup and special effects expert create “a pair of perfect 36DD silicone breasts” for her to wear around Oxford, to see what effect it had on men. Her observations are kind of entertaining, not just as she relates how the men around her pay her more attention, but also how her new bust changes how she feels about herself, and changes how other women treat her.
However, Ms. Stroud seems to go out of her way to make the men she meets come off like drooling idiots.
I wandered off, dismissing him as some saddo with an overt breast fixation and probably a complex Freudian relationship with his mother. But what I didn’t realise was that my experiences with my new chest were about to prove that he was, in fact, just a very normal man.
He stuttered when I asked him to show me how to use the new IT system. He flushed beetroot as I sat down. As he pointed to the screen, I noticed that his hand shook. He seemed incapable of a simple sentence. Eventually, muttering something about going to find his assistant, he fled completely, and sent a (female) colleague back in his place.
But then, after pointing out what buffoons these men were, she explains that they were also somewhat menacing:
Friendly smiles at the supermarket checkout might be fun, and quite flattering, and it might get you home sooner with your groceries, but this was something else. It verged on menacing. And it was completely out of my control.
I realised that a whole lifetime of being checked out, and commented on, like some prize heifer, would drive me quite mad. I stomped home, angry and confused. I found myself longing to rip off the silicone.
Apparently we men are alternately stupidly leering, or overtly threatening. And then some of her “male friends” dump a load of absolute horse hockey on her:
One told me: “I know it’s not right, but when a girl has large breasts, I naturally assume that she must be more interested in sex than someone with a flat chest.”
Oh, for God’s sake.
That’s just stupid beyond belief, and implies a level of conscious thought and calculation that is utterly absent in most breast-staring situations.
Faced with a choice of lumping myself with either drooling idiots, menacing predators, or lecherous oglers, I’m at a bit of a loss. Way back, when it was fashionable to be an ’80s-era sensitive male, I used to ponder such questions — “What is it about breasts that I like so much?” Now, not so much. I quit worrying about it for the same reasons that I don’t spend time trying to explain why I like the flavor of chocolate, or the sight of a beautiful sunset.
I just do.
When I think about it at all, I think that it seems reasonable that sexual attraction would be a matter of basic biology, tied into drives that are wired deeper than anything short of the instinct for personal survival. An animal can’t pick and choose what parts of their genetic birthright they accept or reject, and despite our huge brains and opposable thumbs that’s what we are — animals.
And knowing the male animal the way I do, I think that rather than agonizing over the effect massive mammaries have on us, you should just be grateful that we males have stopped flinging poo when we get upset.
Believe me, some days it can be pretty tempting.
4 users commented in " On the importance of boobs "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackThere are those men who may love breasts and keep it to themselves, and there are those men who love breasts and can’t stop staring at them. Do you know how many times I’ve wanted to snap my fingers and say “EYES UP HERE” to men talking to my breasts? It’s like their eyes are stuck in a magnetic field and they can’t look up. It’s the weirdest thing ever.
I have to agree with Lelo. You, PAGent, probably wouldn’t spend an elevator ride staring at the lone woman’s boobs, but I had that happen lots of times when I was a young thing by certain guys. Now that I have cushy grandma boobs, it doesn’t happen that often.
There are days when I want to fling poo, too.
While I may or may not have spent an elevator ride staring at a woman’s boobs, I can tell you that I have certainly spent many an elevator ride trying NOT to stare at a woman’s boobs.
Even saying that sounds ridiculous.
Surely, if you have control of nothing else, you can control where you look. And yet I frequently find myself casting repeated glances at slit skirts, lowcut blouses, etc., while trying not to be obvious about it. Trying not to get “caught”. I certainly don’t want to discomfort or harrass anyone, and yet I’m not willing to stop looking.
I think this kind of surreptitious gawking is a ridiculous thing for a 42-year old man to be doing. Nevertheless I will almost certainly continue doing it until I flatline and they pull the sheet up over my eyes. And hopefully the nurse in intensive care will have a fine rack to occupy my gaze as I shuffle off this mortal coil.
I just find it particularly fascinating, this juxtaposition of involuntary drives and socially acceptable behavior.
I admit that at times I’ve struggled to maintain eye contact when talking with well-endowed women. I’ve also been sitting with a group of women who openly stare at the butt of a passing man. Or drool over the sweaty physique of a young male jogger stopping by a water fountain on hot day. Whether biologically driven or not, the idea that this behaviour is limited to the male gender is just a bunch of crap. Women are just fascinated with different body parts.
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