Put Your Clothes On

by: Dark Wraith

The story at AlterNet, reported by astrea here at Big Brass Blog, claims researchers have found that men's brains respond to scantily clad women much the same way those men respond to objects. Although for the purposes of the present post I shall let the essential findings go unchallenged, I would be remiss not to make passing note that more than a few issues make this "research" suspect (and I use the word in scare quotes to clearly indicate that it is nothing more than fluff stuff for publish-or-perish desperadoes of academia to get journal publications in their vitae).

The quality of what qualifies anymore as empirical science aside, the issue du jour seems to center around female breasts — specifically, large female breasts — and how "men" (apparently, the implication is all men) go "bikini brained" when they see them.

I need to take exception and a bit of umbrage.

No, big-breasted females do not impress me. I had a mother. Now that I am all grown up, I don't need to live in post-fetal dependence upon the biological milk jugs of a surrogate, particularly if those cans would require a five-dollar return deposit if they were made of glass in a recycling-conscious municipality or state.

More broadly, I have reached a glad age and a happy state of general irritability wherein sexual games of taunt-and-tease annoy me to no end.

I have seen all I need to see, and there is nothing new under the sun... at least there's nothing new I want to see and keep my groceries in my stomach. (That's why the link to man-on-dwarf a friend sent me was the last straw in our e-mail communications.)

Years ago, I was a practicing nudist. That's right: a practicing nudist. In fact, for a while I was on the board of directors of a local group. Indeed, I was the member-at-large. Anymore, I have enough credentials that I need not list that distinction on my curriculum vita. However, in my time attending nudist parks and get-togethers, I saw just about everything from very big to very small, and quite a bit of sun-baked human-beef jerky. While large-breasted women were not uncommon, my attention was generally more focused on such matters as cold-nosed dogs, waist-high nettles, and the occasional agony of in-the-raw bacon-frying, challenging as it is when hot grease pops off the griddle and onto easily blistered man-parts.

Nudist clubs can be instructional. I learned not to care, and it wasn't all because of the over-exposure to over-exposed women. You see, my local club had as one of its members a fellow from the Islands. He was relatively tall, muscular, but lanky. He was also graced by the Lord with what qualified in my book as deformity. Even when he was approaching from behind, I could hear him 20 feet away: "SLIK-slik, SLIK-slik, SLIK-slik..." I wearied quickly of this sound. I also wearied quickly of the women who would look straight ahead while their eyes rotated 360 degrees in their sockets as that fool sauntered by. He knew damned well God liked him more.

With a passion, I do so hate competitive sports.

Nudist clubs were not, however, where I completed my journey into annoyance with nudity.

I'm a college teacher.

Even in this day and age, when kids come to college from high schools and earlier training where they got abstinence-only nonsense beaten into them year in and year out, their hormones are still in high gear. The boys are ready to have sex (and only a select group does on a regular basis), and the girls are ready to have no limits on how far they can experiment with their allure, although many are not nearly as much into sex as they are their ability to capture attention of males by appearing to be as interested as the boys are. In warmer weather, attention-getting rituals mean seeing all manner of attire that could easily kill an older man not prepared for the spectacle that seems to get a little more daring every year. Last Summer was the first in my memory when butt cheeks were showing with no attempt at covering the meat-leg junction.

Cleavage has been on display for several years now, and there's not much more on the top side that can be revealed without more design engineering advances in up-lifting bras.

The slightly warmer weather has revealed a new trend for this year: skin-tight pants that look like a cross between panty-hose and spray-on paint. I think there's a thong involved in some way, but Lord knows how it's positioned, considering the anatomical gallery these things put on display.

It will get worse, this year, I can tell you that. Spring Break follies in Florida aside, sun bathing on roofs and in front of off-campus apartments will be fashion shows of bikinis that are little more than two Bandaids and a cork.

And the young men will be right there, too, trying their best to show their own wares: six-pack abs are the goal, and quite a few more young men these days strive for them. The boys pretend not to care that the girls pretend not to look; but everybody is checking everybody out.

Except for me. I just get irritated with the whole meat aisle.

If I want to see boobs, I'll watch C-Span interviews with politicians. Ditto if I want to see ass. Just like the girls who flop their undulating mammary glands, and just like the guys who twitch their over-wrought ab and man-tit muscles, the people we elect want us to look, and given that my tax dollars are paying for those boobs and asses in Washington, I'll take the opportunity to get my money's worth. Unlike when I had to suffer the elephant trunk guy at my nudist club, who routinely made me feel like Mr. Pony on the Mr. Ed Show, there is no chance at all that the people in Washington will challenge my sense of self-worth and, indeed, my very reason for living.

To finish this post, though, yes, many men do go all bikini-brain when they see generously inflated female breasts and supple, tender buttocks; but my contention that the same is true of women when they look at men should not go unchallenged, so I herewith offer a bit of a test.

Several years ago, I did a fund-raiser for a fellow blogger. I called it The Dark Wraith He-Chest Challenge, and I asked select male bloggers to try to raise $50 each. Anyone who did pledged to post a waist-to-neck nude picture of himself with the understanding that the picture could then be taken down after a few days. Several reached the $50 mark and posted the obligatory picture. I did, too.

For the purpose of the present essay, I herewith offer that picture again, and I shall leave the link up for 24 hours. Click here to see if there is any female equivalent of "bikini brain."

Perhaps I am wrong.


The Dark Wraith has been wrong before when it comes to knowing what works and what doesn't.