bettiwettiwoo's Journal: The Raunchy Eye of the Beholder

An Australian swimmer posts party pictures on her Facebook page: in one she might be pole dancing (fully dressed) with another girl and in some others she is at some sort of masquerade dressed in some sort of police uniform (some pictures here). The prissy bunch in Swimming Australia throws a hissy fit and demands and achieves the removal (censoring) of the photos due to their 'raunchy' nature.

Seriously, did some hyper-inflation hit 'raunchiness' when I wasn't looking?!? Is everything super-sexy now?

Swimmers are people who spend most of their time in swimming costumes (with great bodies to show for all their splashing about) - which is the way we, the public, normally see them: at competitions dressed in tight, revealing, body-hugging cozzies! And my God, how pervy are you if you think pictures like these ones too sexy?! Yes, she is a young, good-looking girl, and yes, she is wearing a police uniform cap, but really??! What's next Swimming Australia? Swimming in burqas? That whole parrot-cage Taliban-mandated outfit when they're out of the pool?

I agree the (Western) world has maybe become a tad over-sexualized with girls sticking it in the camera at any given or ungiven moment, but I really don't see that we will in any way solve that problem by labelling just about everything, everybody and his dog as 'sexy', 'raunchy' or 'pornographic'. On the contrary.

I'm reminded of Mrs Cohen in Life of Brian (I'm paraphrasing):
- Mum, why is my nose so big?
- Sex, sex, sex, that's all you ever think about, Brian!

In short

[Captain Splendid]

Don't have time to really lay it out proper, but my theory for the recent surge in pro-religious groups getting even more vocal lately is due to the fact that the millennium didn't kick off the apocalypse.

Simply put, they needed to go big or go home, and the latter option is defeat, which they will not do.

In not so short

[bettiwettiwoo]

I don't actually think the weird reactions to her photos were primarily the response from religious groups: mostly the anti-sex/over-sexed protesters here seem to consist of head-tilting social-work types and 'concerned' tabloid journalists. The latter I can understand: I assume they want to sell newspapers/tabloid-TV shows; the former seem to think that they 'protect the children' by declaring just about everything even remotely connected with sexuality/the naked body as dirty and taboo. Ex: little naked t