Wednesday, February 11, 2004
The Events of 2-1
I have to say that Janet Jackson's right breast, nice though it may be, is causing nary a splash over here. Europeans are all wondering what's the big deal. To them, it's the confluence of two baffling American obsessions: sex and football.
CNN seems to be digitizing the breast when they show clips of the Super Bowl halftime stunt. All others show Janet in all her glory. A spin around the channels is, er, revealing on this point. To get to the clip of Justin Timberlake ripping off Janet Jackon's dress, I passed MTV Europe's "Top Ten Sexy Videos", featuring Snoop Dog and 50 Cent frolicking among a bevy of topless brown babes, the Swatch commercial featuring the naked ass on a bed and the all-night commercials for the 0900 lines, which show absolutely everything, anatomically speaking. Everything. And this is basic cable. A few weeks back, a (tasteful) photo of a fully exposed set of breasts was plastered on billboards everywhere to advertise some conference or something. Only the North Americans gawked, and nobody said anything.
In fact, nobody is saying much of anything about "the events of 2-1", as Jon Stewart is calling it. Bafflement has dissipated into indifference. It's a non-story, that only gets mentioned when somebody's interviewing an American. For the record, Bob Dole thinks America is a great country for being offended by the stunt. He said so on the BBC.
But this is an old saw: America is puritanical about sex, Europe more enlightened. Their puzzlement about the whole thing is not surprising. What is surprising is that anybody in America is offended. Wasn't she wearing a pasty? Wasn't she, even in her exposed state, wearing more clothing that Lil' Kim wears to church? Wasn't it patently obvious to everybody that this was just another stunt to milk (pardon the expression) a few more minutes of fame for two performers on the downside of their careers?
The real question we should all be asking ourselves is: Why does Bob Dole think it's great that we're all suckers in America?
CNN seems to be digitizing the breast when they show clips of the Super Bowl halftime stunt. All others show Janet in all her glory. A spin around the channels is, er, revealing on this point. To get to the clip of Justin Timberlake ripping off Janet Jackon's dress, I passed MTV Europe's "Top Ten Sexy Videos", featuring Snoop Dog and 50 Cent frolicking among a bevy of topless brown babes, the Swatch commercial featuring the naked ass on a bed and the all-night commercials for the 0900 lines, which show absolutely everything, anatomically speaking. Everything. And this is basic cable. A few weeks back, a (tasteful) photo of a fully exposed set of breasts was plastered on billboards everywhere to advertise some conference or something. Only the North Americans gawked, and nobody said anything.
In fact, nobody is saying much of anything about "the events of 2-1", as Jon Stewart is calling it. Bafflement has dissipated into indifference. It's a non-story, that only gets mentioned when somebody's interviewing an American. For the record, Bob Dole thinks America is a great country for being offended by the stunt. He said so on the BBC.
But this is an old saw: America is puritanical about sex, Europe more enlightened. Their puzzlement about the whole thing is not surprising. What is surprising is that anybody in America is offended. Wasn't she wearing a pasty? Wasn't she, even in her exposed state, wearing more clothing that Lil' Kim wears to church? Wasn't it patently obvious to everybody that this was just another stunt to milk (pardon the expression) a few more minutes of fame for two performers on the downside of their careers?
The real question we should all be asking ourselves is: Why does Bob Dole think it's great that we're all suckers in America?
