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New York, 8:58 AM
Sun Nov 29
12 posts in the last 24 hours
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Though, funnily enough, no one here can live with their parents past 22 and not be considered creepy. "Get out of the house, but you're still a kid!"
What the world must think of us sometimes...
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The reason why the drinking age is 21 is because the US is the only country large enough to necessitate cars, AND wealthy enough that almost every 16-year-old drives one. I've lived enough in Europe to know that DUI there is easily avoidable--not so in the flyover states.
Also, the drinking age would HAVE to be lower in a country where people more commonly stay at home into their twenties, because if I hadn't moved out at 18, I definitely would have had to hit the bottle every day. I love my mother, but damn.
09/16/09
Cars, licenses and whatnot might be cited now, but the drinking age was mostly raised for purely political reasons and as a backlash toward the permissive 70s.
09/17/09
The Puritans who came to the states to flee persecution to develop their even stronger form of persecution are they ones who tried to outlaw drinking, and barring that, making it very, very hard.
The car thing is very recent. Alcohol is much older.
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Thought experiment. Girl (boy) in bikini (water polo Speedos). Sixteen- or thirty-year-old, it's all perfectly OK.
Wrap a towel around her/him and s/he sits down so there's a glimpse of the swimwear from a certain angle. Still OK. Routine, even.
Compare to the above. It's the same, except the context.
And if it's context-related, it's the problem of the viewer, or of the parents who most assuredly had to sign off on the photo releases. Shades of Annie's Miley Cirus shoot, all over again.
Can't we focus on what matters: Gossip Girl b-l-o-w-s!
09/16/09
People put on swimming suits knowing (for better or worse) they'll be looked at, if not scrutinized.
And unless Ms. Momsen has started tweeting her morning dress routine, she probably didn't expect to be "on display" in quite that way. That's the difference.
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Who are now cynically playing the "Oh Noes, children" card to hype her client. Successfully, which irks reasonable people.
It's FAR from a situation of, say, a gym changing room. Hence no expectation of privacy.
Back to the point: if she wore bikini-bottoms instead, would the picture be any different? No.
09/16/09
Occam's razor says you're wrong. No conspiracy. Plus, the picture WOULD be demonstrably different if she were wearing bikini bottoms. Context in a picture is crucial. If she were at the beach, you'd have a case. As is, she's not Lady Gaga.
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And btw, I think it's finally time for Gawker to come to terms with the fact that those pictures of Jen Aniston were in no way, shape, or form of her "lady flower."
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That being said, I think it's kind of bizarre how we fetishize garments in one context vs. another, and that this fetishization alone can dictate what society deems "moral" or "immoral" about them.
To wit: If she were photographed sitting in a red bikini on the beach, there would be nothing specifically "perverse" about it. But if that same red bikini bottom were photographed being worn under a skirt, it would suddenly become a pair of "red panties" and become perverse.
Am I the only one who finds this strange?
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This girl in a bikini= fun girl at beach! This same girl's panties being photographed while she is sitting down= voyeurism.
In one case the person knows what they are doing, they are going to the beach! In the other case they are victim's of other people's sexualization of them.
09/17/09
But that's entirely my point. Such distinctions are totally arbitrary. The "context" you describe is entirely dependent on society's fetishization of certain garments. Call it a bathing suit and its totally modest and routine thing to see. Call it "underwear" (or that most fetishized word/garment of all time, "panties"), and suddenly it's "***whoo-hoo-sexxxytime-hot-hot-baby-YOWZA-whistle***."
And the two garments are basically the same in terms of appearance and body-coverage.
The only difference -- the or "context" as you put it -- is our own joint fantasies/perversions as a society.
I just find that strange. Always have.
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[gawker.com]
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So everyone wins, I guess...
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