Up Front by Emma Hart

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Up Front: That's Inappropriate!

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  • Emma Hart, in reply to Jolisa,

    Who do you think gave me this magnificent chestal region?

    Unfortunately, according to 75% of their respondents, seeing a girl's chest bounce is something called a "stumbling block". I'm assuming this means that, as I walk, young fundamentalism Christian men have to be very careful they don't trip over and hurt themselves.

    Christchurch • Since Nov 2006 • 4651 posts Report Reply

  • Jolisa,

    That Modesty Survey is fascinating, and for all the wrong reasons. The distractingly gorgeous veiled spokesgal on the front page might be part of why the boys couldn't focus hard enough to come to a unanimous opinion one way or another about such statements as:

    An ankle-length skirt with a knee-high slit is more modest than a knee-length skirt.

    Not to mention:

    A skirt that is tight around the hips, but loose below the hips, is a stumbling block, regardless of length.

    Form-fitting skirts are a stumbling block, regardless of length.

    Sparkly, shiny skirts are a stumbling block, regardless of length.

    I do not think that stumbling block means what they think it means.

    But I do like the proto-fashionista fellow who opined: "It if is part of the outfit, I don't see a problem with it. If it is the only thing sparkling and shining, I'm pretty sure everyone will look at the skirt first, rather than at the wearer." Girlfriend: if the skirt's wearing you, instead of you wearing the skirt, take it off.

    Am I hoping in vain that there is an equivalent site where modest girls dish on exactly what kind of boy-clothes let the devil in, and how?

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report Reply

  • Jolisa,

    as I walk, young fundamentalist Christian men have to be very careful they don’t trip over and hurt themselves

    The streets of Christchurch -- indeed, the world -- must be littered with earnest chaps, all toppled by a rush of blood from the brain.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report Reply

  • Andre Alessi,

    I wonder what it'd be like to treat your sexual arousal as a failure.

    On second thoughts, I don't care.

    Devonport, New Zealand • Since Nov 2006 • 864 posts Report Reply

  • Jolisa,

    The more I look, the more I see that there is little that is not a stumbling block for these guys.

    Seeing a girl stretching (e.g. arching the back, reaching the arms back, and sticking out the chest) is a stumbling block.

    So 56% of these guys need to stay out of the library, for their own safety and everyone else's.

    Lifting a long skirt any higher than the knee in order to step over something is a stumbling block

    Even avoiding a stumbling block is a stumbling block. It's so... meta.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel,

    Shout yourself horse...

    Emma, I’ll go you halves in that pony for Lucy, kay?
    -----------------
    I’ll pitch in.

    so that's like ponying up for a pony, which is what - twenty-five pounds sterling?
    quids in or quid pro quo

    ...or is that now 3 people in a pony suit?
    front, back and ...
    ...centaur ?

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • Danielle,

    Girlfriend: if the skirt’s wearing you, instead of you wearing the skirt, take it off.

    But whatever you do, don’t have a bikini on underneath it! Because they are ‘so immodest it’s sickening’ and also? ‘Extremely damaging to my thought life’.

    (Oh, I feel a bit mean laughing at the poor lads. If only there was some way I could pretend to be the voice of god and say to them ‘honestly, just have a wank: you’ll feel better for it’.)

    ETA:

    Even avoiding a stumbling block is a stumbling block. It’s so… meta.

    It *is*! Impressive.

    Charo World. Cuchi-cuchi!… • Since Nov 2006 • 3828 posts Report Reply

  • Martin Lindberg,

    OK, who gave the Taliban the internet? These replies are from the YMTA (Young Men's Taliban Association) right? Right?

    Stockholm • Since Jul 2009 • 802 posts Report Reply

  • andin,

    I could pretend to be the voice of god

    Is that your voice in my head?

    raglan • Since Mar 2007 • 1891 posts Report Reply

  • Jolisa,

    ‘Extremely damaging to my thought life’.

    So sincere, and so universally applicable, that I am crying tears of laughter.

    If only there was some way I could pretend to be the voice of god and say to them ‘honestly, just have a wank: you’ll feel better for it’.

    It should be the Eleventh Commandment.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report Reply

  • Andre Alessi, in reply to Danielle,

    ‘Extremely damaging to my thought life’.

    I misread that as "extreme dangling". I just can't even.

    Devonport, New Zealand • Since Nov 2006 • 864 posts Report Reply

  • JackElder, in reply to andin,

    Is that your voice in my head?

    Are you my conscience?

    Wellington • Since Mar 2008 • 709 posts Report Reply

  • andin,

    Are you my conscience?

    If that position is vacant I guess I could fill it.

    It should be the Eleventh Commandment.

    Perhaps it was...

    raglan • Since Mar 2007 • 1891 posts Report Reply

  • Jolisa,

    I misread that as “extreme dangling”. I just can’t even.

    In the face of all this rampant female immodesty, any kind of dangling is surely a victory for prayer and self-distraction. And extreme dangling will get you straight to heaven.

    This is of course the hateful flip side of tagging all girls as the S word (or in constant danger of becoming one). All boys become, ipso facto, the other S word: stupid.

    And convinced they are possessed of a troublesome stumbling block in their trousers.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report Reply

  • Jolisa,

    After further perusing the Modesty Survey, I have concluded that some sort of veiling is, alas, necessary.

    There are enough attacks the devil launches at us in the area of lust as it is without having to, as often in my experience, stare at the floor the duration of Sunday School.

    Blindfolds for the lads. It's a kindness.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    Come on Kyle, it’s not like you to play the player not the ball.

    Did the pope sign up for PAS? Because I've got some things I want to share with him.

    Otherwise, not the player, just a religious belief system.

    just that we should try and reign them in a bit.

    Kings have reigns, horses have reins (this frustrates me immensely, so I point it out even though I likely make similar errors).

    And from the front page of the survey:

    Always honor your parents above the results of the survey. (Ephesians 6:1-3)

    I didn't know that they had surveys 2000 years ago. I thought things were just decreed.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel,

    The streets of Christchurch – indeed, the world – must be littered with earnest chaps, all toppled by a rush of blood from the brain.

    …hence stum-bled?

    Though it does leave room for some
    entrepreneur to create a whole range of
    quiet understated personal adornment,
    aka Schtum Bling

    …the Diamante range is known as Sham Bling

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • recordari,

    I didn't know that they had surveys 2000 years ago. I thought things were just decreed.

    Servius Tullius, 578-535 BC, first instituted the census in Rome. Does that count? [Sorry]

    I doubt they asked anyone to lift their toga to see if their tunic was shorter than the regulatory length. Or maybe;

    'Lift your supparus. and show us your subucula.'

    [Toga]

    AUCKLAND • Since Dec 2009 • 2607 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    The concept of a teacher getting away with telling a 14 year old child she "looks like a slut" is what I can't get over - and the docility of the child on the receiving end amazes me. I was mild manned and not remotely rebellious but my response - and most kids I knew would also have responded with "How dare you speak to me that way?" or "Who the hell do you think you are?"

    At the very least I can't imagine a teacher making that kind of comment and not being professionally censured. It's rude to make comments about personal appearance unless they are complimentary. Even compliments shouldn't be suggestive, if they're being made be teachers.

    In high school in the 70s everyone showed a lot of skin. Boys wore the bare-midriff thing - first with football shirts, then later really short flannel pajama tops, with cowboys and Indians,, showing several inches of abs, worn with jeans. Sometimes not buttoned up. Cute, and very sexy. Not a look any guy over 22 or 23 might want to attempt. If any teacher suggested they looked like rent boys, there would have been quite angry response.

    Halter-tops were all the rage when I was in high school - whenever it was remotely sunny outside (they heat schools in Canada) girls would be seen in tops that was as revealing as any bra.

    Braless was pretty much standard with most outfits for teens in the 1970. I used to wear a silk charmeuse bed jacket tied at the waist as a blouse, under my Mum's RCAF jacket, and that would have been conservative compared to my classmates, as diaphanous blouses were all the rage. There were plenty of nipples on show among my classmates. Cut-offs - jeans hacked off to the shortest length possible were also popular, teamed with shirts tied at the waist. Or if you wanted to look like a hippy (but who did after 1970?) girls teamed it with a see-through blouse, worn bra-less topped with an open, fringed suede vest. For that look you needed really cute sandals and an showpiece belt.

    None of this caused anyone to be sexually active. I dressed much sexier on some days in high school than I did at any time in my life (though most days I wore jeans, pullover and hiking boots) but I wasn't sexually active until I was 19.

    Even in my sister's day in the 1950s girls wore pedal pushers, teamed with pop-tops, showing plenty of bare middle. And of course everyone wore short-shorts. J.D. Salinger talks about "short-shorts" in his story De Daumier-Smith's Blue Period.

    Who Wears Short Shorts?

    In my role at at AIDS Vancouver I was often asked by my boss to "dress sexy" and had a team of gay men accompany me on shopping trips to "sex up" my look. My boss Brian used to say things like "Angel-tits! I need you to put on your Azzedine Alia and go rub up against the Minister of Health" which was his way of saying he wished me to go to Parliament and lobby about the government.

    I never wore my Azzedine Alia dress at Parliament - it was a black, backless, very short dress that looked like it had been spray painted on, and it was usually teamed with a black leather motorcycle jacket. Not a day look. Not really my look at all, really, but my husband Paul loved it and it was effective for rubbing up against the Minister of Health at evening fundraiser events that didn't require formal dress.

    I've never had anyone suggest I looked like a slut... not sure why.... a boyfriend once told me I had the body of a showgirl and the soul of a librarian. Someone else accused me of choosing clothing as a sort of camouflage... and it was kind of true. But that had less to do with sex or sexuality than power.

    I chose clothes that were less "follow me fuck me" than "don't fuck with me". I once was stopped by a border security officer in Los Angeles, flying up from Cabo San Lucas to Vancouver. He demanded a passport - something a Canadian didn't need travelling through the USA or Mexico. I said I didn't have one, and he said "Well in your case, I want to see a passport - with a face like that you could be from anywhere." To that I responded (to Paul's mounting alarm" with full volume rage, shouting "HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO ME THAT WAY? WHAT KIND OF COMMENT IS THAT?? SHOULD WE MAKE A CALL TO YOUR ATTORNEY GENERAL? WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE SPEAKING TO??" The little man apologised very profusely, scurrying around meekly to appease me. "I'm so sorry ma'm. I do aplogise." There is such extraordinary power in clothing, but not like Tess thinks.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • Jacqui Dunn, in reply to FletcherB,

    “Diamante” after a fake gem? Come on, get real. The child was obviously named after a car.

    EDIT; Uh-oh. Some of you people are so quick! Maybe it's my fault for reading through in order?

    Deepest, darkest Avondale… • Since Jul 2010 • 585 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    He demanded a passport - something a Canadian didn't need travelling through the USA or Mexico.

    Wouldn't your passport be the way you prove you are Canadian?

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • Jacqui Dunn, in reply to Andre Alessi,

    After all, noone would ever blame an SUV owner for leading people on into thinking that they are actually wakers.

    Um. Andre, did you miss an "n" out?

    Deepest, darkest Avondale… • Since Jul 2010 • 585 posts Report Reply

  • Andre Alessi, in reply to Jacqui Dunn,

    Oh typical. You point this out to me after the edit button vanishes! Let's all just pretend it never happened.

    Devonport, New Zealand • Since Nov 2006 • 864 posts Report Reply

  • FletcherB, in reply to Kyle Matthews,

    Wouldn't your passport be the way you prove you are Canadian?

    So you have to carry something in order to prove you dont have to carry it?

    West Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 893 posts Report Reply

  • Jacqui Dunn, in reply to Andre Alessi,

    You'll see that I am fairly slow today anyway, but I wasn't at all sure that I wasn't reading some PAS esoteric wording that everyone but me would know, like y'know, "roflnui" or something.

    Deepest, darkest Avondale… • Since Jul 2010 • 585 posts Report Reply

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