In Austria and Germany it is common to see images of nudity on TV. The biggest newspaper in Austria, the “Neue Kronen Zeitung” has nude picture every day. I think The European society is relaxed about nudity, its no big deal to see breast in a commercials or a nude woman on TV. And why should anyone be offended? After all we are all born naked!
Things are a bit difference in the land of the free, the United States. It seems like nudity is something Americans are not used too, its dirty. It’s no big deal to kill someone around 2:pm on TV, but to see a breast for a few seconds during the Superbowl is a national tragedy.
The article below is eight months old, and when I first read it, I thought it was a joke, but it is very serious…
My Son Deserves an Honest Apology!
Posted Feb. 2, 2004 at www.insightmag.com
By Paul M. Rodriguez
I was ashamed for being a football fan — and of encouraging my 8-year old son to be one — halfway through the halftime show for Super Bowl XXXVIII.Beyond the hype of “good” football and cool ads, the degradation from smut-filled dancing and foul-mouthed lyrics during the so-called show between halves was made worse by the breast exposure of Janet Jackson during a song about getting a woman naked before the tune was done.My son, an avid football fan, was so embarrassed at the dirty dancing and songs that he asked us to change channels until “the nasty stuff” was over — like women’s dresses being ripped off exposing “their underwear.”Despite such filthy displays of “artistic expression,” not even he could have been prepared for Jackson’s breast to be displayed on national television during a “family evening show” that the Super Bowl is supposed to be.”Why did she do that?” he asked his mother and me. “He shouldn’t have pulled her clothes off, right?” he asked me about Justin Timberlake’s white-trash antics.I’m sure that just as the embarrassment and shock exploded in our living room so too the national blush and, hopefully, outrage exploded in millions of homes at such vulgar displays of classlessness.Whether one believes that MTV — the group that put on the halftime show — knew about the undressing of women and the breast-baring of Jackson or whether the NFL and CBS knew about it makes no difference. The artists knew about it and, despite Timberlake’s pseudo apology, we think he and Jackson knew what they were doing. Why else would Jackson be wearing a stripper’s stock ‘n trade over her nipple?Whatever the NFL and CBS were thinking about what the halftime show was to represent, it certainly did not represent the high rollers who attended the football game, and it certainly didn’t represent the large numbers of middle-class adults and families with children who were watching the spectacle.It’s one thing to have such dirty dancing, crotch-grabbing and foul-mouthed lyrics on pay-per-view TV and/or cable-TV stations such as MTV in the post-“family hour” times. It’s certainly quite another to put such trash on knowing that children would be watching.Whether any laws were broken — and we’re hoping there were so fines can be imposed — is not enough for this father. I want an apology from all involved sent to my 8-year old son. An apology that states clearly that adults were wrong in what they did to him. And a promise that they never will do that again. Never!It’s about time that the common denominator that further dumbs down America is rejected. And if it cannot be stemmed from leaders in the entertainment world, the National Football League that prides itself on wholesome family fare, and from families that won’t stop buying services and goods from purveyors of inappropriate materials for our young people, then regulators and Congress need to get involved.We’re all for free speech and abhor the idea of censors. But we do expect that during the so-called family hours of “public” television — yes, it’s public airwaves folks — that my home will not be inundated with garbage that my young son 1) does not need to be exposed to and, 2) I do not want him exposed to.It’s bad enough now that during the morning shows and evening newscasts that my son is exposed to stories about sexual this and sexual that à la the Kobe Bryant debacle. In turn, my son asks me what one of his favorite basketball players is in trouble for with that woman. It’s bad enough that murder and mayhem are the daily feed that permeates local newscasts and we’re forced to turn off the television at breakfast and dinner because of the inappropriate stories being broadcast.But damn it, to be coldcocked like we were — along with millions of others — during halftime of the NFL’s biggest game of the year is too much. No amount of excuses and no amount of apologies ever will be enough because responsible adults should have known such a show was wrong.That said: My son deserves an apology. And every boy and girl who saw the broadcast deserves an apology, too.
I would be interrested in some feedback regarding the article above! So the question is: Is a breast more dangerous then a bullet?