“Well the girls are excited/Because in a minute/They’re gonna get wet/‘N’ the boys are delighted/Because all the titties/Will get ’em upset.” These lyrics underscore an exciting view of female sexuality and its power over male spectators-a reclaiming, if you will, of the male gaze. Two years later, Frank Zappa’s 1979 track “Fembot In A Wet T Shirt” gives props to the gals on stage. As she comes up for air, Bisset appears elegant, her near-nudity referencing Aphrodite. Goggle-faced and sun-kissed, the underwater swimming scene opens the film. Swimming underwater, the English actress surfaces wearing a white tee and bikini bottoms in the 1977 pulp film, The Deep. The first iconic image of a wet t-shirt is credited to Jacqueline Bisset. The wet t-shirt contest predates sexy selfies and Snapchat videos: it’s a living photograph, a tableaux vivant. Whether millennial media habits can chip away at some of the ingrained images of hegemonic sex appeal remains to be seen, but the way people consume media these days helps make an argument for why sartorial events like the wet t-shirt contest can indeed be feminist. A shift is happening, and even if change doesn’t occur immediately, the camera is now in the hands of more people: women, especially, who can turn the camera onto themselves. New media platforms do take some power away from the male gaze. However, has this new access actually changed social attitudes about female sexuality? The infinite aggregation of images on platforms like Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr-media forums that allow viewers to post, rather than simply consume images, say looming from Hollywood billboards or from inside fashion glossies. The diversity in the types of images that people put out into the world is a choice opportunity, especially for marginalized groups to reclaim power by getting on stage and showing their breasts: big breasts, small breasts, augmented breasts, natural breasts, brown breasts, large-nippled-breasts, pierced breasts, lactating breasts, post-sex-reassignment op breasts.īut even though potential to find a sundry of images exists, are people taking the time to seek them out? Or do they go for the easy definitions of what’s sexy/sophisticated/crass/erotic/tasteful/raunchy? Human obsession with spectacle is not new what’s new lies in the aggregation of images-the sheer multitude of them, the myriad ways they can be manipulated, and the rapid speed with which all this can happen. ” This pronouncement couldn’t be more relevant today, when personal exhibitionism is de rigeur. Or rather, expectations of feminine modesty have been historically limiting to women.įor detractors who point out that wet t-shirt contests are judged and winners pronounced, isn’t that the American way? But before the first playhouses opened in the Colonies, across the pond, Shakespeare’s Jacques says to Duke Senior, “All the world’s a stage/And all the men and women merely players. That’s a powerful feat, especially because historically, women have struggled to move freely within trappings of modesty. What appeals to me about the wet t-shirt contest is the ease with which a woman can shift states of modesty at will. But people slip in and out of dominance and submission all the time. When you factor in ideas about class and the friction of hedonist concupiscence rubbing against American Puritan ethos, the white t-shirt contest opens a dialog of sociological intrigue.īut can the wet t-shirt contest be feminist?Īt one time, I used to think that as an object, a woman was unable to gaze astutely at the world herself. Like most garments, its significance is defined largely by its wearer and the style in which it’s worn. When wet, however, the white tee becomes something else entirely. For a moment, as the water hits her skin, she becomes sex.Ī blank canvas-an item to be styled or worn alone, the white tee is lazy or elegant, sexy or grungy.
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