Boobies

That got your attention, non?

A weird double-standard-of-sorts that exists in our society has been increasingly coming to for forefront of my attention lately. I suppose that it is something I’ve been aware of and fallen victim to my entire life, but it seems to be absolutely everywhere lately.

Boobs. Like everything good in the world, my latest point of intrigue has involved what is perhaps the world’s most popular food delivery method (sporks, while utilitarian, just don’t have the media punch that tits seem to have). I’m not here to rant about the sexualization of women in general or anything of the sort, but rather the fact that women with large chests are regularly the butt (breast?) of jokes, but never would a similar word be uttered about flat chested girls.

Just this morning, I was watching The Today Show (Edward R. Murrow certainly watches this from beyond the grave, what with it being such a solid source of news) and they were discussion the fashion at last night’s Golden Globe awards. They flashed one svelte and tiny starlet after another, each more waifish than the last, all while gushing about how glamorous and stunning the women are. Now, don’t get me wrong- a lot of these women looked great, but they all had one thing in common: they were tiny in every way. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with these small women with small chests looking great- in fact, that’s wonderful- it’s great any time any person embraces their body and looks fabulous.

But see, then a funny thing happened. They flashed up a picture of Mariah Carey and everyone started snickering. I’ll be the first to admit that Mariah is often the victim of poor styling, stuffing herself into outfits that are far too young and too small for a woman of her age and shape. But hey, she hardly looks bad, just not at all what we normally see on red carpets, which are usually filled with tiny women who range from painfully thin and sick to healthy, but by no means anything bigger than a size small. This is her last night:

Now, I’m not going to pretend that she hit it out of the park with that dress- the shoulders are weird and unflattering, the waist cuts her off in a weird place, and those sleeves. Each of those is a valid fashion criticism, but what did Al Roker say?

“Look at THOSE Golden Globes!”

My question I pose to you is a simple one: would Al Roker ever say something in similar vain about a less endowed actress or singer? For example, Rose Byrne was considered a style hit of the night, with people on channels and blogs raving about her purple dress. Check it out:

Can you imagine the hell there would be if Roker said something like, “I bet she’s wishing she had some Golden Globes!” or “Look at THOSE ant bites!”?

Golden Globes aside, just last week, the blogsphere was lit up with snide remarks about Jessica Simpson, after some paparazzi shots of her out at dinner surfaced. Us Weekly posted an interesting, though brief, article mentioning all the venom being spewed in Jessica’s direction. All because a girl wore a push up bra out to dinner with her friends. Are you shitting me?

A similar brouhaha occurred when Meghan McCain, daughter of Senator John McCain, posted a random picture of the her and a new book she got on her Twitter. Almost instantly, Meghan started receiving hateful and insulting comments from all over Twitter and before long, news agencies were discussing what a harlot she was for having the audacity to show a little cleavage in a Twitpic. A brief article with the picture can be found here. Yes, there’s cleavage there, but that’s a girl in a camisole at her house, messing around and taking stupid pictures. When you have large boobs, they look like that. It happens. I know from personal experience that even when I’m completely covered, people will make some attempt at sexualizing my large chest. Meghan is an intelligent  (check out her column on The Daily Beast), beautiful woman and there is absolutely no reason that a silly photo on her Twitter should be used to discredit her as a person- all because she has a bigger chest! It’s insanity.

You’re probably thinking to yourself: well, if these girls don’t want to be judged for their tits, maybe they should cover up. I’m here to tell you that it doesn’t work like that. Sure, sometimes I flaunt my chest and why shouldn’t I? My friends with nice legs wear short shorts and heels when we got out, the ones with nice butts wear skin tight short dresses, but I’m the hussy because I wear a vneck over my d cup? C’mon. And there are plenty of times where I cover up, but people still make comments. A tiny peek of cleavage out of the top of my shirt is scandalous, when flat chest girls can wear deep Vs without much discussion. Even then- if I’m sticking my chest out in a push up bra, you can talk- I put it out there, but I can literally wear a turtle neck and still receive comments about how OMGHUGE my tits are. And you know what? It’s frustrating because I just can’t win. My tits will always be the butt of jokes.

What gets me is that my chest isn’t even that large. I’m a D cup and when I tell people this, they tell me that I must be wearing the wrong size bra because my boobs are HUGE. Excuse me, I’m acutely aware of the size of my chest, thanks. Much more so than you will ever be lucky enough to be, in fact. I don’t think people really think about what they are saying, but on my end, the implication seems to be that I’ve got freakishly large- circus sized tits. People think it’s ok to make comments about me when I’m in regular, covered clothes. People think it’s ok to reach out and grab my boobs. People think it’s ok to make jokes. It’s not. Ever.

And do you know why? Because if I went up to a flat chested friend and commented about how their shirt would look cute if they could actually fill it out a little (hardy har har har), they’d cry. If I said their chest was comical to me because of its size, they’d cry. If I patted their chest to feel the bones, they’d cry. But all of these things are ok to do to me because hey, I’ve got circus tits, right?

I think the rationale behind this standard has something to do with the idea that a large chest is desirable and so hey, what do I have to complain about? And I can tell you first hand that, that is exactly what flat girls don’t get: it is not some blessing to be endowed. Sure, men like my boobs, but do you know what it’s like to try to have an intelligent conversation with someone, only to have them not look up from your chest the entire time? Sure, it doesn’t sound like much, but you have no idea how degrading that is until you’ve experienced it your entire life. Heck, as an adult I can even push it away, but imagine being a 15 year old girl on the debate team and getting ballots back from adult male judges that say you lost, but hey- you’ve got nice tits (alright, it usually wasn’t that direct, but I did have a judge once tell me that in person after the round). That fucks a kid up, because you feel completely and utterly helpless. It sucks.

Or how about when I was a teenager and my friends sat me down and explained that I was making them feel bad about their flat chests. I was confused because hey, I’d never say anything bad about someone else’s body like that- that’s terrible. They explained my egregious error. You see, when we’d go to Forever 21 and they’d pick out cute tube tops and backless shirts for me and I would point out that I couldn’t wear that because of my large chest, this hurt their feelings. That was me rubbing my large chest in their face (and not in that way men would later grow to love). What they didn’t get is how much it hurt me that I couldn’t shop where my friends shopped or buy the cute shirts they bought. It didn’t matter, though, because the sheer existence of my boobs threatened them and because of that, they couldn’t hang out with me anymore. Seriously.

Flat chested girls seem to think that boobs make it easy to find clothes that fit, but the reality is that all women have problems finding fitting clothes and that’s just because of inherent differences of the female body. Like I said, I’m solidly in the “normal” range of bras (much to the surprise of those around me, apparently) and I have tremendous trouble finding clothes that fit right. God forbid I want a button up shirt!

My point is just that we all need to remember that everyone has insecurities- even the most “perfect” and beautiful woman in the world. Critical comments about the way a person looks just aren’t ok unless openly invited. And just because someone has big tits, does not mean that they are any less of a person or a more welcome butt of your jokes. You hear me, Al Roker?

PS: Follow Meghan McCain on Twitter, she’s funny as hell and smart to boot.