American Modesty

Americans, when it comes to our bodies are a modest lot.  I don't know where it comes from.  Why in a society where we readily plaster an image of a scantily dressed person on a billboard do we have such a sense of personal modesty?  I think for the most part Americans don't see this in ourselves.  It is only when we travel around the world and look back do we realize how modest we really are.

My first lesson in this came in Europe as a student.  I was traveling one summer with my back pack on my back through the great capitals of western civilization.  From time to time I would meet other wayward travelers and we would decide to journey with each other for a few days if we were headed in the same direction.  Usually the experience resulted in an address being exchanged and a commitment to stay in touch that would never be maintained.  After a few years we would look through our address books and wonder just who that name belonged to.  At any rate, I remember meeting two men and an attractive woman from New Zealand in Copenhagen, Denmark.   New Zealanders and Australians are really the great travelers of the world.  They would leave their home countries sometimes for years at a time to venture out and explore distant shores.

We had just visited the Carlsberg brewery and decided to take some sun in a nearby park.  Our bellies were filled with free beer samples and we were ready to just relax and unwind after such a stressful experience.  We sat on a big patch of grass and each enjoyed the warmth of the summers day.  I looked to the right and watched some Danish women push their strollers by.  When I looked to the left I found my New Zealand female counterpart was topless, breasts sticking out in all their glory.  "Holy shit!" I thought. "This is cool."  I tried to be calm and act as if it was nothing.

Many Americans have similar stories from their first trips to a European beach.  The fact is, while we in our minds equate nudity with something sexual, for most of the world it is simply a body without clothing.  It's not entirely uncommon to spy a man taking a leak, when a man's gotta go, a man's gotta go. 

Recently there was a big story in the American press about the implementation of body scanners in airports.  Setting aside the fact that they are really a useless example of the United States Government throwing a lucrative contract to former Bush Director of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff who now manages a consulting firm representing the companies that manufacture them, Americans feel quite violated.  They produce a cartoon like image of our bodies for the airport cops to see.  Honestly, if some person was to save a line drawn image of my body and find it so attractive to use for unspeakable things frankly, I would feel quite honored.  Many Americans however were outraged.

Bathrooms are another extreme example of American modesty.  I can think of many times in Europe when I would be using the toilet in a bar and a woman would walk in, greet me and then go into a stall.  Recently on a trip to Asia I was in Soul, South Korea, standing at a urinal doing my thing.  The female attendant responsible for my restroom, I know this because her picture was on the wall, came in and commenced to mop around my feet.  She didn't care and honestly neither did I.

I am not suggesting that we all become nudists but there is something deeply psychological about the way our society hides our bodies.  I must confess however I did grimace this past weekend at the sight of an overweight red neck man emerging shirtless from his house to fetch something from his truck.  His white flesh stood out like a beacon accentuated by the rolls of his tummy.  While the sight did cause me to turn away, I don't reject his right to be there.

Every so often a story of an outraged populace will pop up in response to viewing a woman breast feeding her child.  While I confess were I the woman I would most likely try to hide myself from full public view, I have to question a society and the indignation that results.  Didn't we all as babies at least give it a shot at some point?  Would we prefer the poor kid to just go hungry as a salve to our sensibilities?

What does it all mean?  If there is a moral to anything I guess it is simply, come on people just get over it, your really not that special.