I have to admit that I laughed at this from Gail Collins’ Friday column:
Everybody hates cancer and everybody likes breasts — infants, adults, women, men. Really, it’s America’s most popular body part.
Collins is actually making the same point as DougJ’s in this post — though, as befits a proper New York Timeswoman, (or perhaps because she must, to remain such) she does so a bit more obliquely that one finds in the fearless Balloon Juice mothership. And I’d guess that it’s at least within the bounds of possibility that some Americans may not be all that enamoured of women’s chests…
…but I quibble.
Really, the whole point of this post is to have a little Sunday giggle with the help of a quick trip down memory lane (please applaud my punner’s restraint there. Too obvious anyhow.) Embedding is verboten on this clip, but who among us of a certain age would not make the connection between “America’s most popular body part” and this scene. (Warning: actual Woody Allen sighting at that link.)
Titian, The Worship of Venus, before 1576.
SiubhanDuinne
Oh yeah, you would choose an artist whose name begins with “Tit.” Subtle.
Veritas
O/T, but looks like Europe could really use a bit of Global Warming right now.
Snow in Rome! Wow. Better call Algore…
BGinCHI
So, the breast comments with the Titian really calls to mind the Dan Aykroyd sketch where he plays E. Buzz Miller the “art critic.” You can’t spell Titian without, well, you know.
As here:
http://www.hark.com/clips/frsqvlrpdn-honest-to-god
dr. bloor
Nope. Ben Franklin’s full quote–since scrubbed by the pinch-faced Puritans that came after him–referred to “death, taxes and boobies.”
FlipYrWhig
Amanda Marcotte has been saying that it all reduces to boobs = good, vaginas = bad.
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
@Veritas:
Go away: There’s already enough tits on this thread.
gbear
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor: win
RossInDetroit
The Collins column surprised me. She found a lighthearted way to ease into a subject that had been contested with flamethrowers and halberds all week. Subtlety and humor on the same page as Bobo. What a contrast.
J (reader)
The first thing that came to my mind, given what today is, is Janet Jackson’s nipple. Parts of America certainly do NOT like breasts – they go apeshit angry if they appear on their TeeVees during their beloved Super Bowl, and the FCC gets into a multi-year tizzy trying to fine the people responsible for destroying America’s innocence by broadcasting a nipple for approximately one second.
JGabriel
Tom Levenson:
I laughed, not at the pun, but at the familiar necessity of restraining oneself from making it. Heh.
.
Yutsano
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor: Well Mittens only got 42% in the Nevada vote, so Veritas has nothing else to troll on. They really do not want Willard, at least the teatards don’t. But they’re gonna be stuck with him.
Xenos
@SiubhanDuinne: As to the word ‘tit’… my 12 year old son is learning the body parts in his German class.
Did you know that the plural is ‘Titten’?
Xenos
@Veritas: You dork, Rome is a bit North of the 41st latitude. Compare that to a US map at some point. It is closer to the North Pole than Cincinnati, OH.
Amir Khalid
@J (reader):
I remember that incident. I can’t for the life of me imagine not enjoying a free gander at Janet Jackson’s boobies, or even just one of them. I guess some people just don’t appreciate beauty.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Veritas: Except it takes a whole lot of energy to move a system that strong. You know, the kind supplied by Global Warming. When you’ve learned what the scientific definition of warming is, come back and try again.
Hawes
The sad part is when Ashton Kutcher remakes the Woody Allen movie and the boob scene, it will all be done with CGI and lose that natural feel of early ’70s cinema.
Although I don’t think that part was the breast part of the movie.
Cermet
@Xenos: Please, the ass Veritas was just trolling to prove trolls are as stupid as most republican voters – we are talking box of hammers here.
SiubhanDuinne
@Xenos:
Wait til they get to travel related words and “Fährt” appears in the vocab list.
Calming Influence
How true. It’s why trips “Down Mammary Lane” and songs like “Thanks For the Mammeries” are so deeply imbedded in American culture.
Ruckus
@Cermet:
Never really got the box of hammers deal. Yes a box of hammers has zero sense or intelligence but the contents can be put to good use. Veritas on the other hand…
Delia
One thing I really admire about Gail Collins: she can work Mitt’s car trip to Canada with the family dog strapped to the roof into any topic whatsoever.