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I was walking along the beach one day during my January holiday earlier
\nthis year. I like to walk from one end of the beach to the other each
\nday. The forty minutes it takes is good thinking and relaxing time.<\/p>\n
This day just as I was nearing the end of the beach itself where I
\nturn to head out over the rocks to the point, I noticed a group of about
\nfour teenage guys standing around in standard uniform of board shorts
\nwith either hands in pockets or arms crossed. I was a bit envious of
\nthier tanned youthful bodies. As I got closer I realised that one of
\nthem was not a young man but a nonchalant young woman with not large but yet noticeable, and quite definitely bare, breasts.<\/p>\n
It made me wonder again what our world would be like if it were acceptable
\nfor women to go without a top everywhere it was acceptable for men to.
\nA world where breasts were no more remarkable than say a nose. I wondered
\nif, in fact, women would be more equal in such a world. If they would
\nnot be less objectified. I’m pretty sure I will never know. I will,
\nhowever, continue to wonder.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I can remember trying to draw the shape of a womans breasts under a
\njumper when I was about 10. Even earlier, I remember seeing my Grade
\nPrep teacher running for a train one day when I was five. (When I told
\nmy mother about this she joked "Cows and women should never run."
\n)<\/p>\n
So my fascination with breasts goes back a long way. This fascination
\nhas been a struggle. For a long time I felt guilty about it. I knew
\nthat women didn’t like us staring at their boobs \u2014 and I could
\nbe as focussed on them as the next man. (I still sometimes drive around
\nthe block just to get a second glimpse of a woman whose breasts attract
\nmy attention). But as I’ve approached my first half century. I’ve started
\nto learn that all of us, men and women alike, like to be seen as attractive
\nand that women are beautiful and your breasts are part of that beauty.\n<\/p>\n
During this year I’ve set about trying to understand what makes me
\nso attracted to breasts and how I can express that attraction to women
\nin a way that respects their ownership of their own bodies yet acknowledges
\ntheir beauty.<\/p>\n
Part of that journey for me has been to read. I looked up books about
\nbreasts on Amazon. There seem to be two types of books about breasts.
\nIn the first category are books about breast health, breast cancer and
\nbreast feeding.<\/p>\n
In the second category is a new breed of books all written by women.
\nThese books are examples of women looking this men’s obsession in the
\nface and trying to understand it. Maybe only women can do this objectively
\nbecause they don’t have the obsession. A trio of writers opened the
\nsubject in the late 90s.<\/p>\n
The first and still the classic example of this genre is Marion What’s in a breast? That depends on who’s asking, says Marilyn Around the same time, Meema Spadola<\/strong> went a long way "I believe that every woman has a breast story," says Meema Leaping beyond the angst of puberty and adolescence, Spadola thoughtfully![\"cover\"](\"..\/mt-static\/images\/Amazon_Graphics\/0345388941.01.MZZZZZZZ.jpg\")
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\nYalom’s<\/strong> A
\nHistory of the Breast<\/em>.<\/p>\n
\nYalom, author of this scholarly, illustrated treatise on the breast
\nin Western society. “Babies see food. Men see sex. Doctors see disease.
\nBusinesspeople see dollar signs.” Breasts have been denounced as wanton,
\nor idealized as givers of power or life in images of Egyptian goddess
\nIsis nursing pharoahs; sturdy, maternal Mother Russia; or the more eroticized,
\nbare-breasted symbol of republican ideals in France. Psychologists,
\nreligious leaders, advertisers, and pornographers have rhapsodized over,
\nvilified, and used breasts to sell everything from war to Cadillacs.
\nAnd, finally, women have seen in them pleasure, power, sustenance, fear,
\nor failure to measure up. (From Amazon.com)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n![\"cover\"](\"\/mt-static\/images\/Amazon_Graphics\/1885171277.01.MZZZZZZZ.gif\")
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\nto demystifying breasts with her documentary and book Breasts –
\nour most public private parts<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n
\nSpadola, who has spun that assertion into a much-praised documentary
\non the subject and, subsequently, a book called Breasts. Between its
\ncolorful covers is an epic saga of pleasure, power, affection, woe,
\nconsternation, fear, anticipation, and ready-or-not metamorphosis
\nshared by females age 2 to 90. Because breasts are a hard-to-conceal
\nbadge of womanhood, 9-year-old Ali finds that her new curves "shoved
\nher out of the world of childhood and into puberty." How those
\naround a girl treat this change makes a huge difference to self-esteem.
\n"Tie those things down, you might poke somebody’s eye out,"
\na mother kids her 13-year-old daughter. Others recall being teased
\nmuch less kindly within their families for developing too fast or
\nnot fast enough, and dodging catcalls and far worse from strangers
\nwho suddenly felt free to comment on their bodies.<\/p>\n
\nprobes into how women feel about their breasts–whether natural, enhanced,
\nor downsized by surgery–in relation to work, love, baby nurturing,
\naging, cancer, sex, and friendship. "Breasts are aggressive,"
\nsays one woman. "Men feel compelled to look at them, so sometimes
\nI feel like it’s rude to other women to show too much breast."
\nWhether indulgent or insightful, Breasts delivers on its promise to
\nreveal what women really feel and how their self-images help shape
\nthe course of their lives. –Francesca Coltrera (from Amazon.com)<\/em>\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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