Have you seen the new Janelle Monae video, “Lipstick Lover”? As you can see here, it is a rather sexy little clip of a harmless little tune. What it teaches us though, is not only that Ms. Monae is a talented young woman, as lots of us already knew from her past music, writings and acting in movies like Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, but surely something of where we are as a culture in the continuing conundrum over the slit, hole and nipple.
Thankfully I am ‘out here’ keeping an eye on these things. But have you noticed how, in just a few short years, we went from pixelating ass crack and nipple, surely never showing penis or vagina, to now revealing lots of large cock (and if you don’t think the cock that is being revealed on shows like H.B.O,’s brilliant but short-loved The Minx was large, prosthetic though they were, than consider yourself a lucky recipient!), and showing full bare booty? But despite our recent evolution, if you will allow me the use of that word, and as is clearly on display in Janelle’s Monae’s new clip, ground-breaking as it might be, nipple is still obscured by the ubiquitous blurry dot.
Granted, it’s hard to judge cultural mores or how far we have come by what we see in a video clip. When one talks about evolution of style and taste, our music video output, and surely music videos of the past decade, have breezed by all decency standards (and thank god they have) to give us eye-candy moments leaving us breathless. Madonna’s 80’s output can’t hold a candle to stuff like Cardi B’s W.H.A.P. and surely all the bare booty we indeed get to see in “Lipstick Lover.”
But it is interesting to note that in all the sturm und drang (or if you prefer to Disney-fie this, the folderol and fiddledeedee), in “Lipstick Lover,” Monae is still throwing a clear, completely ineffectual blurry patch over exposed nipples, hers especially (and in the end what are we covering as we clearly see what we aren’t supposed to see through the blurred patch anyway!). So, from this then, can we still assume, that it is acceptable to show copious amounts of breast flesh, which we have been doing and accepting for years, but we still need to obscure nipple? And does this still make the case I have always made that, even in the face of our modern mores and supposed cultural evolution, that we are still afraid to recognize the parts of our bodies that can secrete, even though what the female nipple can secrete can support and nurture life?
Up until very recently, ass crack was blurred-out and in some broadcasts still is. My contention over this was that here was yet another example of the standard bearers keeping us from seeing that which we all knew was there (and all rightly have) while showing, again, more actual body flesh than we had ever seen previously. What was being kept from our view by not showing crack, still surely obscured in plenty of instances (although more and more shows have now ‘freed the crack’), is that here is a ‘part’ of our body from which, in-between, and surely a few inches in, is where the poopie comes out from. Oh, say it isn’t so!! Again, keeping us from the actual crack keeps us from even thinking about, in even a brief passing moment, secretion.
God forbid, we see a penis hole; you know what comes out of there! And vaginas are ok if we only see the slit or hair. And don’t worry, unless it’s a streaming show or cable, we are not seeing many slits or pee pees anyway.
So, where does this all leave us? You got me Potsie. I just report on this shit because it nags at my brain. The conundrum over the slit, hole and nipple doesn’t much rate on anybody’s daily radar, I know. I just wanted you to know I was out here fighting the good fight for you while you enjoy Janelle Monae.
She really is something, isn’t she?
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