When Jen of Blag Hag first proposed “boobquake”, I thought there was a 60% chance that I wouldn’t be able to stay out it. Now I guess that has reached 100%. The idea started because an Iranian cleric blamed “immodest” women for the frequent earthquakes in Iran. Jen suggested that this cleric’s hypothesis be tested by American women choosing to wear something immodest on Monday, starting with Jen’s promise to wear her most cleavage-flashing shirt. Unfortunately, a cute joke like this quickly devolved into exactly what you’d imagine, complete with drooling morons acting creepily titillated in a way that makes you wonder if they’ve ever seen a woman naked in the 20-30 years that have passed since they went through puberty.
I can understand responses to boobquake like Beth Mann’s, which basically amount to denouncing the lasciviousness of it all, and pointing out that a system where women are paraded around like animals in a zoo for male enjoyment isn’t really the best alternative to forcing women to be covered from head to toe, whether they like it or not. But I do think it was a little overblown. Beth took comments like my initial ones (basically, “I can’t participate, since cleavage is only considered immodest if you have a lot of it.”) as more self-loathing than they were in my case and probably many others. Also, I don’t have a problem with lasciviousness so much as the inequality and the objectification of women for sleazy dudes. And one could argue that this isn’t quite like completely objectifying faux campaigns like the “post your bra color for breast cancer” nonsense, since this campaign is actually proving a point.
However, I’m not really comfortable with boobquake. I pointed out to Jen on Twitter that I was going to be reading for the Boston Skeptics that night, and so it would be highly inappropriate for me to wear booty shorts, and make a mockery of me. Not that I have booty shorts to wear. By mainstream American standards, I have pretty much no clothes that would be considered immodest. Not that I’m prudish by any means. Just a little goes a long way is my style.