Should young men have averted their gaze?
YOU’VE probably noticed we’ve been in various lockdowns (plus a 17-day firebreak in Wales that was a lockdown in all but name) for more than a year.
Although we haven’t been able to travel far, communications have moved further, faster and in greater numbers.
We’re bombarded daily with information, statistics, official figures, opinions and viewpoints that our brains are expected to absorb and mentally digest.
We managed okay before the internet, Zoom calls, texts, emails, breakfast TV and 24-hour rolling news, but since they’ve become part of our lives there are more platforms for people to insult, mock or shut down anyone whose opinion they disagree with.
A friend of mine recently read an online article that stated Pan’s People – resident dancers on Top of the Pops 40 years ago – objectified women.
And teenage boys and young men shouldn’t have watched them.
Talk about redundant retrocriticism!
My friend remembered Pan’s People often wore more clothes than the girls in the audience and danced to 1970s hits like Chirpee Chirpee Cheep Cheep! and Ernie – The Fastest Milkman In The West, so it was doubtful Pan’s People stirred hidden male desires.
In response, he wrote this tongue-in-cheek post…
“Are you suggesting that during the three minutes Pan’s People were dancing, young men like me should have averted our gaze and read a book instead?”
Almost immediately a humourless poster sniffily responded . . .
“If you’d read more books in your youth instead of watching Pan’s People, you wouldn’t have become such a prime example of toxic masculinity!”
Wow!
Even Janet Street-Porter would have considered that an
over-reaction!
My friend, who could never be described as a ‘toxic male’, was shocked and initially reluctant to respond, but eventually felt he had to . . .
“I’ve loved and read books since I was a child and written several of my own, plus screenplays, stage productions and over 400 TV shows. I’ve worked with actresses, make-up girls, and many female singers, dancers and TV presenters without ever being accused of ‘toxic masculinity’. Please think twice before aiming further inaccurate insults at people you know nothing about.”
Unsurprisingly, the other poster didn’t respond.