I do see your point. It’s one of those weird situations. I don’t know that he should have been charged with recording and salivating over images of babies’ asses, but it does sort of bother me that we wort of “feed” pedophiles these images. (The guy was convicted of molesting a child, so he really was a pedophile.)
And you gotta admit, diaper commercials are the king of Gratuitous Ass Shots. (I don’t see where those images actually help sell the product, so they do strike me as sort of pointless.) Considering the number of sickos out there, I’ sort of hestiant about it.
I wouldn’t want a lower-back fake tattoo on my (hypothetical) daughter, but that’s me. I also won’t buy those “bad attitude” t-shirts for my son, so I guess I’m a little uptight. But as for those tattoos, they are increasingly common on young women and today’s fashions make them visible to everyone. Therefore, it’s easy to imagine that a little girl might want one there. It’s also credible to me that an adult would comply (or suggest one there) being ignorant of the supposed connotations. So that doesn’t really raise my eyebrows.
As for topless, anyone who is upset with that must be out of their uptight minds. I’m with Excalibre on that one.
I figure there are three ways to respond to these pictures:
“Aww, isn’t that just cute as hell? Nothin’ melts the heart like a kid in a swimmin’ suit!”
“Oh. My. Gawd! Can you BELIEVE how these poor babies are being sexploited!? How it must warp their little minds! I must call Social Services immediately!”
“Whoa! Young hotties in swimmin’ suits! One’s topless, the other two are gettin’ a little lesbo action! Hot damn!”
The thing that bothers me the most is the pose - it doesn’t look like a natural 5yo stance. It’s coy and sexual to me; it reminds me of a Playboy model teasingly hiding her breasts from the camera. The fake tatoo just accentuates that sense.
However, I heartily agree that we have a weird phobia of the human body in America. If it were a photo of a little kid at the beach, doing normal little kid things, it wouldn’t bother me for being topless.
I guess it’s reflected in my rules for my kid - she can run around at the beach or in our back yard naked, for all I care, but I immediately threw out a shirt her grandfather got her because it was off-the-shoulder and looked to me like junior slutwear.
I disagree. Her expression lacks any hint of “come hither” needed to make it sexual. Kids naturally stand like when they’re self-conscious – like, when people are taking their pictures. The pictures look a little posed, but mostly candid.
“Ass shots” in diaper commercials are seen pretty much everywhere. Why is it then that only American pervs seem to be a problem (I don’t believe that, but it seems to be the conclusion based on your opinion)? And don’t you see, a guy so sick to get sexually excited by a BABY’s ass is sick enough to do it even if you hide babies away from view.
I have to admit, I hate those naked ass shots of the baby in diaper commercials, too. I really don’t need to get an idea that there’s poop between those cheeks to know what the diaper does. I don’t think they should be taken off the air, I just think they’re stupid as hell.
On the one hand, I really dislike the way toddler and little-girl fashion has been tarted up the last few years, so that young children are in fact sexualized in that we are dressing them in clothes based on skimpy, sexy teenage clothing. That’s not cute and innocent, it’s weird and creepy, and I do not buy clothes like that for my kid, because she is 6 and a kid. So I do think there’s a lot of validity to this horror-stricken reaction Excalibre is complaining against, because we do live in a culture that constantly pushes older behavior onto younger children and encourages them to act and dress in provocative ways that do not fit their ages. This means that it gets harder to distinguish between inappropriate ways to dress children and natural childish nudity, and while one is fine and great, the other is not.*
On the other hand, these particular photographs were supposed to be private shots taken for the family. I think it was probably a mistake to have a photographer friend take them; someone got hold of the negatives or the files and posted them in public, where they didn’t belong. I would have advised Crawford to retain all the images herself and not to let anyone else have them. The shots themselves are pretty much cute dress-up shots of a little girl acting like Mommy (if your mom is a famous supermodel, that is), but most parents would not put them on the Internet; they would be kept in a family album or on the wall, which is where they were supposed to go. But it is also true that very similar shots could be taken in a different context that would be very creepy. And because we live in a world where creepy photos are taken of young children, it’s understandable that some people are upset.
*One example of how much this has pervaded our society is to look at old pictures of little girls in dresses. 50+ years ago, little girls wore very short dresses that showed most of their legs, and no one thought a thing of it, because they were little children and by definition innocent and not sexual. Sexual beings covered their legs or showed them off in a sexual manner; they didn’t wear short skirts in public. Now, I would not put my little girl in those short dresses, because “short skirts” means sexuality to most people, and it looks weird and inappropriate to have a 4-yo jumping around in a really short dress–even though that same 4-yo might run around naked or in nothing but little shorts with no problem. A lot depends on what we see in particular styles of clothing and what our cultural lenses are telling us.
How can taking a picture of a naked child be a crime if having the child be naked in the first place isn’t a crime? No one calls CPS if my daughter doesn’t wear clothes, or if she takes a bath. So why would they call CPS if they saw I had a photograph of my daughter playing or taking a bath?
The people who say they are protecting the children from exploitation are the ones who are sexualizing these children. They are projecting their own twisted sexuality onto some hypothetical child molester. Naked children are not sexual. Pictures of naked children are not sexual. And naked adults are not neccesarily sexual either. And pictures of naked adults are not neccesarily sexual either.
I’m with Excalibre. This new attempt to “protect the children” is a symptom of a sexually twisted society.
Excalibre, I think you miss understood me. Basically, I was wondering out loud if I perhaps hadn’t grasped the ramifications of the situation because I’m not a parent. I saw nothing wrong with the photos at all, even with the so-called “tramp stamp.” As a matter of fact, right off the bat, I felt it was wrong to label the pose topless. I mean, as it’s been pointed out, she’d have to own something at that age to be covered in the first place. So, I wanted to know both sides of the equation from folks who actually had kids and I further had no desire to discount their opinions and feelings on the matter. Hopefully that makes sense and establishes my views better.
Sure I see it. However, I think we should consider that, in a sense, we’re giving them “free porn.” No, I’m not saying that we need to censor art or make new laws. (Anne Geddes books don’t need to be pulled from shelves.) But I do think we should be aware of the fact that there are people out there who feed off of these
images.
What’s the point of it, anway? These commercials aren’t art. The nudity serves no purpose in selling the product. (You don’t see adult butts in underwear commercials, or --God help us-- Depends ads.) If there was a valid commercial interest in it, or an artistic one, it’d be different. Instead, it’s just gratuitious, superfluous nudity of an underage person. Why give perverts a licit source when we don’t need to do so?
Oh, come now.
How 'bout this: if it’s a diaper commercial, show the kid wearing a diaper.
What would be wrong with showing adult butts in underwear commerials?
The baby nudity in diaper commercials has a point. When you change your baby’s diaper the baby is very often naked. At least their butts are naked. In fact it is topologically impossible to change a baby’s diaper unless the baby’s butt is not covered at some point during the process. Baby clothes need to be changed several times a day.
And babies are cute. And naked babies are cute. Adult humans think human babies are cute because otherwise they babies would never survive. I adore my baby daughter’s cute little face and her cute little head and her cute little ears and her cute little tummy and her cute little butt. I think every single part of her is cute. Because parents who thought their babies were “meh” didn’t tend to raise very many of them successfully, and I’m the product of thousands of generations of humans who thought human babies were cute and so I’m the same way.
A baby’s butt is terribly, terribly cute to parents. That’s a scientific fact. Advertisers know what they’re doing…juxtaposing their product with images of cute babies to induce people who love cute babies to buy their product. Caring for a baby isn’t an experience for robots, it is sensual…you’ve got baby poop and pee and spit and drool and nose goblins everywhere, baby smells, baby skin, baby hands grabbing, baby mouths chewing. Human parents should LIKE to touch their baby and have the baby touch them.
So why should diaper manufacturers portray fully clothed babies? Because there’s one sick guy out there masturbating to pictures of naked babies? Is this really a national crisis that can only be solved by telling parents to keep their sexy sexy babies fully clothed at all times?
What diaper commercials are y’all watching? I see mostly newborns being held up to impeccably (and impossibly) made up “mothers” and toddlers running around, often with creepy-adult voiceovers explaining how New Super Duper Stretchy Sides (which are never new, nor super, but get new names every three months from the marketing department) move with the baby during his grueling day of chasing the cats and rolling on the floor.
I think I’ve seen some bare baby butt in diaper CREME ads, but that makes just as much sense as seeing elbows in moisturizer ads.
But even if there were a special All Ass Diaper Campaign, so what? Asses is where diapers go. Baby butts are cute - much cuter than diapers. Toddlers toddling in nothing but a diaper is cute - gives a better view of their Buddha bellies and swaybacks. Advertisers like cute images that make people smile and buy stuff.
And who cares if the sicko is whacking off to diaper ads? Let him whack all he wants! It’s the molesting of actual kids I’m worried about.
You said that pretty explicitly in your first post, but the later post that I quoted still struck me as allowing a little more leeway than I frankly think such views deserve. Like I said, this is something that I’m beginning to find seriously troubling; I’m upset by the idea that we’re supposed to live in such terror of pedophiles that we start to regard a young child’s completely innocent nudity (something that I understand disappears suddenly and spontaneously as a kid gets a few years older) as something that has to be hidden away completely. I think I overreacted a little to what you said, since obviously we basically agree. But I find this horror at naked children really disturbing and I think it’s something people should respond to for what it is - hysteria.
But how comes then the only ‘Western’ country I hear having a problem with that is the US? (to be fair, many people in the US). Did you corner the market on perverts or what? Every country has perverts and yet a lot don’t seem to have a problem with showing babies’ butts. Or do the Spaniards and their ‘Culito Feliz’ ads got around to get rid of all pervs? How about the Danes with their todlers books with families sunbathing buttnaked? Really, I am just trying to understand what is really what you are propossing.
Babies butts are cute, in an innocent way, if anyone sees something else it is either out of excessive puritanism or a complete whacked mentallity. I don’t see any other way. I hope that this trend doesn’t continue, I would like to be able to let my kid roam naked as I see fit. Luckily where I live it doesn’t seem to be a concern.
The fact is that there are perverts all over the place, covertly getting their jollies from perfectly innocent things. Thirteen-year-old girls and boys going about their daily business are ogled by 40-yo creepy people who fantasize about getting them alone. Other creepy people are saving bra ads or diaper ads or ads of kids modeling school clothes, to use for their own nefarious purposes. There is nothing to be done about that, and if we start hiding perfectly innocent and adorable photos of babies in diapers because someone, somewhere, is going to get off on it, then we’re just getting ridiculously controlled by fear. Yes, it’s horrifying; it’s also pretty inevitable, unless we really are going to put everyone in burkas.
It is good to be careful and realistic. It is not good to be controlled by fear. (Nor, I will again reiterate boringly, is it good to put our children into inappropriately sexy clothing.)
Another good thing to do, as long as we’re on the subject, is to make sure your kids’ coaches and school employees are properly screened; we just had a friend find out that his kid’s coach had not been; he’s been arrested now.
Nothing at all, in my opinion. I’m just pointing out that for some reason, the Censors That Be have decided that you can’t show a person’s butt unless they’re under a certain age. The babies may be innocent, but the viewers aren’t.
Right, but I don’t need to see a demonstration to understand the uses of Charmin or Stayfree.
It’s sort of interesting, sociologically speaking. When it comes to adult products, we use fully-clothed models who dribble blue liquid onto the product to demonstrate its absorbancy. (Blue was chosen because it’s a color which is never excreted from the human body, I assume.) But with a baby, we show the area from which the substance needing to be absorbed is issued.
I guess you have to be a parent. I don’t think babies are all that cute. Puppies? I go nutty, but babies just don’t do anything for me.
Not a national crisis. As I said, I don’t think that new laws need to be written or censorship rules put in place. I just think that advertisers should be aware of the way their advertising can be misused.
And, God, I wish it was just one or two guys, but there’s a shift-load of sick fucks out there. Maybe having a husband who works in corrections has made me ultra-sensitive to it.
Books have been written on this very subject-- very, very thick books. I don’t pretend to be an expert on why American culture has such a high incidence of sexual violence or even just violence in general. But there are a few factors at work that might be of interest:
Greater media saturation. Incidents are widely publicized. It makes it seem like there have been massive numbers of child molestation cases because they stick out in your mind.
We’re a rather paranoid people, subject to moral panics over the popular issue of the day. I don’t think any culture is immune to that, but added to our frenzied media it can seem sometimes like danger lurks in every shadow.
In some ways, the US clung to some of the Victorian Era’s sensibilities: that of the angelic, innocent child. (Which is why you’re ten times more likely to hear about a child victim if she’s adorable and blonde.) Some of the works on this that I have read have speculated that the more a culture idealizes innocence, the more some people will find a thrill in destroying it.
Then again, seeing nudity frequently in casual context desensitizes a person. I’ve seen a Coke tray from the early 1900s. In it, the waitress is lifting her skirt to step over a curb, flashing a beautifully-shaped ankle. I’ve always imagined a Victorian mother clapping a hand over her son’s eyes so he didn’t see that bit of sauciness. If that lady could see what girls wear to nightclubs these days, she’d probably drop from the shock.
So . . . maybe the solution is more babies’ butts. Dunno-- just musing in print, here.
Some have suggested that some men feel “powerless” and thus kids are attractive because they’re helpless and easily exploited. Further, (though I’m a bit skeptical about this) American culture with its emphasis on empowering women has made the status of men somewhat nebulous. In response to it, some men have sought out people they can dominate entirely-- children.
Women are subject to this as well. Take the well-publicised incidents of teachers sleeping with their young male students, for instance. IANA shrink, but I’d bet you a dollar that these women have felt dominated and helpless in their relationships in the past.
In the prison in which my Hubby works, occasionally a female officer will be discovered to be having an affair with an inmate. These are grown men, of course, but the power dynamic is the same as if the inmate was a child. The female officer weilds enormous power over him. She can make him leave the area, refuse to see him, or even take away privledges (if she’s a bad officer.) She decides every aspect of their relationship-- when and where they’ll meet, when they’ll get physical and exactly what he’s allowed to do.
Now, not every person who feel powerless would be willing to victimize another person in order to gain some sort of mental status, but a surprising number of people will.
There really isn’t any way to *help *pedophiles. Most are too ashamed to come forward and seek help for improper desires. We only find out about it once they’ve done a crime. Before then, counselling would be quite beneficial to someone who’s determined to fight their urges, but most will never seek help until it’s too late. Once they’re in prison, therapy is haphazard at best. Once they’re released, legislation has made it very hard on them to try to return to society.
There are a hundred other factors. As I said, really tedious books have been written on this very subject and I shouldn’t write another, here.
