I am happy to see that the Mods are trying to improve the culture of the board, although I think the comments made in the sorority email thread were a bad place to start. The author of the email isn’t an SDMB member and the thread seemed to be just a “let’s laugh at this stupid person who’s been in the news” sort of thread and not anyone attempting to have a remotely serious conversation or ask for advice.
That said, it seems like whenever there’s a complaint about “Heh heh, BOOBS!” responses to posts where women make any reference to their breasts, someone attempts to defend this by claiming that decent women don’t allude to their breasts in mixed company or in front of strangers. Even a post like this:
is considered so close to being pornographic (see for instance Absolute’s post in the locked “Misogyny on board” thread) as to render men powerless to refrain from making crude jokes. Yet on this very same board, it’s so common for men to post about their erections or how they are/will soon be masturbating that it’s considered shocking that a Mod would even suggest that perhaps they tone it down.
Again, Happy Lendervedder’s post in the sorority email thread is far from the worst example of an erection joke in SDMB history…but that’s kind of my point. While that particular post didn’t really bother me, it does bother me that these kinds of jokes – even in more serious threads where it’s not just dumb but offensive to make such remarks – seem to be regarded by some as such a well-established part of SDMB culture that those of us who tend to find them obnoxious and creepy are just supposed to shut up and accept it. But at the same time, women who ask for medical information or advice on buying bras are treated by some Dopers like they’ve gone so far outside the bounds of propriety that they shouldn’t expect to be treated with respect anymore. That’s messed up.
I personally hope the Mods continue to discourage Beavis and Butthead-ism around here.