Seeing as how we’ve got onto an interesting topic of discussion courtesy of the FaceBook ‘bra campaign’, i thought I would look a little more into it. I do agree with many comments denouncing this “campaign” to a large extent. I also understand where others are coming from who support it. I want to work out what the real issue is here.
Firstly, I want to make it very clear right now that this mini essay of mine is in no way meant to make anyone feel guilty for how they view breasts – neither men nor women. Nor for women to feel bad about how they view their own breasts, in either a sexual way or in a functional way. And it is especially not meant to make any woman feel condemned if she does not view breastfeeding in the same way as me. It is meant as an objective view of the facts surrounding the issue, and any emotion is purely mine that I have inadvertantly not managed to remove from the discussion.
I still maintain that any discomfort over the issue of talking about bras/breasts is an issue of sin, not sex. Breasts are by definition not sex organs (defined by those organs involved in reproduction), they are primarily functional as mammary glands.
Sure, they can have a physical, sexual attraction and function as an erogenous zone, but so does the mouth. The mouth is used primarily to speak and eat, not to seduce or titillate. That is a secondary function that cannot be thought about on a continual basis, or we would all be guilty of lust and impure thoughts. A smile has a very different effect from a sensual pout or tongue run over the lips in a seductive fashion. To stop mentioning smiles or to never talk about the food we put in our mouth just because of the other uses of the mouth does seem a little strange – and yet the same thing has happened as regards the breast. We need to bring purity back into our culture.
So, from that point of view, I can understand how this whole ‘campaign’ could go astray – and on some people’s FB it has. The chief function of a bra is to support breast tissue, not to seduce men (I suppose you could argue that some bras would find it very hard to fit that definition!). I think a single, non-emotive word describing the colour of a bra (or any piece of clothing for that matter) being worn is different from some of the conversations I have seen on Face Book. I also think that the colours red, purple, black, or whatever, are not necessarily sexually motivated or meant to turn guys on – any more than wearing an item of red, purple or black clothing is. (Granted, some women may be trying to allude to more, and if the motivation of this is to get men just to think of women in their underwear – it is at the very least counterproductive to the cause). If the colour of a bra was important only to men, then all those sexually pure single women should never wear bras of any colour other than beige or white.
We have to be careful not to mix the issues up. If we have an issue of sexual immorality and taboo in our culture, that is the issue. Women need not be ashamed of their breasts as a result. If it were not at all about men controlling their thoughts, then we should all be wearing burqas so that men won’t be tempted to imagine things they shouldn’t. Yes, women need to help protect the sexual purity of their brothers - women should not dress in a seductive manner, or use seductive body language. However, just by virtue of having breasts, and not wearing a baggy tent so that their shape cannot be seen, it does not mean that women are trying to seduce men. And men should not lay the blame for their thoughts solely on women.
The Bible charges us to take control over our thoughts. (2 Corinthians 10:5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.)We are faced with temptation every day and can either succumb to it or not. We are not to deliberately allow ourselves to be tempted, and neither should we deliberately tempt another – so that argument is moot really. I am trying to get to a different level of this topic.
I agree that this campaign has not necessarily had the desired effect of only raising awareness for breast cancer (and maybe it wasn’t started for that – will we ever know?). If that’s what it was started for, it’s no surprise to me that the viral nature of such things has mutated it into something less than pure. If the way it has been done has made men uncomfortable, I apologise for having been a part of it, but I am not ashamed of my breasts as the source of nurture for my children and a place of comfort to lay their head.
As far as breasts and the Bible, my not-yet-in-depth-study shows, the term breast is used about 70 times. Chiefly generically to refer to that part of the anatomy to the front of a person and between the neck and the belly. When the word/term breast is used in reference to a woman (ie. Not generically, to a man or in regard to the part of an animal used in an offering), there are about 29 references. Of these, 21 refer to the breast as something to be beaten or torn at (in the sense of grieving), but chiefly as regards nursing a child or comfort given at the breast. Only 9 are of a sexual context and seven of these are from the Song of Songs. The other two are explicitly sexual in reference to impure sexual practices. The seven that are used in Song of Songs are found amidst references to eyes, hair, teeth, lips, temples, neck, tongue, and even the feet, legs and nose, as all being desirable. Song of songs, being poetry, the text uses a parallel construction. This means, basically, that similar thoughts/sentiments are reiterated with slight modification – either to emphasise equal importance of ideas or to maintain fluency and coherence to sentence structure. So, by that token, there are less than seven original ideas referring to the breast in a sensual manner. Other references in the Song of Songs refer to the breast as in indication of maturity or readiness of the giving of marriage. And yes, breasts do indicate physical maturity, as does facial hair on a male.
The current attitude toward breasts being ‘taboo’ has really only come to the fore in the 20th century. I am unsure of exactly when such puritanical thinking took over, but certainly as late as the 1930s there were propaganda type posters of women exposing their breast to encourage them to nurse their babies. These, and other earlier images – (Images of breastfeeding in art – www.breastfeedingart.net/index.html) indicate a very different attitude in the ‘Western world’ to the current sexualised viewpoint. The number of images (over hundreds of years) in art and iconography of the Madonna nursing Christ at a fully exposed breast – and even nipple – shows that our discomfort with the breast is a relatively recent thing.
One author puts it this way (www.007b.com/breast_taboo.php)
The general breast taboo and the provocative visual images in the media greatly encourage men to view breasts as objects of sexual arousal and play. Men are actually being conditioned to see breasts as sexual - to them, breasts become almost like inanimate objects that automatically "click" their brains to the "turn-on" mode.
This "obsession" is to be distinguished from a general appreciation of breasts for what they are (source of nourishment). Boys who were breast-fed as babies have a deep-seated "built-in" appreciation for a woman's breasts due to the child-mother relationship. This is NOT sexual in nature, nor arousing, but merely an instinctive appreciation towards breasts deep in one's psyche (soul).
What has happened to that appreciation without the sexual obsession? Clearly it is not just a matter of logic, or else there would be nothing to discuss. And what is the answer? How do we change the thinking of a corrupt world?
I am not a repository of answers, but I do have the questions. If anything, I think that this latest little episode on Face Book is yet another wonderful conversation starter. Not everyone will agree on everything, but getting people talking is the first step to building understanding and relationships. I hope I can use every little piece of controversy that I come across as an avenue to relating to another human being and seeing where that conversation can take us.
I want to inspire imagination in others. Imagination is wild, creative thinking. Sometimes we are so certain of our beliefs and values that we never question what we take for granted. I think that’s dangerous. It’s ok to question what we think and come back to our original ideas, but to never question is arrogant and ignorant. And that I strive not to be.
