A post about Bras.

I have a love hate relationship with Bras. They fulfil my penchant for matchy matchy accessories but they also screw me over, because I like to wear backless/sideless/seethrough things which ultimately leave be in a bra quandry (which normally ends up in me not wearing one). Then about a month a go, I was with friends getting ready to go out, when my skinny friend X had a new dress with a really schweet back that was all criss crossy and nice, and was clearly beggin for a braless night on the town. So she was just trying to figure out what to do when I suggested she shouldn't wear one (imho the dress was tight enough, and she was skinny enough, to get away with it). This resulted in me recieving a "oh no she dideent" look from my friends.

"It's disgusting" said one, "I can always tell when someone doesn't wear one, it just looks slaggy" said the other. "MEh" I shruggged. WHAT IS THE BIG DEAL?? THEY ARE LUMPS OF FLESH. Thinking about it, maybe it is my problem, am I just overly comfortably/bit of an extrovert? No... there is definitely more to this isn't there? Why do we consider bra's to be protection? Protection against what? Most of the young women I know do not have enormous boobs.....We wear THE SKIMPIEST dresses, but are then horrified by the prospect that we might have a Janet Jackson esq moment? What is wrong with nipples? Why can we be sexual, but not that type of sexual. Since when was there a "right and wrong" type of sexual metaphor?

When I was younger I used to know a girl who used to wear bras in bed "just in case", but was also one of the first girls I know to start sleeping with her boyfriend. Isn't this a bit of a strange paradigm? Girls are petrified of the notion of free breasts or nipples showing, but are increasingly more sexual. Is it a desire to revert to a angelic state of gangly girlness, a sign that their sexualisation is something not totally normal? Perhaps the bra as sexual/humilatory protection metaphor is a symbol of the quandry in which young women are now placed.