Kate’s breasts: we could do with some manners

A screenshot of Catherine and a cover page of the French magazine, Closer, showing topless pictures of the Duchess of Cambridge.

A screenshot of Catherine and a cover page of the French magazine, Closer, showing topless pictures of the Duchess of Cambridge.

Published Sep 22, 2012

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London - I've never seen Kate Middleton's boobs.

Yes, I know I can ogle them on the internet if I wish, regardless of that quite surprising ruling by the civil court at the Tribunal de Grande Instance de Nanterre. But Kate's tits are still there, online, completely against her will, to be leered at, laughed about or dismissed as somewhat lacking as a masturbation aid. I've heard all of these views so far.

Kate, darling, your tits' anonymity did not die in vain, it helped shine a light upon a lot of very odd views about women.

But I, for one, will never look at them. Cackle and call me Pollyanna if you wish, but when I imagine a young woman crying her eyes out, possibly curled in the foetal position, which I'd be if my nipples were strewn across 22 pages of a French rag, feeling abased and violated by some self-serving weirdo with a long-lens camera - I don't think, “Anyway, enough of that, let's see what shade her areola is?”

Or when I imagine Kate's husband, who watched his late mother harassed by the press until her dying breath, screaming at lawyers trying to prevent the photos' resale, well, damn, it takes the titillation out of these tits for me. These people are human beings, having human emotions and I am human, too.

I didn't look at the sex tape of Tulisa from N-Dubz either - not that I'm sure Kate or Tulisa would thank me for linking them here - because Tulisa's pain, embarrassment and betrayal over a sexual matter was evident and I don't glean pleasure from that.

Increasingly, I think the Western world could benefit from rediscovering the simple pleasures of being gentlemanly - or gentlewomanly - chivalrous or decidedly old-fashioned. You know those moments in Downton Abbey when someone insults Lady Sybil and three men stand up holding soup spoons crying “Now then, that's not on!”? That. I'll take that human emotion over the defence of creepy weirdos with long-lens cameras any day. It's odd we live in an era where basic empathy and manners are seen as either inflammatory, weak or simply “a bit wet”.

But I do feel empathy for Kate. Kate's love of high-neckline, knee-length Issa frocks and neutral make-up matched with her perpetual silence have never suggested here's a woman trading on her raw sex-appeal who'd accept tit pictures as “part of the job”. Although this takes me down a victim-blaming cul-de-sac I'm not comfy with either. Neither do I think it's fair that by being upset about her partial nudity, this makes her an enemy of nudists and naturists.

“They're only tits!” I've been told several times. OK, then go and look at some with the owner's consent. And if you're reading this becoming increasingly irate because you believe that the freedom to look at Kate's tits on the internet is one of yer' basic human rights, why, in fact NOT being allowed to look at snaps of the tits of women who don't want to show you their tits means “at some level those Taliban geezers have won”, well, I weep for you and your tiny peanut brain.

In fact, sometimes I weep for what the internet did to humanity - thankfully, all the LOLcat pics cheer me up immensely.

Similarly, if you're one of the “Well, she shouldn't have slipped her bikini top off by a private pool, several hundred metres from a road which was being guarded by the world's most vigilant security if she didn't want pictures to be posted on Twitter so men can discuss whether they'd toss or not toss off over them” brigade, well, off into the dunce corner for you. Go and stand with Mr and Mrs “Well, I pay my taxes which pay for the Queen's corgis' food, so if you think about it I have a RIGHT to see those tits”. A long career as a daytime Sky News talking head for the Taxpayers' Alliance awaits you.

So, thank you, Kate's boobs, for exposing a lot of misogynistic rot. - The Independent

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