The teaser at right is for a gallery image from my life drawing class. Some of you may have been to a life drawing class. A naked person poses in the center of a room, and a bunch of art students have to draw her, or him. This phenomenon has been mostly unchanged for a hundred years or more. I remember once seeing a rather charming picture where a bunch of women circa 1900, with their corsets and their hair in big poofy buns, sleeves rolled up, drawing a naked man. Well, naked except for a small item of clothing covering what is generally regarded as the naughty bits -- an item of clothing which Seth Green, in the commentary track for the Buffy Episode "Wild at Heart," described as a "man thong."

I talk about this because the issue of "decency" is swirling through the zeitgeist.

This is because of an interesting convergence. On the one hand, we have that whole Janet Jackson Super Bowl half time thing. Now, I didn't watch the Super Bowl. I never watch the Super Bowl. I've been in the same room with it, but I can't honestly say I've watched it. This year I wasn't even in the same room with it. But I've seen that clip of Justin Timberlake (whoever he is -- I mean, I know the name, but I couldn't tell you why) ripping off part of Janet Jackson's corset thingy over, and over, and over, and over. And apparently I've seen this little film clip (with digital blurring) so many times because it was Scandalous! Shocking! and Indecent!

I'm so outraged! Show me again!

And on the other hand, we have these same Guardians of Public Decency trying to prevent people from getting married because they happen to be the same sex. I don't know, maybe I'm hopelessly out of touch, but when exactly did it become MORE respectable for a couple to be living together without being married?

Actually, I fear that I AM hopelessly out of touch.

I have a prudish, neo-Victorian streak. I first noticed this as a child, when I thought the 70s were tacky. My view of appropriate public swimwear gets up to about 1950, and after that everything is much too revealing. I don't have a problem with "clothing optional" swimming situations (the Victorians, in spite of their infamous prudery, had many enthusiastic nudists. They thought it was "healthful.") but think it is inappropriate the instant anyone lets on that they've noticed other people are naked. I've been waiting for a good five or six years for the bottom of women's shirts to start meeting the top of their pants again. I'll wait forever if I have to.

I started to idolize Miss Manners in high school, when I wasn't coping very well with being an adolescent in the modern, sex-obsessed world. It wasn't that I didn't know about such things, or that I wanted the arts to be censored. Heaven forfend! I just didn't think what other people were doing was any of my business. And I didn't want to hear about it. No, really. And I don't think that joke is funny, either, and do you really think it's an appropriate topic in work setting? Hrrmph.

The worst offenders have always been these Guardians of Public Decency, though. They just won't stop talking about the things they find "indecent," which gives them the chance to wallow in their own prurient interest, while maintaining their holier-than-thou pose. Genuine prudes see right through that. We've noticed that one reason we know so much more than we really want to about what adult, mutually consenting people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms is because these Guardians of Public Decency bothered to make it illegal, then tried to enforce that illegality in the very public courts. Or because they thought it was so horrifying that the president engaged in a sexually compromising position with an intern that they had to make it the only topic of public discourse for a year. (For the last time! Unless she was an enemy spy and he was giving away national secrets, IT'S NONE OF MY BUSINESS! And I don't want to hear about it. No, really.)

So, if you're feeling the urge to live in a more decent and civilized society, read your Miss Manners. Stop poking your nose into other people's bedrooms. And, for Heaven's sake, pull up your pants.