April 14, 2012

• Play Or Go Home

  In my last blog I tackled how immodesty can hurt someone more deeply than you might think. But immodesty also has a very interesting effect that is part good and part bad. My immodesty has an interesting effect on you: how do you compete?

  One option is to shame the immodest person. And quite honestly, I'm all for this in certain situations. Look, if a guy with perfect 6-pack abs decides to go shirtless at a random spring party, strategically I should mock him like crazy, because there's no way my topless self can compete. Don't hate the sarcastic playa yo, hate the game. I'll neg his biceps all day. Ok, that's enough slang, heh, but I'm always amused at the "Oh, why are you being so mean to the immodest person?" Look, they know the game, and so do I. When you play your game, others will play theirs too. So, um, Jamie's such a slut with that top, and this has nothing (everything) to do with the fact that she's a D student to your A average.

  But player-hating is a mean counter strategy. Sometimes what cracks me up is when guys take a suck-up role to the alpha male in the group. Have you ever seen guys do this? They just become subservient to the top dog in the group and pick up the scraps and laughs he throws them. You have to pay attention to this, it shows you just how funny men are. We have such an amusing capacity to become mindless followers. Onward Brainless Soldiers!

  There's one final choice, and it's what might be good about immodesty. There's nothing more beautiful than beating an immodest person with one arm behind your back. To win the girl without talking about your salary or wearing your tightest shirt. To win the boy without hinting that you really enjoy sex or while you're wearing a t-shirt and shorts rather than a tube top. If immodesty is so bad, then you should be able to win while still being a bit more modest, right? A good man or woman would appreciate it. And that's the debate right there: if immodesty is so bad, why do people still fall for it? Aren't we more observant, more intelligent than to fall into the first pair of breasts or the first convertible we see?

  Of course, there's another danger to talk about, and that's being so modest that you self-sabotage. I'm not a doctor, I work in a hospital: She's not a model, she just "helps the photographer out." Modesty can become deliberate withholding, holding back what makes the world beautiful for your own selfish reasons or hurt feelings. So sometimes when an immodest person shows up, it forces some of us quieter folk to come out of our shells and show our own peacock feathers. (Pause to consider the mixed metaphor of peacock feathers coming out of a clam shell, and laugh with me. I told you this would be a one-hour blog blitz!). Sometimes we need to be reminded of our own powers, of our own gifts, and sometimes we hide ourselves under a bushel for selfish reasons. One might oddly see immodesty as doing society a service, of starting a game of show-and-tell that would not happen without the first person to step boldly forward.

  More circular writing ahead!

  • 3:19 pm
  • 4 Comments