Westernization of Iranian clothing...

Oh come on now, Mughaal!  What about belly a dancer's dress? that is pretty traditional and its MIDDLE EASTERN!

Clothing can be sexually provocative, but not only Western clothing.

Originally posted by Mughaal Yeah but no one goes around wearing belly dancer clothes, do they? It is the actual fashions and fads that reek of sex. They dont have to if the designer doesnt want to. But i suppose sex sells.

Tell's a lot more about you than Western clothing. It doesn't "reek of sex" to me; you need to get around more.

Edited by Styrbiorn - 09-Dec-2007 at 10:06

No, it really doesnt tell you anything, except im worldly or cultured.

Edited by Mughaal - 09-Dec-2007 at 10:10

They dont wear it out of the bedroom? Hip Huggers? Yes you wear a bikini at the beach; but that is not native to other nations. You also have women wearing the undergarments mentioned - which also is nonnative to other nations.

Originally posted by Styrbiorn I want proper sources that in these societies, women didn't care about their physique. Your personal opinions doesn't count as sources.

the idea that the woman should be beautiful appeared in some social conditions in diverse societies. Different to animals, where usualy the male is the one that have to be beautiful, in human societies the males have to be strong and the females beautiful. This is the result of the cult of sexuality which dominates the human kind, a sort of clichee based on a more developed sexual conscience than the one of animals.


But there have been and still are many societies where the beauty of the women is not a value. We can distinguish which was the way the women were perceived from their visual representantions in artefacts. In Neolithic (with the exceptions of early civilisations, Egypt, Sumer) there was not a precoupation for the female beauty. In the Bronze Age appeared.

And here I must enter an aside: The post reproduced in the thread from Mughaal is different from that found in my e-mail, which contained the pictures that underscored that "sex sells". Whether it was censorship or simply an excess of bandwidth I do not know, but the pictures clearly made his point: the bimbo surrounded by identical twin "metrosexuals" as well as the parfum commercial. And it is with regard to the latter that I must deliver an anecdote from my own hoary youth in the 1950s. Back in high school (college or gymnasia depending upon terminology), we students mounted a musical [Kiss me Kate] for which besides being the "student" director, I was also in charge of promotion (the school had a 2,000 seat auditorium and its productions were community events). Among the many fliers I devised was one "borrowed" from Guerlain Parfums with its phrasing "Promise her anything, but give her Guerlain", which I changed to read "Promise her anything but give he two tickets to Kiss me Kate" with the appropriate illustration of a romantic embrace in Renaissance clothing with a good bit of cleavage. The day following the distribution of the flyers I was dragged down to the Principal's (the Head Master) office and repeatedly berated for distributing such a salacious type of pamphlet. Needless to say I was dumfounded by all the ado and the promises of impending hell fire! Where I thought I was being clever, others assigned evil motives [and the head of the Drama Department did not have her teaching contract renewed and was replaced the next year by a lady whose husband was a Protestant minister!]. Are such attitudes still prevalent in a Western context today? Yes, they are and one need not look far to find acute criticisms of merchandizing activities as pursued by Calvin Klein, Halston, and yes, Abercrombie & Fitch:

Edited by drgonzaga - 09-Dec-2007 at 15:49

OK, Mughall, you've made your point by illustrating what could only most charitably be described as states of undress! In fact, your illustrations are more pornography than merchandizing subtly espousing anarchical rather than cultural identity. Of course, from a practical point of view, just how far will any society tolerate this type of vacuity esentially reflecting the exploitation of people by various professions. Those male images are fully within a homoerotic context and do say much about the nature of the fashion industry in a contemporary context.

Edited by drgonzaga - 09-Dec-2007 at 16:38

You just compared underwear with outer garments.

And that indian and chinese dress also had a cut which outlined the feminine shape making them sexual in nature too, by your standards. 

Sorry Mughal, but I do not see people walking down the street, topless or in underwear, ever.  Those adverts are trying to promote brand awareness using sexually provocative images and are totally invalid in your comparison.

How about actually taking pages out of a mainstream catalogue showing outer clothing and trying to make the same point? 

No not really, and i dont appreciate your attempt at being politically correct and so trying to discredit me. Its not working.

I wasn't attempting to be politically correct.  My analogy was deliberately flawed because it is the direct opposite of your comparison and its sole purpose was debunking yours by being equally ridiculous.

i don't see people in Iran or the ME dressed like that belly dancer in the same way that I don't see people in the West dressed as your specimens.




Edited by Zagros - 09-Dec-2007 at 20:45