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Video: John Oliver Wonders How The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue Is Still A Thing
By
Jen Chung
Published Feb 16, 2015
Modified Feb 16, 2015
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By
Jen Chung
Published Feb 16, 2015
Modified Feb 16, 2015
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Now that the world has gotten to see what only probably Derek Jeter and Hannah Davis's doctor had seen, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver has tackled the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, wondering "how is this still a thing" especially when there's the Internet:
Over the weekend, novelist (and bete noire of Jonathan Franzen) Jennifer Weiner wrote an op-ed for the NY Times about the extremely revealing cover:
It’s the year of the torso,” Ms. Davis told Matt Lauer on “Today,” in a transparent attempt to win the award for Best Use of a Euphemism on Morning TV. Seriously, when you look at her picture, you do not think “torso,” any more than viewers of Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl nipple reveal thought “pecs.”...
Back in the day, nobody worried what her [mons pubis]. looked like because nobody was seeing anyone else’s. One could go hours — days, even — without glimpsing another lady’s ladybusiness...
Formerly among the most private of private parts, the mons pubis is now just another area to be pruned and policed; examined and improved, weighed in the balance and found wanting. It’s obvious, but, perhaps, worth pointing out that what regular, everyday women have in their panties does not much resemble what Ms. Davis so boldly displays. For starters, there’s occasionally hair. For another, there’s frequently a bit of padding.
There’s probably a biological reason for that. Imagine heterosexual intercourse, in the missionary position. Do men really want to thrust against something as firm and sculpted as a clenched fist?
Weiner complains, "Show me a body part, I’ll show you someone who’s making money by telling women that theirs looks wrong and they need to fix it. Tone it, work it out, tan it, bleach it, tattoo it, lipo it, remove all the hair, lose every bit of jiggle." (But there's a "plus-size" model in the Swimsuit Issue now!)
Notably, former Leonardo DiCaprio girlfriend Bar Rafaeli also showed off her m.p. in 2009 for the SI Swimsuit Issue. Anyway, Davis herself has said, "There’s controversy every year, so I think it’s kind of just silly that they’re making it out to be the big thing; I mean it’s the swimsuit issue. There are far more scandalous pictures in the magazine if you open it up. It’s a girl in a bikini, and I think it’s empowering; I’ve been hearing it’s degrading. I think the people who are saying that aren’t feminists, because I think when you’re a woman and you look at that picture and if you overanalyze it as anything more than just a full picture, it’s just silly to me."
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Hannah Davis
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue
Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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