THE U.S. victory at this summer's Women's World Cup soccer finals added yet another item to America's registry of puritanical no-nos. In the glorious tradition of all interesting scandals, this one involves underwear.
Incessant media chatter followed U.S. midfielder Brandi Chastain's spontaneous victory dance after the World Cup match - a celebration that included shedding her jersey to expose a black Nike sports bra. Camera shutters flashed, Nike stock soared, and another moment in sports history was sealed.
"Brandi strips!" cried caption writers across the nation. Horrors. Perhaps, however, women shouldn't be surprised at the (predominantly male) sports industry's googly-eyed reaction. As Edgar Watson Howe once remarked, "a good scare is worth more to a man than good advice." And if Chastain's self-described "momentary insanity" teaches nothing else, it's this: bras are scary.
Even scarier to some, though, is the idea of no bra. This year's July/August issue of Gear, a relatively obscure men's magazine, features a nearly-nude photo of Chastain and her trusty soccer ball. And this only is the most recent in a spate of jersey-shedding photos to grace such periodicals as Playboy.
Figure skater Katarina Witt appeared there last December, along with Russia's Maria Butyrskaya and Germany's Tanya Szewczenko. Then there's high jumper Amy Acuff, who recruited 11 other athletes to pose in the scantily clad, but much advertised, "2000 Calendar of Champions."
For some reason, reaching the top in female sports translates into a singularly potent directive: get naked.
Naturally, many question what this means for women. After all, there are the children to consider. At one autograph-signing in the Pittsburgh area this weekend, more than 600 fans showed up, pens in hand, to meet the sensational Chastain. Many were young girls who look to the dynamic soccer team as role models.
And what about the world beyond athletics? Are we staring down the barrel of a possible "Sexy Senator" photo spread featuring Hillary Rodham Clinton?
In a word, no. The recent actions of Chastain and company constitute a step neither forward nor backward for the feminist cause. What the situation does illustrate is a refreshing willingness among women to do the same things men do when they become famous-market themselves to the public.
After all, no one forced these women to pose nude. Someone offered them a business opportunity, which they willingly accepted.
And why not? Men use sex appeal to sell magazines. Only two summers ago, X-Files hunk David Duchovny appeared on the cover of Playgirl, with his trousers conspicuously absent. I didn't complain about the evils of nudity then, and I won't do so now.
Everyone knows the media is the last place Americans should look for role models. Public figures like Chastain may have a responsibility to be true to their sport, but off the field, they do not have to bow to pre-conceived notions of "propriety."
Issues of personal choice become key here. Other female athletes simply hire a publicist to get them in TV commercials and on boxes of Wheaties. Chastain chooses a racier route. This doesn't make her less of an athlete, nor does it detract from her personally. It simply cinches her identity as a woman of the '90s.
And what's wrong with that? Absolutely nothing. When you think about it, the issue really isn't so difficult to lift and separate. After all, there must be a market for photos like Chastain's, or magazines wouldn't feature them. Which means, at bottom, that America secretly enjoys its sports-bra baring beauties. So much for the "wholesome role model" argument.
No, ladies, it's definitely not time to break out the corsets and wimples. In fact, we should be buying more sports bras - perhaps the very model Chastain wore on that fateful July afternoon. For a mere $40, we can join the ranks of modern women, who bear it all no matter what the reaction.
Or we could choose not to participate, raising our own daughters on old-fashioned brassiere values. I doubt the invisible spheres of gender equality will shift much either way.
(Kiki Petrosino's column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily.)
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