Lingerie That's Really Shocking

There are a great many things that I would love to be able to say about the ridiculous grandstanding and buffoonery taking place in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac, masquerading as legitimate Congressional oversight. Sadly, I have to take a pass because I'm so angry about it that I need some time to gather my thoughts to write coherently. I'll get to it in the next few days ... in the meantime, let's talk about rape prevention underwear.

Yes, Dear Readers, last month Time Magazine ran this odd, if interesting article - Indian Students Develop ‘Rape-Prevention’ Underwear. India, of course, has been in the news because of a series of brutal, high-profile gang rapes and other vicious sexual attacks against women.

Three Indian engineering students have developed lingerie known as Society Harnessing Equipment, which incorporates “anti-rape” features to help women protect themselves against sexual assault. According to one of the developers, the underwear includes a GPS link and a cell phone transmitter which would send an SOS text to police and emergency services and to the girl's parents, and is capable of delivering a 3800 kV shock to an attacker.  The circuitry for the GPS and associated sensors are located near the breasts, where research indicates women are likely to be first assaulted.

The article goes on to note that the idea of devices to prevent rape is not a new one*. In South Africa the controversial Rape-Axe, a latex device worn by a woman like a tampon and studded (pun intended) with inward-facing, razor-sharp barbs to impale an attacker's private parts, was first introduced in 2005. Though the Society Harnessing Equipment can reportedly deliver up to 82 powerful shocks, it’s quite a bit more humane than the Rape-Axe**. 

The students are hoping to make their design available for purchase soon.

Not to make light of a serious issue, I think it would be interesting if we had a device which would deliver powerful shocks to the brains of elected reprehensives who are otherwise brain-dead and fixated on self-aggrandizing showboating*** rather than serious investigation of real issues.

Have a good day. Enjoy that electronic lingerie.

More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

* Of course, the famous chastity belt was meant to discourage not only rape, but consensual (if unapproved) sexual relations.

** Not that "humane" is necessarily a quality one might wish to apply to anti-rape device.

*** Yes, Mr Issa, I'm talking to you.

A Permanent Reminder of a Temporary Feeling

There are a great many things I don't understand, such as color television, Republican economic policies, the mind of Kim Jong-un, and the appeal of the Kardashians. Another is the desire on the part of many otherwise intelligent people to get tattoos.

There are very few tattoos, especially on women, that I find attractive, especially when - after a few years - the colors have faded and the skin has sagged so that what might once have been a work of "art" is now a fadded, blurred smear on the canvas of the body. Most tattoos are, in my humble opinion, hideous, and do nothing to enhance the beauty of a lady or the handsome appearance of a gentleman. On his album Beach House on the Moon, Jimmy Buffett sings a song about tattoos called "A Permanent Reminder of a Temporary Feeling," which pretty much sums it all up.

I thought about the subject of tattoos yesterday when I ran across this article on CNN: "Suffering from 'Tattoo Regret'." The article was written by plastic surgeon Dr Anthony Youn, who has a great deal of experience in removing tattoos from men who finally realized that they really didn't love Annabelle forever, or women who came to understand that the lengthy quotation they had inked on their arm was less intellectual than visually tacky (and, often enough, misspelled*). Dr Youn tells the story of a lady who, when she was a free-spirited young thing in her 20's, got a tattoo on her lower abdomen that she came to regret many years later when she became a grandmother and needed to set a positive example for her grandchildren. ... the tattoo read, "Dinner is served."

A tattoo is one of those things that probably seems like a great idea when one is drunk or stoned, but isn't quite so appealing in the bright light of day. If you need a tattoo, try this one ...

not this one ...

Ladies, please think twice before you get that tacky tattoo**. Invest in some nice clothes instead. You'll thank me later.

Have a good day. More thoughts later.

Bilbo

* In a hilarious skit on the old Smothers Brothers TV show, comic Pat Paulsen was horrified to learn that the huge new tattoo across his chest read "Born too Loose" rather than "Born to Lose."

** Consider what happened to Maud Adams in the 1981 movie Tattoo.

Unnatural Selection

I ran across this somewhat odd article the other day - Men Prefer Women Who Look Like Them: Study.

Hmmm ...

It seems that a group of French researchers at the Institut des Sciences de l'Evolution de Montpellier have conducted a study which focused on two evolutionary hypotheses: the theory of homogamy, which suggests that many animal species prefer genetically similar partners ... that is, those who look like them; and the uncertainty of paternity ... a man's preference for women who will contribute fewer of their own traits to their children, allowing him to identify his own offspring more easily.

The results of the study indicated that men did, indeed, identify women as attractive who resembled their own faces, but did not support the uncertainty of paternity hypothesis.

This means there must be a lot of phenomenally ugly men out there looking for equally phenomenally ugly women.

I had enough trouble finding dates in high school without the added pressure of trying to find a girl that looked like me. And why would I have wanted a girl who looked like me, anyhow?  I love my sister, but ...

I think this is another candidate for an Ig Nobel Prize.

Have a good day. Don't tell Agnes that she looks like me ... there's no telling how she'll react, but it could be ugly.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

A Few More Odds and Ends

I'm running a little bit late this morning, having overslept my alarm by about 15 minutes, and so my brain isn't quite engaged yet. Therefore, instead of the usual insightful and erudite post you probably were expecting*, how about a few minor odds and ends from the old blog fodder file to hold you over until tomorrow, eh?

Saudi Arabia has very little to recommend it other than a whole bunch of oil. In fact, were it not for all that oil, it would probably have remained nothing more than a backward and misogynistic storehouse for sand. The desert kingdom is widely known for, among other things, forbidding women to drive ... but it seems that the government and religious authorities are sticking a tentative toe into the 20^th century** by considering the possibility of allowing women to get behind the wheel. Here's a photo from the news release ...

Halloween is not far off, and everyone is thinking about their costumes. Zombies are, for some reason, big again this year, so if you want to dress up as a zombie and be really believable, you should probably work on mastering the USDA-approved zombie diet ...

I think we're probably safe here in Disneyland-on-the-Potomac in the event of a zombie invasion ... the shortage of brains would probably cause hungry zombies to go elsewhere in search of nourishment.

You can tell there's an election coming by the geometric rise in the number of robo-calls that tell you that (insert candidate name here) is a worthless douchebag, rather than explaining clearly why you should vote for (insert candidate name here) instead. This makes it difficult to make an informed decision, which is why I don't pay much attention to polling results ...

I ran across this interesting story in The Atlantic yesterday - Study: In Homicide Defense, When the Beautiful Are the Damned. There's a general belief that a beautiful woman can - literally - get away with murder ... but that may not necessarily be the case. We all remember the classic scene in the movie Basic Instinct in which actress Sharon Stone attempts to ... uh ... distract the detective (Michael Douglas) who's interrogating her*** ...

According to a study done at the University of Granada in Spain, her ploy may not have worked as well as she might have hoped, as the study results indicated that women charged with murder who plead self-defense are more likely to be perceived as guilty if they have straight blonde hair and "a slender and elegant appearance." You can read the full study (titled Is Miss Sympathy a Credible Defendant Alleging Intimate Partner Violence in a Trial For Murder?) here, preferably before you decide upon a solution to your problems that might draw the attention of the coroner.

And that's it for today.

Have a good day. More ... and, hopefully, more coherent, thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

* Silly you.

** The 21^st would probably be a bit too much to expect.

*** That scene is #85 of the Top 100 Movie Moments, as ranked by the website IGN.com.