Yesterday, I reported on my household’s experiences watching the televised Super Bowl, part of my ongoing experiment to find out whether men really–as the rad-fems allege–get so buzzed on testosterone while viewing the game that they haul off and beat up their wives and other nearby females. (See “Wimpy New Englanders Won–I Hated That,” Feb. 2 below.) While measuring the guys’ violence levels–which hovered between food-impaired and inert–I couldn’t help but notice and comment on the equally inert halftime show: doddering Aerosmith, talent-free Kid Rock, and so forth.
But in an embarrassing reporting lapse, I failed to notice–completely failed to notice–the show’s startling climax (as it were), when Justin Timberlake ripped off Janet Jackson bodice to reveal her right breast in its naked entirety, save for a silver pastie-tipped nipple. (You can read the news story and watch a video of Janet’s Breast Event here on CNN.) My bad! My excuses are that we have a really small TV (when it comes to technology, we’re late adopters) and we were all too preoccupied with jeering at the rest of the show’s lame entertainment antics–the King Tut hand movements, for example–and wondering whether someone actually got paid to choreograph this thing. Even our 6-year-old guest, Johnny, proved to be too discerning on the aesthetic level to take in what was happening on the salacious level, and so was saved from the scandal to children for which millstones should be hung around adults’ necks.
Meanwhile, FCC chairman Michael Powell, who spotted the incident while watching the Super Bowl with his own two kids, has ordered an investigation of the incident–as well he should. And both MTV, which produced the halftime show, and CBS, which broadcast this year’s Super Bowl, have issued profuse apologies, saying they had no idea that the strip show, which had not been part of the rehearsals, was coming. The Super Bowl, after all, is a whole-family event in many households, and it’s supposed to be family-friendly. And Janet herself has also apologized–sort of. Her story is that the bodice-ripping was a last minute idea that she and Justin cooked up. Her exposed breast was supposed to be modestly (!) encased in a red lace bra, but something went wrong with her costume, she says. Of course, that still raises the qestion of whether any sort of televised strip show during the Super Bowl is appropriate for youngsters. And if I were Janet, with a brother in hot water for his own alleged bizarre behavior with children, I’d have stayed far away from this one.
But the real question is: Considering that the silver nipple was clearly supposed to have been seen by someone, do you believe Janet? Or is your response: Uh-huh. Readers, let us know