Parades are always fun, right? Not necessarily so today in Auckland CBD when around 1pm, amidst week-long media frenzy, Pornographer Steve Crow lead his mainly female staff down Queen St without a crucial element of clothing. That's right, bare-chested women paraded on the back of motorbikes, utes and cars with the top down (excuse the expression) in broad daylight.

Ignoring the ongoing saga that occurred with Auckland City Council declining his application for a permit for the parade, as well as accusations against the parade as merely being one giant advertisement for Erotica (Auckland's adult themed expo) and Crow's fight for apparent freedom of expression, is there another issue underlying all of this?

Boobs. Are they a sexual image? Or a mothering nurturing one? Are they merely just another part of our anatomy? Or should we be modest with them?

I want to know why it appears to be okay to have funbags flung around publicly in daylight and yet if a male were to fling his meat and two veg in the same manner, he would be arrested for indecent exposure... How is that fair and equitable? Some of the strongest moments in this parade were the presence of drag queens (unfortunately not showing off their own hooters) and one lone male without his shirt on. The images of members of the non female variety participating in this parade really shone through as a powerful message about equality (or lack of it).

What really shocked me the most was the complete amazement shown on the faces of men, young and old. Okay, I understand why some young men may look like a dear in the headlights (again excuse the phrase) but seriously, have the older men not seen any pink puppies in their entire life YET? The ogling that was going on was slightly embarrassing, not for myself or for my gender but for the men themselves.

Maybe this is my deep seated problem with this parade: the fact that men act like they have never seen boobs before! HELLO!!! We each have (usually) two of them!!! Sheesh. So if I can do my approximate sums... 6 billion people in the world, 3 billion females, roughly 1 billion haven't reach puberty which would leave 2 billion people with two bouncing Buddha’s approximately of course. Therefore that equates to... step back for this!... four BILLION breasticles in the world. Four billion. And I would even make the giant leap of a guess in saying that this is more than all the trouser snakes in the world (and as a side note, you don’t see women losing their marbles over wanting to view schlongs in all their glory. Work that one out for me!).

If I wanted to be completely PC, I could carry on about nudity in broad daylight, sexualisation around children, promoting the porn industry as well as jumping on the feminist band wagon of men disrespecting women. But I won't, we've all heard it before. All I wanted to voice was why? Why are sweater stretchers so fascinating? Why are they not as offensive as other certain parts of the body? Even as a owner of these enigmas, I myself cannot quite put my finger on this mystery. Maybe this parade could be a catalyst for deeper thought on the matter. In the meantime, I'm off to the mirror for some quiet naked reflection. Maybe the answers are in front of me... literally.

Tags: boobs on bikes