Swimsuits, Modesty and the Male Brain

Your students may or may not be plugged into the part of the Internet – and/or Christian culture – that has been detonated in recent weeks over the resurrected topic of appropriate swimsuits for girls.

It started from a Q Talk by actress/business woman Jessica Rey in which she traced the evolution of the bikini – and its negative impact on culture – and then introduced her own line of modest, attractive swimwear.

The most interesting study she referenced was one in which Princeton researchers scanned the brains of male volunteers and found that those looking at pictures of scantily clad women were more likely to see those women as literal objects – because the part of their brains that think about people as people shut down and the part of their brains that think about tools lit up.

As you can imagine, Christian bloggers and teachers have responded to Rey’s provocative speech in a variety of ways. Some have applauded Rey for bringing the issue of modesty back into the spotlight for teen girls, especially. Others see this new emphasis as a throwback to a time when the church tended to shame girls and women for the wandering eyes and lustful thoughts of men.

Others have pointed out that perceptions of modesty for women exists on a sliding scale, depending on what culture you find yourself in – or that the word modesty, itself, when used in Scripture in relation to women, is about not flaunting wealth as much as it is about not flaunting body parts.

The question is: Does any of this help you as a youth leader? How do you teach modesty to your students? How do you help boys and girls understand the challenges each gender faces when deciding what to wear and figuring out how to look at and think about the opposite sex?

And how in the world do you make and enforce swimsuits standards for camp and pool parties? On that one, David Grant offers some really helpful thoughts.