Women with drones on the beach near the Sanibel Island Lighthouse. Paul Goldfinger © 2016.
By Paul Goldfinger, Editor @Blogfinger.net
Our series on “Girls in Their Summer Clothes” is about more than fashions. We have a photo of women on the beach in Ocean Grove from 100 years ago, and they were covered from head to toe, and that dress was about more than modesty, because it says something about the lives of women then in our culture.
This past summer, we posted a photo of an OG lifeguard walking on the boards in a tiny orange bikini, proud and uninhibited. Again, it says something about women in our society.
Our music also provides a similar sort of social commentary.
Here is a song by Dean Martin. It was written in 1925, and he recorded it in 1957. He undoubtedly was not criticized then for the lyrics, which today would cause a firestorm by feminists.
We have to take music and photography in the context of their time. The same applies to the criticism of statues from another era, such as those of Robert E. Lee.
Incidentally, we took some grief over girls in bikinis in the past, but our OG lifeguard brought no criticism when we put it up on Blogfinger last summer.
DEAN MARTIN.
“Sleepy time gal when all your dancing is through
Sleepy time gal I’ll find a cottage for you
You’ll learn to cook and to sew
What’s more you’ll love it I know
When you’re a stay at home, play at home, 8 o’clock sleepy time gal.”