Some Chinese company decided that having regular booth babes at their CES shack wasn't enough. Instead, they used naked women in some sort of artsy-fartsy installation that was supposed to illustrate the advantages of whatever products they were selling.
While the women were painted and wore flesh-colored underpants, many people are now outraged.
I'm not.
It may be my Spaniard nature—used to see naked or topless people on the beach and not looking twice—but I don't find this is offensive, tasteless or derogatory at all. At least, not as much as the classic booth babe. I find it stupidly dumb and unnecessary, but that's all.
Yes, I realize that this company is obviously trying to grab eyeballs, but I look at this booth and I just see female bodies painted. They are not in an erotic position. They have no attitude whatsoever. They are just there, standing like statues. Neutral.
Compare that to your usual booth babes, many strapped in tight clothes that push their breasts up to the pneumatically impossible and show every crevice of their vulvas as they try to lure stupid morons into booths with the promise of a flirtation what will inevitably go absolutely nowhere.
This is similar to the difference between a nudist beach and a porn magazine. The former has zero sex appeal, zero erotism, zero sex, even if the women and men have incredibly beautiful bodies. It's all natural and even boring. The latter is usually game of prohibitions, of uncovering something, of tight clothes that show half a nipple, and the possibility of pleasure and orgasm. It's natural too, sure, but there's a game. A game that the companies use to lure men into their booths.
This is definitely not that case. Perhaps you don't see the difference. Maybe I'm mistaken. But, to me, this is more harmless art installation—albeit useless and stupid—than the blatant erotism of the classic booth babe.
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Images courtesy of Scott Schaen/Chip Chick