It is quite amazing how rapidly the social climate has changed in the past 50 years. Large breasts are highly valued in this culture; they are a great source of a woman's sex appeal, and much of women's clothing styles are designed to reveal this particular asset.
Flashback 50 years. In 1960, 24-year-old Sandy Cherniss, who boasting a bustline of 41 inches, was asked by school officials at the college she attended to "tone it down" in effect, so her bosoms would not provide such distraction to the male students.
There is no way this would ever happen in the modern world of 2010. Halter tops and other "club wear" type clothing are manufactured for and marketed to pre-teens just on the cusp of puberty, many whom haven't even developed breasts yet or started menstruating. Girls are shown that exposing their breasts and showing as much cleavage as (legally) possible not only helps in securing a boyfriend but oftentimes a job or promotion, too; many girls learn that it's often their body, not their brains that are their assets most valued by others.
One of the most fucked up things about this ad is that it places the blame on the female student, telling her to tone it down, as if she should be punished for her biology rather than expecting the oggling boys to behave like decent men and not gawk at her endowments while in the classroom. Rather than holding the male students to a certain standard of higher level academic decorum, they blame the female student.
After reading the text that accompanied the first photograph, I realized that this incident took place here in San Francisco, at City College. San Francisco is arguably the most politically progressive urban area in the United States and is seen as a counter cultural and queer mecca throughout the world, yet even here, just 50 years ago, things were vastly different.
Here is a clearer picture of the student, Sandy Cherniss.
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