The enmodestening of Shakira

Here is the image:

I’ve been told that the woman is Shakira. I’ve seen her picture before, about a year ago, in a copy of Maxim smuggled into our apartment by one of my wife’s friends. He took it with him when they left. It’s not so difficult to imagine the “before” shot so I won’t bemoan the fact that I don’t have one.

Here’s the story.
I live in a frum neighborhood. That’s “traditionally Jewish” for those of you on the outside. The center of this neighborhood is a shopping area around an elevated subway stop. Advertising on the overpass is consistently inappropriate. It usually targets an ethnicity that is not well represented in the area while remaining blithely oblivious to the very obvious big hat, dangling fringe, wig and snood set.

One morning I noticed Shakira staring down at me. Over the next few days I grew tired of her broody, fawning entourage. I grew more and more embarrassed for my neighbors who I imagined do not share my appreciation for twenty foot tall, scantily clad women. Apparently I was not alone. Someone climbed the trestle in the night, with a can of yellow paint.

At first, I imagined the act to be Talmudicly informed. Substantively ignorant of Talmud myself, I’ll admit it was a gut feeling. There seem to be two issues. The covering of the singer and the preserving of the advertiser’s investment. I looked briefly into both.

There doesn’t seem to be much in the Talmud to support the act of covering singers on billboards. Apparently, when living in the Diaspora (anywhere but Israel) we let the natives dress the way they choose. If they come into our houses, we make like the maitre d’ in a fancy restaurant and loan them a jacket. In public it’s our job to avert our eyes. Tzeniut is the law around modesty but it only applies to Jews.

As for the advertiser’s investment, what was not done is telling. The sign wasn’t damaged. The radio station kept their ad up. The logos weren’t defaced. Someone considered the radio station’s investment to be a value worth preserving. Shakria’s face was untouched and notably, her shoulders remain bare. Someone with a strong and moderated sense of “the proper thing” painted a blouse on the girl, but it doesn’t seem to have come out of the Jewish tradition.

And the moral of the story:
In so much of the city, breasts and genitalia are more likely to get painted on a sign then painted over. I’m feeling proud of my neighborhood for this. Maybe if I knew the real story I’d be less impressed but for now I’m comfortable romanticizing it. So, what’s my new theory? Now I’m thinking it must have been done by some wayward yeshiva boy at the behest of his mother.