So photogenic!
It’s one of today’s most mystifying and as-yet unanswerable questions confounding humankind, especially women. Why do so many men transmit pics of their penises? To both women they know and women they don’t know. The second-to-last episode of the TV hit series Succession waded into the dick pic zeitgeist but unfortunately shed no new light on the phenomenon. At a meeting, Roman accidently texted his father Logan a dic pick that was meant for his oedipal obsession Gerri, sitting across the table. Logan, aghast and dumbfounded, demands to know: “Are you a sicko? What is this? Why do you send them? Roman contritely responds: “People just send each other pics of their dicks. Just a way to say, ‘here’s my dick’.” Men aren’t known to be the most self-reflective half of the species. But if they can’t explain genital sharing, surely some behaviour scientist can shed light on why we suddenly have men doing in droves what their fathers or grandfathers would never have thought of doing. Is it a technology thing? In the seventies it would have been considerably more logistically complicated given the state-of-the-art photography equipment, not to mention the delayed gratification (i.e., photos still in the snail mail!). Or does it reflect a different view of privacy? Or maybe new concepts of courtship? Although, I’ve yet to meet a woman who says she found a penis photograph the least bit titillating. My guess is that much of today’s generation of guys feels the same way about their penises as guys in the 70s and 80s felt about their cars (definite chick-bait). If true, it speaks volumes about the continuing communication chasm over what women want. And how depressing that so many men see their penis (aka car) as representing and conveying to women the essence of who they are and what they have to offer.
AK