The seven deadly sins of Hollywood (1957)

YOU CAN T CENSOR A LOOK We are inundated with statistics telling us that Miss X has a vital half inch more than Miss Y; and girls built on a less ample scale tend to regard themselves as being practically deformed. This bosom-fixation is now so pronounced that a girl can make a career out of mammary over-development even though all her other talents are notably underdeveloped. I think the craze originated in America, and psychologists have found an explanation for it, as they find an explanation for everything. They say that the American man has not yet severed the umbilical cord that ties him to his mother : that when he regards Miss Monroe in a body-hugging sweater with such delirious awe he is subconsciously hungering for mother-love — the love he perhaps failed to get at his mother's breast. In other words, it means that he has failed to mature, that he has not outgrown the mother-phase of development and that his sex-fantasies are still those of adolescence. I do not know how valid this Freudian theory is, but I am inclined to go along with the psychologists when they conclude that there is something essentially immature about the worship of the bosom. I do not wish to suggest for one moment that I am prejudiced against this part of the female anatomy or that I am unappreciative of those girls who have made it their stock-in-trade. I have as high a regard for a pleasing shape as anyone. But I feel that you cannot measure allure with a tape-measure; that a couple of inches one way or another cannot make all that much difference. If, in these matters, our tastes are to be governed solely by size, where, I dread to think, will it all end? If we are to apportion blame (or credit, dependent upon your point of view) for the present preoccupation 151