ABOUT IPA, AND INTRODUCING OUR FIRST COLUMNIST

We rate everything from Port Townsend Brewing as quaffable, top-notch suds.  That is our considered position on local beer and we’re sticking to it.  

So much for a beer tasting review.  This is really about the last group of dancers in the Rhody Festival Parade.  I was told they call themselves The IPA.  Not India Pale Ale.  No, they are “The Intergalactic P**sy Alliance.”

You’d know how to fill in the missing letters if you had seen them.  A group of women in very short skirts, some not reaching their thighs so that their underwear was out in the open.  Their dance was nothing more than the thrusting of pelvises at the crowd.  They were nondiscriminatory:  men, women and children alike got the treatment.

The woman gyrating directly in front of me wore lacy undies and franticly pushed her pubic area at nearby onlookers.  Little was left to the imagination.  She appeared determined to make sure we all saw what she was revealing.  Desperate, even.  It wasn't artful or entertaining.  It was aggressive.

Nothing was left to the imagination regarding another woman.  Was she even wearing anything under that strip of fabric that flapped as she bounced?  It didn’t look like it.

I wish I had had the presence of mind to take photos.  But then again, I don’t think I would publish them on this site.

This spectacle came in the same parade as marchers and floats of high school bands, people celebrating substance abuse recovery, local businesses, classic car buffs and electric vehicle activists, veterans, senior citizens, hospital workers, candidates for public office, first responders, the royalty of different area festivals, the missionaries of Youth with a Mission, a church’s day school.

What was the point of this aggressive display of female anatomy?  What were they saying? 

Sure, you can say, “If you don’t like it, don’t watch.”  But families with children did not know what was coming until it was upon them.

If a group of men in jock straps (or without anything under their kilts) suddenly faced the crowd and performed the same pelvic thrusts and exposed themselves, would it be acceptable?

Is this sexual harassment, or at least inappropriate sexual behavior that should be condemned?  Charlie Rose, David Letterman, Matt Lauer, Harvey Weinstein—all of them are accused of exposing themselves to unwilling witnesses. Does the same standard apply to what concluded an otherwise family friendly-all-around-good-wholesome-fun Rhody Parade?

I mean, who asked if we wanted this thrown in our faces?

Is it okay if women expose themselves, but not men?  In the case of the vile famous men just mentioned, they wielded power over female victims.  That is a critical factor in those cases.  But, to be fair, the IPA women also possessed some degree of power and responsibility which they used without consideration for their audience. 

Maybe the whole purpose was to be “in your face.”  That, in itself, implies a power imbalance.  What were the families seated on the curbs, on blankets and in folding chairs to do, run away?

I just don’t know.  It didn’t seem the classiest way to end a lovely parade showcasing the best in our community.  I’ve heard from other people on the receiving end of this crude choreography.  They also felt disappointed, even victimized to some extent.

I’m not the only one wondering about things like this.  Tomorrow’s column by Scott Hogenson shares his thoughts in Moon Over Port Townsend.  “Moon,” not as in a lunar event, but in a woman pushing posterior flesh out a truck window at Sims Way and Haines Place and how our police responded.

Scott Hogenson is a prize-winning journalist who has been a member of the academic staff at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he lectured in the School of Journalism and served as managing editor for the Wisconsin Public Radio News Network. Scott has also been a contributing editor for National Public Radio in Washington, D.C., a broadcast editor for United Press International, and a news director for radio stations in Virginia and Texas.

Scott’s columns will likely be provocative.  Let me restate that:  Scott’s columns will definitely be provocative.  I may not agree with what he says. This will be his column expressing his unique viewpoint.  We welcome well-written responses to Scott and will be happy to publish them.  No more than roughly 700 words, please, the same rule Scott works under.