Leave Me Alone in My Speedo!

Women can wear -- no, are encouraged to wear -- bikinis and clingy bathing suits. The thong is no longer a scandal; women's side straps leave little thigh unexposed. Show it off! And no snickering goes on; leering perhaps. But for me there is this cult of Speedo shame.
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The black and white photograph was taken in 1956; I was six years old. I am standing knee deep in the Atlantic Ocean at a beach on the eastern shore of Staten Island, New York city's southern borough that was so devastated by Hurricane Sandy three years ago. It was the Eisenhower Era when the Staten Island beaches were still clean -- and America was more innocent.

I am wearing what can only be described as a Speedo, that smallest of swimwear that has become synonymous with racing bathing suits. My brother, four years older, is next to me wearing a slightly bigger but also skimpy suit. In the '50s at least, the small suit seemed the thing. No one giggled, no one pointed or made disparaging references to your sling shot, no one told Speedo jokes

Today, on Michael Phelps or Mark Spitz, such a tiny suit brings no comment. But when I don one - even though I am in reasonably good shape for a guy who just started Medicare - the guffaws and jokes are endless.

My friends warn they will not visit me in my backyard pool if I wear my Speedo. I dare not post a Facebook photo showing the Speedo on my annual visit to French St. Martin each January for fear of an onslaught of jibes.

My two children kid that they will not join me on our annual sojourn to the New Jersey shore if the Speedo also joins us. Years ago my son would not join the local swim club because they only raced in Speedos.

I recently gave a Speedo as a gift to a good friend who had just had surgery and lost a lot of weight. He wore it on a vacation to Greece and his wife took a picture of him (he looked fit!) and sent it via- email to me. But they deleted it from their cell phone for fear a hacker would find it and put him out there with the likes of Jennifer Lawrence.

Of course, if he was in political office I could understand. The Governor of Alaska recently had to withdraw a nominee for a judicial post because photos of him in a leopard-skin-patterned Speedo and a cowboy hat, surrounded by women in bikinis, surfaced. I usually wear a baseball cap and pose only with my wife.

The jokes and barbs are usually good natured, but occasionally turn creepy.

Two years ago my wife and I went in late September to Asbury Park, New Jersey, to get in a stroll at the beach. The late summer weather was nice enough to wear bathing suits and touch the water, but a bit too cool to really swim. So we just walked the shoreline. I had on my small form-fitting red suit. I am always self-conscious on American beaches. In St. Martin or Europe a tiny suit is de rigeur, but no one in America -- except for or me - seems to dare wear one.

I did this day, and as we passed two young guys -- both wearing long baggy bathing suits - they stared at me. I knew they were snickering. When we passed them, I turned to look back. They were both making lewd gestures and laughing. They stopped as soon as they spotted me looking. I had given them enough time to make at least three Speedo jokes.

In fact, there are entire web sites devoted to Speedo jokes and one offers the "Top 10 Reasons to Skip the Speedo." It is mostly about men showing too much blubber, which seems more of a commentary on American fitness than skimpy swimwear. Late-night comedians love Speedo jokes. Even nurses at hospitals cannot resist.

Eleven years ago I was diagnosed with colon cancer and I needed a major surgery. The surgeon was going to cut a hole below my stomach. So the day before the operation I needed to be examined by a nurse who was going to mark, literally, the spot where he would make his incision.

She gave me a choice. It could go in one spot or another. "We don't usually use the lower region," she said, "unless you are one of those guys who wear a Speedo." We both laughed, but I had to tell her, I actually do wear a speedo. I still opted for the upper cut.

So two questions come to mind when I think about the Speedo. The first is why do I wear the skimpy bathing suit version? And multiple reasons come to mind. Vanity is probably first. I am kind of short at 5 foot, 10-inches tall. And when I wear those baggy American-style suits I look like a little dumpy man, which I am not. But in the Speedo I look.... well, kind of fit, albeit showing more than some people like.

In fact, on one occasion when my daughter was having some girlfriends over to our backyard pool, my wife took me aside and said that the green suit I was wearing might be a bit too thin on material. More of the package was visible than might be appreciated by the crowd. I changed, quickly. I am past the stage and age where it pays to advertise!

The other reason is my antipathy to this Victorian Era leftover. I resent that men are not supposed to wear form-fitting outfits, and that it is somehow not masculine or too overtly sexual - or just plain offensive. What is it in American culture that gives this cue that the male body is to be more fully clothed than the female?

Women can wear -- no, are encouraged to wear -- bikinis and clingy bathing suits. The thong is no longer a scandal; women's side straps leave little thigh unexposed.

Show it off! And no snickering goes on; leering perhaps. But for me there is this cult of Speedo shame. I don't mean to suggest that men are the oppressed gender; for sure women are still much more likely to be discriminated against in the workplace -- and the world.

But I can no longer even find a Speedo suit over the counter at a store. I have to go online to buy. The market and the culture are both speaking. And what they are saying to men is you somehow have to be ashamed of your body. I am not.

I wish the Speedo police would leave me alone and the culture would let me be six years old again, standing in my skimpy suit, without being embarrassed.

Robert Miraldi is the author of the biography "Seymour Hersh: Scoop Artist." www.scoopartistthebook.com

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