Vidal Organs

In last Sunday’s “Little Box in the Lower Left-Hand Corner,” Pam Palmer cites a recent Film Clip, asking what the big deal is concerning male frontal nudity.

Gore Vidal has elucidated this point in one of his essays (“Women’s Liberation: Feminism and Its Discontents”): “Though female nudes have been usually accepted in our Puritan culture, until recently the male nude was unacceptable to the Patriarchs. After all, the male--any male--is a stand-in for God, and God wears a suit at all times, or at least jockey shorts.”

RICK SANDFORD

Los Angeles