Louisa Simmonds

It’s a penis, FFS!

In case you haven’t heard, the actor Orlando Bloom – the very same hunk of gorgeousness who sparred and smouldered his way through LOTR as Legolas, went on to marry Miranda Kerr, and is now dating Katy Perry – got papped with his kit off last week. 

As in FULL FRONTAL. PENIS.

You might also be aware that it’s huge news when a celebrity gets caught in the buff, but even more so when it’s a male celebrity, because there aren’t equal nudity clauses in movie contracts when it comes to men and women, so the penis has become somewhat hallowed in its appearance.

Whereas we’ve been exposed to the complete smorgasbord of tits and fannies through our lives – I used to have to look at them on page 3 of The Sun every morning at breakfast – which makes it a rare, and frankly fine day, when you get a cop of a non-sexual dick pic.

Somehow we ended up playing an improvised game of Charades at the dinner party we attended on Saturday night and I chose ‘Orlando Bloom’ for my opposing team to guess, (kinder, I believed, than someone else’s suggestion of ‘lasagne’), and was somewhat surprised to see that none of our middle-aged friends had heard about Orlando’s ‘paddle’ photos which had trended on Twitter and broken all records on social media.

Which is probably because my friends are not as a) desperate b) sad or c) bored enough to get titillated by penis photos of a celebrity – and TBH, even I’m not sure how I justify my frantic search for the uncensored photos, so I acknowledge that some might see it as rather louche for a fifty-year old mother to seek out unsolicited pictures of a young man’s dick. And definitely a case of double standards.

But my interest wasn’t about his dick exactly…because like the majority of women, I am appalled and affronted by the invasion of privacy when phones and computers are hacked and nude photos of female celebrities are leaked.

Although… in Orlando’s case, his public unveiling did take place on a beach, in broad daylight, with the blessing of Katy, in front of other bathers…and it was quite a beautiful sight.

And how many of us would do that if we really cared about the fall out?

Personally, I think that the phenomenal interest in these photos is about more than titillation. It’s because we’ve been starved of penis in the media as well as a statement of women’s desire for some catch up –  as in ‘tit for knob’ (as opposed to tit for tat). Sure, we know that it’s an invasion of privacy when we feast our eyes salaciously on Bloom and Bieber’s bits, but we also feel entitled to a bit of equality here. We’d like men to understand for once what the full glare of sexual exploitation means, and if Orlando, (like a handful of other actors who have whipped it out for their craft, apart from you, George) is prepared to play ball, I have all the more respect for him.

It’s a penis, FFS!, and in case you’re itching with curiosity, a nice one at that.

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