Hugh Hefner's perspective: "Showbizspy reports that Hefner said: "Palin would make a great centrefold. I don't know what it is, but there's something about a really sexy-looking woman wearing glasses. Imagine what she's like when those glasses come off. It would be a new definition of the word vice in vice president.""


OF course, this is a perspective from a man who is deeply invested in the objectification of women and has made millions on that theme.

On a more heuristic note, I think there is an endless undercurrent in the thinking of people of both sexes who are of prime reproductive age (or a little past it, as in Bobert's case) which forms an "evolutionary evaluation subroutine", continuously scanning for optimum opportunities for species reproduction. And I also think, me, that this evolutionary trait is deeply embedded, no matter what social overlays one imposes on top of it in the way of manners. The very DNA on both sides drives it; kings do it, monks do it, bishops lusting after little boys do it (although in a completely perverted vector) and even pent-up Victorian spinsters do it, up to a point. Whether this constant undercurrent, like the drone string on a vina, should be left completely in the unarticulated background, as Emma would prefer, or brought out in verbal play as Bobert seems inclined to do, is entirely a matter of cultural preference. De gustibus non disputandum. (Everyone is entitled to bad taste).


A