Aga Shunned by Polish Catholic Church

[Kieran]

I don't think it's cultural, I think it's to do with the faith. No religion says nudity is bad - but no religion says posing nude for a magazine is a good idea.

For the record, I'm no prude and I don't mind these photos, but I think the youth group she's involved with are right in their view - but I think they're also probably making a little publicity for themselves out of this too. Whatever happened to taking someone aside if you feel you should correct them? Perhaps then, Aga would give her view and nobody else need know about it...

 

[Johnsteinbeck]

^ i think you're making a good point there. got a feeling they might be glad about this opportunity to make some waves.

 

[kskate2]

An update on this story.
Aga received some positive feedback from ThinkProgress here:
http://thinkprogress.org/sports/2013/07/17/2316061/radwanski-catholic-espn-body-issue/?mobile=nc

She also issued a tweet in response to the Youth Crusade:
http://msn.foxsports.com/tennis/story/agnieszka-radwanska-photos-facebook-response-ESPN-body-issue-071913

 

[tented]

An update on this story.
Aga received some positive feedback from ThinkProgress here:
http://thinkprogress.org/sports/2013/07/17/2316061/radwanski-catholic-espn-body-issue/?mobile=nc

She also issued a tweet in response to the Youth Crusade:
http://msn.foxsports.com/tennis/story/agnieszka-radwanska-photos-facebook-response-ESPN-body-issue-071913

Thanks for the updates.

ThinkProgress makes a few good points, such as "Nudity itself isn’t necessarily sexual, and Radwanska could have worn clothes and still posed in far more suggestive positions."

I also like the comparison of the Michaelangelo works which included nudes, and these pics.

My guess is if these pics had been of a male member of that Polish group, this would never have become a controversy.

Finally, note the priest's phrasing of "promoting the mentality of men looking at a woman as a thing." Why didn't he include the notion of other women looking at the pics? If you're going to get it wrong, then get it wrong all the way.

 

[Moxie]

"Lewdness" is in the eye of the beholder. If we take the spread, (which ESPN has done before,) as a whole, with male athletes included, I fully believe it is a celebration of the athletic body, which is a positive thing, even in keeping with works of great art, as others have mentioned. Many athletes, male and female, tennis players included, have done other kinds of fashion spreads where they are selling their sexuality/looks much more than here, (and much more than their athleticism,) even where they are fully clothed. To the extent that I have ever been an athlete, (and a dancer,) I understand that they appreciate their bodies as their instrument, and don't see nudity as a sexual provocation. They are proud of their bodies...not because they are so "beautiful," but because they are so strong, and serve them well. And they are naked in front of their co-workers all the time. Why shouldn't they be comfortable in these powerful, amazing bodies? I believe the ESPN spread is always done in that spirit.

It really seems unfair to me that anyone would have separated Radwanska from the others who posed for that piece.

 

[joylan1]

Who the heck is Thinkprogess? All the photo's our photoshop to make them more sexually appealing, they are not natural. the nonsense that because it's not in playboy it's OK... If you walk down the street naked is it OK because your not posing for playboy?

This is just soft porn for the elite...

 

[Moxie]

Who the heck is Thinkprogess? All the photo's our photoshop to make them more sexually appealing, they are not natural. the nonsense that because it's not in playboy it's OK... If you walk down the street naked is it OK because your not posing for playboy?

This is just soft porn for the elite...

Photoshoping doesn't change the intention of the photograph, and the intention of all of those photographs was the celebrate the bodies of athletes. If they had been clothed to the extent that they are in their job, in the same poses, you would have no complaint. There is no displaying of their "naughty bits," if that's what bothers you. I don't see this as "soft porn." (Usually, I would think, there would be another person in the photograph, for one.)

It's stunning to me how awkward people are willing to feel about even discrete nudity.

 

[Kieran]

Psst! The intention of the nude athlete photographs is to sell more magazines...