That's Not The Bat-Signal

One more place to add to my list of places I don't need to visit. Any more. Today's addition is Madrid, Spain. I have nothing in particular about Spain itself, nor Madrid itself. It's the guy walking through the streets of Madrid who is projecting images of his penis onto the sides of buildings that I have a problem with. Wait. What?

Apparently a one Jaime del Val is making the rounds through the streets of Madrid. The only difference between him and other tourists is that he is naked and wearing a contraption that, really, looks like something straight out of Ghostbusters. (But I know it's not from Ghostbusters because in Ghostbusters there were NO penises. Well, of course there were penises! We just didn't have to see them! And thank God for that! I mean, after all, it's Bill Murray for cryin' out loud.) The purpose of his crotch contraption is to project an image of his penis onto large surfaces for all those around to see. WTF? It's like some sort of phallic bat-signal!

This is disturbing on many, many levels. The first one is that the man who is walking around parts of Spain with high powered projection equipment attached to his genitalia is mentioned BY NAME in the story by the good folks across the pond at The Metro. WHY do they know this man's NAME? That leads me into the second level of wrongness. The one that says a man whose name is known should NOT be walking the streets of Spain, naked, and with the intent of projecting an image of his alleged manhood onto the sides of buildings. No, if you have gone through the trouble of learning this chap's NAME, it should only be under the pretext of your arresting him and taking him far, far away. Other than that, there's no reason to call this guy anything other than "you freak". Look at him, will you? Do you have a better name? I didn't think so.

Then there is the burning question (other than, "Oh, what the hell is that?!") which is, "What in the hell is the point?" Because from what I can tell, it has to be something bigger than just his penis (which really shouldn't be too hard to accomplish, judging from the photos). And I suppose that if his name is known, I should assume that his "cause" would be known as well.

So what is it? The "cause"? I'm guessing mental instability at this point. What? Oh, HIS cause. Sorry. His cause is to "...denounce the 'homophobia, sexism and hypocrisy' of the Catholic hierarchy and the 'empty symbol of a society of control and consumption, and a culture of tourism and the overall simulation', respectively", according to the Spanish website Terra. (Gracias.) Well, then. That explains why he was projecting the image of his unit (he calls the images his "organs of power", which sounds a bit like they would be penis superheroes.) onto the side of a Cathedral building on Tuesday night. Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute. NO IT DOESN'T!!!!

:::sigh::: Fine. Here. Behold. Organ of Power Projecting

OK, now I absolutely, for SURE know THAT was NOT in Ghostbusters! What is with the Black & Decker Snake LIght wrapping around his ASS?! (Oh, great. Now I've got that commercial in my head. "It's the Snake Light...from Black & Decker....it gets around, around, around, around....") And why does he have to be naked? Can't he just whip it out at each pre-selected location?<br>

NOTHING has explained why it is that he is doing....THAT to make his point! I'm fairly certain you can make a point against hypocrisy and homophobia and everything else he was against and even a few things that he wasn't against, AND that you can do so wearing some freaking clothes and without projectile genitalia! Has this man never heard of, oh, I don't know, A SIGN?!?! Is the concept of "picketing" completely lost on this dude?!?! Judging from those photos I'd have to guess that, sadly, it is.

Not only has he projected his schlong onto the side of a Cathedral (which is a fairly good way to get your ticket to hell pretty much confirmed), before he did that, according to Terra, "he launched his deformed genitals in front of Congress to denounce 'the weakness of democracies'." Now they're deformed? So, shadowy, on the side of buildings AND deformed. Man, everything is just going wrong in this story. Not that it started off all that right to begin with. I'm just saying. But, you know, I don't know that a lot of people are going to look at the Spanish Congress building and see a large, shadowy, deformed penis on the side of it and think, "He's denouncing the weakness of democracies!" I just don't see it happening like that.

When I've thought of exhibitionists (which is to say, never), I've always pictured the guy wearing that long coat and loafers with socks. Oh, and a hat. There's usually a hat involved. I don't picture some perverted Dr. Peter Venkman going around giving midnight showings of his penis in a fashion similar to that of a drive in movie. But this particular Spanish exhibitionist thought differently than I did. Except for the Ghostbusters part. You can't deny the similarities between the Penis Silhouette Creator and the Ghostbusters weaponry. Compare the two below.

It's undeniable. They're practically the same. Here's another one. Again, note the similarities; they're eerie.

Sphere: Related Content

For Sale: 5,000 Extra Calendars

So let's say you live in rural Spain (Yes, apparently there are rural areas in Europe. Think chalets and yodelers if it helps you.) in a little village called Serradilla del Arroyo. And in this village all of the kids in the village are crammed into the one classroom that the elementary school in the village has. It's probably worth noting that there are seven students in this school. Yes. 7. (I don't know if that's entirely relevant, but it is interesting.) Clearly, your seven students need room to learn. What to do? What to do? I know! A bunch (well, 7 at the most) of the student's mothers will have "semi-erotic", suggestive photos of themselves taken in various garb and poses use them to create a calendar to sell in order to raise funds for the school. Um, OK. What could possibly go wrong?

Three words. Behold! Miss October:

Above is one Itziar Zamarreno, a 40-year town counselor in the village. She is sporting a lovely pelt of fox fur and brandishing weaponry borrowed from one of the local townfolk (as she does not like to hunt). Sweet Fancy Moses, if I was an elementary school aged child and that was my mother wearing animal hide, holding a weapon and straddling, well, anything, the point of trying to raise money to help out my school would be meaningless to me. That's because I'd be spending the majority of my time memorizing bus schedules so that I could get the hell out of there as quick as I could.

Now, it may surprise you that the calendar isn't doing very well. Then again, it may not surprise you. At first, the $8 calendar sold very well. Then, it stopped selling very well. Then it stopped selling. (I certainly hope that they were marketing the thing outside of their town that only has seven children in the entire elementary school. You're not going to make a whole lot after you've sold then one calendar to each of the seven families, I'll tell you that right now.) And while they fully admit that their marketing techniques could have been better and that they did miss Christmas shopping season (hard to say if that would have made a difference in this case), they still owe the printer $16,000. Hmmm...$8 each...owe the printer $16,000....So, I'd have to guess that they were expecting sales of over 2,000 calendars to make a profit. That seems like a stretch, given their location and, well, Miss October, for starters. Oh, wait, they have five thousand copies left. Wow. Did someone not see Miss October before this went to press? Again, seems like a bit of a stretch.

Some other photos in the calendar include a woman with what is described as "discreetly placed Christmas tinsel" and another one where the woman is covering her body with just a red umbrella on a picnic table. (Hey! I bet that one guy would buy some of these! He seemed to love his picnic table. Has anyone called him?) Sure, it sounds good in theory, but in reality? You decide. Here:

OK, personally, I'm all for two semi-nude (or totally nude) women posing together. (And they don't even have to be "posing"! That's not a requirement for me to be OK with it. Hell, they don't even have to be in the same room for it to be OK with me. Unclothed women are very, very good.) But the photo above just doesn't have that "semi-erotic" feel (pun definitely intended) that I think the women were going/hoping for. The woman clutching the umbrella looks painfully surprised and a little bit afraid. And that tie-dyed parasol isn't exactly conveying the "free love" feeling. Not with that one woman looking as if she is trying to convey the message, "I've been abducted. Please send help."

Yeah, I don't know if this whole things was such a good idea in this situation. Apparently, the women got the idea from a similar venture by a group of women in England who were in their mid-50s to their early 70s. They did the "discreet nude" calendar bit of with photos of themselves in order to raise money for research for cancer (a noble cause). Theose were the women who were the inspiration for the movie "Calendar Girls". They were also the women who raised $2.55 million dollars after they sold over 800,000 calendars and got a movie and got a book deal. I guess that's what these ladies thought would happen. They might not have actually seen the other women's calendars, though. Maybe that's why they thought they could pull it off. Here are some of the English women (fully clothed. And not in fox pelts, either.):

Don't they seem pleasant? (How they got Bea Arthur, 2nd on the right there, to agree to that, I'll never know.) See, they seem a bit different than, oh, say, this:

Yeah, those two pictures seem awfully different to me. Both in theory and content. But don't worry. Thanks to some recent publicity about this poorly thought out, but very well intentioned venture (through the printer who let everyone know that the ladies were behind on their payments), people are stepping forward and buying calendars once again. (It's a Christmas calendar miracle!) I have the feeling that this is going to turn out just fine. The printer will get paid, the kids will have more room in their school and the women above will be able to put on some real clothes. Yep, that sounds like the optimal solution for everyone involved. Or wearing tinsel.

Sphere: Related Content