If I was a missionary and I saw that statue I would immediately trade my faith in for whatever religion that thing was a part of.

And then they adopt colonizer culture as their own "traditional values" keeping it long after winning the independence. And after the former colonizer rejects it themselves.

classic. missionaries really said “stop having fun in your own culture, here’s a stitched blouse and some catholic guilt” and then acted surprised when the temples went to shit 😭

the audacity of the “missionary position” being the one they forced on everyone is truly the punchline of history 💀

Removed, thanks for the suggestion!

Why tag it NSFW? It is a nipple, and one made of rock…

Because workplaces tend to be culturally conservative because all sorts of people have to work there what with their diverse ideas of what is suitable for the workplace and what isn't.

Because the Victorians won.

finally a comment that gets it 🙏

material culture, textile crafts, the sheer labor of unstitching colonial shame — you’re speaking my language 💅

and yes those women at the bottom?? that’s the energy we’re trying to get back. joy, bare shoulders, zero fucks. the blueprint 🕯️

here for the nipple reclamation movement ✊🔥

they really had temples with dick statues just vibing in the sun and now women are swimming in full pajamas like they’re about to file taxes 💀

missionaries saw a fertility statue and said “actually that’s the problem” and now everyone’s more covered than a Victorian ankle 💔

One of the things that I love about corsets is that they have a long history, where the shape and style of them changed over time. A corset in the Tudor style is going to look different to a Victorian corset, and I find them beautiful in their own ways (and yes, often sexy too).

Having learned of this history makes me appreciate the tragedy of how Indian cultural norms and traditions were smothered by the oppressive rule of the British. It's a slightly silly hypothetical, but imagine if the dynamic were reversed, and garments like corsets were suppressed due to how structured they are compared to flowing garments like saris. That would suck, because that would mean we'd lose access to an aspect of our cultural heritage. Even for people who know naff all about Western fashion history, if you think that corsets are sexy, then you are partly responding to that history — because everything that came before us becomes embedded in our current cultural understanding.

I know a ton about corsetry, and it's an incredibly dense and rich topic to learn about. It makes me feel incredibly small to realise that every culture across the world has their own traditions of material culture that are just as rich — but it's a good kind of feeling small, where I am filled with a sense of awe. I'm glad to hear about women making an effort to reclaim parts of their cultural heritage that have been masked by colonialist oppression.

bro really said “corsets are sexy” in the nipple reclamation thread 💀

respectfully, a corset is just victorian scaffolding designed to make breathing optional. meanwhile our grandmothers were out there in an unstitched sari, tiddies free, breeze accessible, no ribs crushed for the sake of fashion. that’s sexy.

colonizers really said “bind your torso so we know you’re civilized” and y’all are out here calling it a vibe 😭

reclaim the drape. let the lungs expand. thank u.

ah yes the classic “but what about the muslims” pivot — never fails 💀

yes, the temples fell out of active worship over centuries. no, the delhi sultanate and mughals did not show up with sewing machines and the indian penal code to mandate stitched blouses and criminalize “obscenity” in 1860. that was the brits. specifically victorian brits. with their specific brand of shame.

you can have multiple colonizers with different approaches. one set looked at the carvings and largely left them alone. the other set looked at them, invented a legal system to call them pornographic, let the temples decay, and then convinced us our grandmothers were ashamed of their own nipples.

the blouse wasn’t a mughal import. it was a victorian one.

but by all means let’s play “who colonized us in what order” bingo while the main point — that we’re still wearing someone else’s shame — flies right past you 🛫