National Penis Day, New Zealand
In 2002. the New Zealand AIDS Foundation declared National Penis Day "to highlight the need for men to be able to talk about sex in a healthy way and to be able to take seriously their own sexual health and that of their partners." However, the group was prohibited from putting up billboards (above) to advertise the day. Dare we say the AIDS Foundation couldn't get it up? Under New Zealand law, the billboard was considered obscene.
AIDS Foundation director Ken Hague said, “What we wanted to depict in the billboard would have been acceptable on Swedish children’s television, for goodness’ sake. It is no coincidence that Sweden has much lower rates of sexually transmitted infections than does New Zealand when we men are continually told that we should be ashamed of our sexuality. It’s about time we got over this silliness."
The following year, the foundation reached out to media outlets. A rock FM station in Christchurch, New Zealand organized a protest in the city's Cathedral Square on National Penis Day, Sept. 4, 2003. Listeners were asked to participate naked. The guy standing is Alex Behan, a DJ at the radio station.
Several dozen participants showed up, plus hundreds of spectators.
Participants were told to arrange themselves in a pattern on the square, like a Spencer Tunick art piece.
Then they knelt down to form the finished pattern, a giant penis. We're looking at two ovals, from which the shaft extends away from us.
At the tip of the shaft, Alex Behan addressed the crowd. Hopefully, this event helped the AIDS Foundation get their sexual health message across.
3 comments:
Part of me, more coming from a more tribal logic, collective unconscious and all, would say the summer solstice would be a better say. So, December for NZ.
Apparently they don't circumcise in New Zealand
Do they still have that?
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