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Susan Sarandon’s Cleavage? At Screen Actors Guild Awards Bothers ?Piers Morgan?? — Here’s Why That Doesn’t Matter

By Stephen Jordan
Published on: 05:51 PST, Feb 5, 2016

Susan Sarandon’s cleavage not only caught the attention of Twitter during the recent Screen Actors Guild Awards, but her outfit also seems to have bothered British newsman and former Mirror editor Piers Morgan. Sarandon was giving the night’s In Memoriam tribute to David Bowie and chose to wear a white double-breasted tuxedo suit with a black bra underneath. On the night of the SAG Awards, Twitter was hot with tweets about Susan Sarandon’s cleavage, making jokes and with some others slut-shaming, or cleavage shaming, her for her choice of outfits.

Piers Morgan is being accused of the latter, criticizing the outfit as both “tacky” and “inappropriate.” On Wednesday, Morgan sent out a tweet of disapproval regarding Sarandon’s choice of outfit, reports the Huffington Post.

Susan Sarandon, 69, decided to fire back on Thursday, releasing a picture for #TBT (Throwback Thursday), and tweeted a photo of herself in a bra, humorously dedicating it to Piers Morgan.

A few hours later, Morgan responded by clarifying his statement, tweeting, “Just for the record, @SusanSarandon, I think your cleavage is magnificent. I’d just keep it hidden for ‘In Memoriam’ tributes. Love Piers x.”

The actress later received plenty of women agreeing with and supporting her by sending photos of their own cleavage to Piers. Morgan was unphased by all of this and went on to suggest that “if guys did that to a feminist writer she’d scream for their arrests.”

“Won’t be long before feminazis start attacking me as ‘sexist’ for retweeting the cleavage tweets their fellow feminists are sending me,” Morgan tweeted, following the litany of responses he received.

And Piers had plenty to say on the matter, according to Toronto Sun.

“Feminists now sending me photos of their cleavage to ‘punish’ me for criticising SusanSarandon. Curious notion of punishment… I’m under cleavage attack… Seems to be some massive misunderstanding that I am anti-cleavage. I’m only anti-cleavage during In Memoriam tributes to dead people…”

The point Piers Morgan seems to be missing is that men have a history of telling women what they can and cannot do, should and should not do, with their bodies. Morgan telling Susan Sarandon to “hide” her cleavage is merely an extension of that sexism. But with the tweets he has been sending out, he’s clearly already made up his mind that Sarandon is in the wrong, and the only reason a woman would dress that way is to get the attention of men.

Twitter user @Hysterrria sent out a tweet to Morgan, saying, “I don’t know about you @piersmorgan but I don’t flaunt my cleavage for the sole purpose of people sexualizing them.”

Piers responded, “What other purpose could there possibly be in flaunting it?”

And that response spells out a pretty big problem, which is the assumption that women’s breasts exist for the sole purpose of being sexualized. Piers seems to suggest that a woman would never think to dress in an outfit like that for the sole purpose of pleasing herself and no one else – her body has to revolve around the opinion of a man. Biologically, breasts exist so that mothers can feed their offspring. They are not inherently sexual, society has made them that way, and it is a particularly sexist notion because we do not do the same for men.

Susan Sarandon's Cleavage? At Screen Actors Guild Awards Bothers ?Piers Morgan??, Here's Why That Doesn't Matter
Actresses Eva Amurri Martino (L) and Susan Sarandon. [Photo by Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Turner]

Men’s chests are not sexualized in the same way women’s are – men in general are not sexualized the way women are. By Piers Morgan asking “what other purpose could there possibly be in flaunting it?” he is reaffirming the idea that men need to and can validate a woman’s worth based on what she wears or how she carries herself.

If Susan Sarandon wants to wear the outfit she chose to wear, it is her right as a woman to do so without the approval of men. The history of sexism and misogyny involved far outweighs one’s desire to tell Sarandon to “be respectful.”

[Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images/Anthony Harvey/Getty Images]

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