Okay, time for a short history lesson. Mardi Gras Carnival has been going on, by reliable accounts, since 1781. The late 1830's saw the dawn of the Mardi Gras parades, in the form of processions consisting of horseback riders and highly decorated carriages, all ridden by people wearing elaborately decorated masks. This comes from the idea that Fat Tuesday is the last day you get to make a complete fool of yourself and indulge before Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Catholic tradition/ceremony of Lent. The masks were there to provide the illusion of anonymity for those people making fools of themselves so that their neighbors would still respect them in the morning - or at least that those neighbors would never bring up the behavior, since the masked person obviously didn't want it advertised, which worked back then because manners were more complicated and reliable at the time. No, seriously, that's how it worked. You were wearing a mask, they would act like it was somebody else.
Anyhow, since Lent is the time of symbolic emulation of Christ's forty days in the desert preparing for his public ministry, it is a time of fasting and introspection. But before then, it's party time. Seems a little counter-productive or contrary to the point to me, but people are going to do what they want to do... or whatever everyone else is doing, since they have no original thoughts. Either way, that's not what you asked, and you likely only have so much tolerance for my bitter cynicism.
Proceeding with the short history lesson, in 1871, the Twelfth Night Revelers were the first Mardi Gras Krewe to pass out "throws," small trinkets tossed to parade watchers as mementos of the occasion. The tradition spread like wildfire throughout the other Krewes and has become a staple of Mardi Gras ever since. One apocryphal origin story for the tradition of throws is that New Orleans was one of the last great pirate ports. To keep it a safe haven for those of less legal seafaring professions, the pirates made a habit of riding down the streets with a portion of their loot, passing it out to the crowds of people that cheered their arrival. This effectively made the entire city willing accomplices who had "no idea where those nasty pirates went." This is complete conjecture, since none of this exists in a documented form, but due to the highly illegal nature of pirate culture, it's entirely possible that it never got written about in any reliable manner. Still, it's a nice story, and I'm printing the legend.
In any case, the history lesson is over. Kinda. This next part is fairly recent, so it's less of a "history lesson" and more of an explanation of recent events. I know, it's still history, but some people shut down and stop listening when they hear the word... which doesn't matter since I started this article with the word. Fuck it. One last short history lesson.
A few years, or maybe only months prior to 1998, a young, enterprising film producer by the name of Joe Francis took a single film crew to several locations around the country. These locations included the California and New York club scenes, the spring break parties of California, Texas and Florida, and last but not least, Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras. You see where this is going. Joe Francis is the founder of Mantra Entertainment, producers of the Girls Gone Wild videos. Contrary to popular belief, however, GGW did not create the practice of flashing in New Orleans. They merely capitalized on it. But, in doing so, they made the practice more widely known, and somehow, more mainstream.
The explanation for where flashing started in the first place is simple human psychology. For the Mardi Gras throws, it was a way to get the attention and good graces of the men passing out the throws. Which do you think a guy is going to pay more attention to: a woman yelling "Throw me something, mister" or a topless woman yelling "Throw me something, mister"? And this goes for as far back as you can take it. This kind of behavior isn't modern, really, and in the scenario of a pirate town, it's not that hard to imagine a woman of lesser morals using her body to advantage. The Spring Break flashing is another story entirely, but you didn't ask about that.
If you have a question for the demon, send it to askthedemon@gmail.com, and remember:
never stop asking questions.
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