It's hard to speak in defence of dick stickers, and I'm not about to. I stopped wearing mine to the beach one memorable day at Hat Head 12 years ago when my wife joined my eldest children in the attack. It was heated. Perverts wore dick stickers, they cried, and that afternoon I bought a pair of board shorts. Until that day I'd had no idea that there was anything even remotely offensive about budgie smugglers.
I have just read that Britain's biggest theme park resort has banned them, which is a big step given that just over the Channel are millions of dark and swarthy types who delight in standing around thrusting their bulgeing bellies and swimming briefs at onlookers.
The only bods wearing sluggos on our beaches these days are dark and swarthy - in deference to the sensibilities of women and children the rest of us have moved to board shorts despite the chafing and discomfort. But what's good for the gander is good for the goose, so how about some deference on the beach to the sensibilities of men?
Men wear more and women wear less, and while that is often a wonderful thing it is often not so wonderful. We are confronted at every beach by sights that recur as flashbacks for years - I had a flashback this morning of a shockingly tufty bikini wearer of quite some years ago. Rampant tuftiness is not the only shock in store at the beach. There's belly rolls wobbling between upper and lower elements of the bikini, navels that burrow out of sight, inner thighs that squelch audibly.
So I say it's time that women who don't rate eight on the Bo Derek scale of 10 revert to the one-piece with the frilly rings that run in layers from the top to the bottom. Wide frilly rings and with a little skirt at the bottom. Is that too much for a man who wears board shorts to expect?
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