It was August 14th, 1945, and the Allies had just declared victory over Japan. All throughout New York City people were leaving their homes shouting “It’s over!” and joining the spur-of-the-moment celebration right there in the streets. The excitement that World War II was finally over has since been memorialized in the famous V-J Day in Times Square photo from Life magazine.
While its a heart-warming image of celebration after the bloodiest war against a foreign enemy in our nation’s history, the story behind the image may come as a surprise.
“Suddenly, I was grabbed by a sailor.”
When Greta Friedman heard the news on the radio, she left her office where she worked as a dental assistant and wanted to scope out the celebration in Times Square. The 21 year old saw the big lighted billboards that go around the buildings streaming the words “V-J Day! V-J Day!” and that’s when it happened.
“Suddenly, I was grabbed by a sailor,” Greta told Patricia Redmond, an interviewer representing the Maryland State Daughters of the American Revolution, back in 2005. “It wasn’t that much of a kiss. It was more of a jubilant act that he didn’t have to go back. I found out later he was so happy that he didn’t have to go back to the Pacific where they had already been through the war.”
When asked if she knew who the sailor was, Greta said she didn’t have a clue.
“..he did not give his name or anything. I didn’t see the picture until the 1960′ s when I looked at a book called the Eyes of Eisenstaedt. I immediately wrote to LIFE and they said that they would send me a picture, but the person has been identified.”
Actually, three women in total came forward claiming to be the woman, two recounting the story in very similar details (although the kiss occurred in different parts of Times Square), and another telling a more embellished account that turned out to be drastically different from the two others and what the original photographer remembered.
Here’s the picture, again.
“Hey Adrian, we won the war!” Left: George Mendonsa; Right: Greta Friedman.
Here’s where it gets interesting. The man said he had “quite a few drinks that day,” and everyone who spotted him out in the photograph admitted that everyone was drinking a lot in celebration. In one of the pictures, his fiancé is standing behind him and looking toward the camera.
And the most interesting part of them all: There’s the obvious perpetuation of rape culture in our immortalization of a picture in which a woman is helplessly taken into the strong arms of a man and non-consensually kissed.
I know, I know. Jesse, you’re reaching. Jesse, everyone was excited that the war was over. Jesse, they were obviously celebrating that they didn’t have to fight anymore.
I mean, look at them:
No seriously, look at them:
Everyone was partying and everyone was having a good time! As some of our readers on Tumblr put it, how could the kiss possibly be fueling rape culture at a time like that?
Let’s consider how Greta described what happened.
When asked what it felt like when he grabbed her and kissed her, she said:
“I felt that he was very strong. He was just holding me tight. I’m not sure about the kiss… it was just somebody celebrating. It wasn’t a romantic event. It was just an event of ‘thank god the war is over’ . . . it was right in front of the sign.”
When asked if the sailor said anything to her, she replied:
“No, it was an act of silence.”
Then the interviewer asked her if she thought George Mendonsa (the famous kisser) went around kissing all the ladies.
“No, but other sailors did! They were happy, they didn’t have to go back to war. They’d had enough! We established that many ladies were kissed by sailors that day… in celebration… all throughout the day and the evening, people were there. It was like New Year’s Eve only better!”
Greta later tells the interviewer that in 1980 Life magazine reunited the two in Times Square, where she said that she didn’t want to reenact the kiss because his wife was there.
“But I didn’t know that then [that his wife was there in 1945]. It wasn’t my choice to be kissed… (in 1945). The guy just came over and grabbed! (in 1980 for the reenactment of the kiss) I told him I didn’t want to redo that pose! We have the picture here, and it is kind of a reenactment of the pose and the sign on Time’s Square says, ‘It had to be you!’”
In the book The Kissing Sailor: The Mystery Behind the Photo That Ended World War II
The following are excerpts from the book:
Friedman herself said that the kiss “happened so fast” and “wasn’t a big deal,” but lets not forget that this was a time in America when women were socialized into property-like gender roles. When George laid Greta over in his arms and she describes him as “very strong,” certain images of the controlling nature of male socialization and the devaluation of women stemming from that period come to mind. Need a refresher?
Considering the social atmosphere at the time, it’s not that far-fetched to assume that Greta and every other woman who was kissed that day might have thought the same thing – that the sailors kissing them were excited, strong, and not asking for permission. If you read the NYP’s unraveling of the story, they point out that George admitted to drinking so much that he doesn’t even remember grabbing and kissing Greta. But does this make it reprehensible?
Some argue that the celebration was tantamount to New Year’s Day, where everyone expects to give and receive kisses from willing strangers who are excited to ring in the new year. This, however, doesn’t excuse the obvious lack of consent from all accounts. After all, just because you surprise me with a clenching non-consensual kiss and I dismiss it as you just being excited, does that make it any less non-consensual, forced, and selfish on your part?
Others say that it’s “just the way things were back then” and that sometimes, “you just grabbed a girl and kissed her.”
An Inspiring Display or Definitely Rape Culture?
We took to our social media accounts to find out what the blogosphere was saying about this image. It seems that some Tumblr users surfaced it a few days ago for the anniversary of the taking of the famous photo. And if there’s one thing I can count on Tumblr to do, it’s call out sexism.
Of course, with strong proponents of analyzing history from a new, never-before-appreciated feminist perspective, there are bound to be opponents. We’ve compiled some of the best of Tumblr’s reblogs on this topic below. We’ll start with the proponents.
Yes, this is definitely rape culture.
“Look at his hands, look at her balance. She’s not daintily placing her foot in the air, she is off-kilter. The placement of his legs and the force he is exerting on her is pulling her off of her feet. Look at his hand on her waist. He’s forcing her hips into that position. Look at her head in the crook of his elbow, he has entire control over the position of her head. Look at the way they kiss, look at his closed fist. This wasn’t a gentle advance with an opportunity for dissent (or consent), this was a woman ripped off of her feet and molested. This is rape culture” (smartsauce).
- – — — —– ——– ————- ——————— ————- ——– —– — — – -
“Nobody’s saying he thought ‘I’m going to go assert me some power.’
But think about it. When you get really happy, do you ever punch the air in excitement? You do, right? Or something similar.
Do you ever go down the street and punch people in the face? Because you’re so happy?
No, you don’t. It would be the same kind of exuberant gesture, but your mind recognizes that… other people have feelings and rights, and when you exercise physical exuberance on them like that, it’s called “violence” and it is a bad thing.
For his joy and elation to be channeled in this way, “kissing any and all ‘females*’ on the street”, that says something about the way that women are constructed in his head, about what boundaries he does and doesn’t observe and how strong they are.
Without more data it would be impossible to say exactly what it says about those things, but we know that he sees women as being 1) interchangeable to a sufficient degree and 2) publicly accessible to a sufficient degree for this to register as an acceptable course of action.
No, he’s not stopping and doing some complex calculation on that score. That’s the point. This is how he acts when he doesn’t think, when he’s uninhibited.
That’s rape culture at work. That’s a rape culture mindset.” (alexandraerin).
- – — — —– ——– ————- ——————— ————- ——– —– — — – -
“I can’t believe I never saw that. It’s pretty obviously not HER choice when you actually look at the pose” (mirthful).
No, this is definitely not rape culture.
“Are you f###ing kidding me? This does NOT look like ‘rape culture’ you bastard. It looks like two people who are in love, and the man took charge and was like ‘bitch Im gonna kiss you and Im gonna kiss you hard’ except the bitch part, sorry. xD Pure love right here, not ‘rape culture’” (hug-a-panda-day).
- – — — —– ——– ————- ——————— ————- ——– —– — — – -
“How dare you even begin to equate a kiss in the heat of the moment to something as horrible as rape?
Yes—rape culture and the like are perfectly all right things to talk about, and should be talked about and addressed. But appropriating a completely innocent image, and appropriating an entire person’s life and legacy and ignoring how /she/ felt about this event in her life is so completely wrong and disgusting that I can’t even begin to fathom it” (thespacecoyote).
- – — — —– ——– ————- ——————— ————- ——– —– — — – -
“WHY DO YOU ULTRA-FEMINISTS HAVE TO RUIN EVERYTHING
THIS IS ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL AND ICONIC PHOTOS TO SYMBOLIZE THE OFFICIAL END TO WWII (VICTORY OVER JAPAN DAY)
and you wonder why people think you’re all crazy as shit” (fleursdeleon).
- – — — —– ——– ————- ——————— ————- ——– —– — — – -
that’s a man, being thankful to see his woman after surviving a terrible war. yes, HIS woman. (nautical0nightmares).
So who is right?
Do we accept this photo for the Americana that it is, symbolizing the awe-inspiring hope and celebration of Japan surrendering after we blew them to pieces? Or do we gaze into the relics of history with a new lens on social perspective?