What? Now the Japanese are complaining of the nude Michelangelo Statue being to risque and they want to put underwear on David? Next thing they will be demanding is to put underwear on all animals just because their nude!

Come on now, use a little common sense people, surely you can't be intimidated by the size of that or can you?

The original David by Michelangelo in Florence, Italy is awesome. I could only stand in awe of the detail. The larger hands some mention and genitals don't even come into focus when standing before this work of art. There is detail in every aspect, muscles, blood vessels, tendons, etc. One is entranced at the work involved in the making of David.

Incidentally, someone mentioned thinking that this article came from Oklahoma or Kansas before they realized it was from Japan. In today's world, everyone has the opportunity to be well informed, well traveled, meaning we do appreciate culture. Perhaps if they take advantage of opportunity they might learn something about their neighbors in the U. S.

Did the GOP move to Japan?

At least this silliness is not occuring in Kansas. The Westboro Wing Nuts from Topeka would just pray for the entire statue to crumble to bits and when it didn't, one of them would push it over.

All Disney characters also have only 4 fingers. Is that the same thing as this guy having big uh uh uh hands? That Japanese would find this too risque is extremely funny. Can anyone guess where "Up the skirt" was invented?

David? If Michelangelo had a sense of humor, he'd have named it Richard.

The residents should be thankful the businessman isn't a Ron Jeremy fan.

This idea is coming from a country that has raccoons, other animals anfd fictional creatureswith giant penises and testicles, tentacle rape, hentai, ecchi, yaoi, yuri, regular pornography in films, television, movies, magazines, and books, and classical erotic art? I kind of have to agree with what pb said, though, they need to cover everyone or no one. Also, onemanonewomanmarriage, please correct me if I am wrong but is not a museum a public place as well, people? missedmark, the statue would not look good with either a kilt or a sailor girl outfit. I believe that a hentai "kiddie porn" outfit would also be blasphemous to one of the great kings of the Bible. I would go with either a pair of Hello Kitty boxers or do like they did in the very last episode of the cartoon called "Timon and Pumbaa" and put on some boxers with hearts on him. Maybe Japan is learning to adhere to a few more morals than we forgot in more recent times? They DO say that Christianity is spreading in that part of the world and Asia and Africa seem to be having more and more Christians appear every day.

Just take the staue down and give it to a town that is educated enough to to appreciate art. Who cares? Maybe this is a town where all men may NOT be created equal? This statue has been around for eons, Now they want underware on it? Get real.

Is this all NBC can find to pass off as news today?

So they can't bear to see a naked male statue but their country can churn out tons of hentai that show everything from simple sex to tentacle rape? Something japs seem really into....ewww. Maybe someone should point out to them that thing between his legs is called a penis and that every male has one.

I think the problem with the replica of Michelangelo's incomparably beautiful "David" stems from a difference in cultures between that part of the world where the sculptured masterpiece was conceived and created and lauded for centuries as one of the worlds great art treasures, and the culture of Japan. Japanese art has not used either male or female nudes in its art lexicon. Human figures are always and only depicted at least partially clothed so that female breasts and genitalia of both sexes are never exposed. The Eastern art traditions are every bit as prized and honored around the world as are the Western art traditions. But the art of a region of the world always grows out of the folkways and mores of its indigenous culture and population. Eastern art is very stylized, formal and elegant in its refinement. Western art has almost from the beginning depicted the human form without garments. Don't forget, western civilization and its characteristics are much younger that the ancient traditions of China and Japan which both boasted ancient societies when western Asia, Europe, Scandinavia and the British Isles were inhabited by people still dressed in animal skins and their populations routinely raided one anothers tribal homeland, looting, burning and carrying off women , children and what ever else struck a barbarian's fancy. Now comes "David" in his monumental, glowing, marble glory. And he is a shock to the sensibilities of the relatively small people of this ancient Eastern nation. There is nothing in their own art traditions to act as a reference to Italian baroque art. I would suggest the the patron who gifted his town with the sculpture offer to cover the genitalia of the statue with the customary fig leaf which was applied prolifically on the nude statues throughout Europe when later, more conservative societies also found male and female frontal nudity vulgar and offensive. But to add anything more to the "David" beyond a fig leaf would seem a desecration. Not even a loin cloth should be permitted. And if nothing will satisfy the sensitivities of the local towns people, the the donor should consider removing the sculpture to either a museum or perhaps sell or donate it to a US or European facility. Unfortunately, it's my understanding from all I've read, that Japan's culture is still a closed culture and prides itself on the purity of his social customs, and the racial purity of its population". They neither admire nor desire what they consider the decadence of Western traditions polluting the taste and standards or bloodlines of its people. And I think the rest of the world has no choice but to respect their position on East/West cultural integration and change. One fig leaf coming right up!

the men there are like "dang... that's way bigger than any of ours, let's cover it up lest our women figured out how tiny we are....."

I think that Japan needs to get over it. If they don't like it that someone has paid a pretty penny for something as marvelous as this piece of art, then let them hand it over to someone, whether it be the person that paid for it, another country, or museum some where. If they put underwear on it, I would hope someone would stand up for this piece of art and take them off. SERIOUSLY grow up and please appreciate something so spectacular. This is a piece of history recreated for us all to enjoy. Leave it alone!

In Japan? where sex education is the entire 12 grade class having sex all lined up on the gym floor. Whatever

This is why I wake up every day. Always something surprising. I was SURE this was gonna be a story about some uptight Bible Belt town in the Midwest or South. I'm so used to seeing lunacy like this (put undies on David... right) from American religious conservatives that it didn't surprise me to see the link. Turns out Japan has issues with art like this too? My bad, Midwest and South!

It's an all out sausage fest. Not good.

You know all the guys standing by the statue are discussing on how there wives drive by the statue and wonder why little hubby is so little. Boooo Yaaa!! We look like gods to them. Must suck to be them.

This is art. They just need to get over it. Covering "it" up is not how this work of art was meant to be viewed.

This .... in a country where you are allowed to put womens dirty underwear in a vending machine......

Have you no shame? Japan has war crimes they have to answer for beyond the San Francisco Treaty
of 1951. Before Pearl Harbour, from the advanced of Shanghai to Nanking, the Imperial Japanese Army murdered 500,000 civilians and disarmed soldiers. Women, children and even the pregnant were not spared, they were raped and killed, (Wikipedia: Nanjing Massacre and The rape of Nanking.)
According to a testimony delivered by missionary Ralph L. Phillips to the U.S. State Assembly Investigating
Committee, he was "forced to watch while the Japs disembowled a Chinese soldier" and "roasted his heart and liver and ate them. On August 15, 1951 and September 18, 1951, China published statements denouncing the San Francisco Treaty, stating that it was illegal because China was not invited to participate in the drafting and signing of the 1951 Treaty despite being one of the main victims of the Japanese aggression. The evidence for Chinese sovereignty over the Diaoyu islands are quite compelling. The most interesting evidence is emerging from old Japanese government documents and suggests that Japan in effect stole the islands from China in 1895 as booty of war. Adding to that. The San Francisco Treaty of 1951 says Japan has adminisatration not sovereignty of the islands. So why is the Japanese government being so sneaky nationalizing some of the islands by buying them from a private Japanese owner whom they sold them to in the first place. Very recently, the PM of Japan Shinzo Abe visited the war shrine to honor Class A WWII war criminals. And he said it was ok that Japan colonized Korea, and that the enslavement of Korean women as sex slaves was ok. And he even whitewashed their war crimes in textbooks. Japan committed horrible atrocities. Unlike Germany, they deny what they did and never compensate the victims. Can you imagine Merkel honoring Hitler???
Japan is still bullying. Can you imagine when Al qeada killed 3000 innocence and America stand by and do nothing?

One historical irony is that Michaelangelo sculpted David, the King of Israel, uncircumcised!

Robert-2445036 (AKA: the hired chinese propaganda troll). This is an article about a wetern statue in Japan, and its impact in a Japanese community. Please add something of value, or go back to reading onion articles.

...heh, heh, heh. They said erected!

They didn't like the erection OF the statue or the erection ON the statue?