Liberty, Equality, Swimwear

Jean and Marcel were getting ready for their shift at the municipal pool when they overheard an exchange that stopped them both in their tracks.

Two women, speaking with the calm intensity of people reporting an imperial incident, stood near the tiled entrance.

One—let’s call her Renée—was decrying what she called “uncontained flesh,” insufficiently secured within what she described as a flimsy excuse for swimwear. It, she insisted, had disrupted her internal equilibrium and ruined her appetite for lunch.

The other, Marguerite, was no less appalled—but not by modesty. She was distressed by what she called the collapse of French excellence in silhouette. A female patron, she explained, had entered the shallow end with a smug expression, wearing a loose, shapeless garment that offended not only fashion, but the very concept of geometry itself.

The overheard conversation stayed with the loyal servants of not just the municipal pool, but of French recreational decency and aesthetics, an institution, as they understood it, that was rooted in careful stewardship.

They decided that a matter this important could not be dealt with appropriately at pool level.

It was therefore taken to their supervisor, the manager of the facility. Jean and Marcel explained that this was far beyond an isolated complaint, but part of a growing concern.

The women in question, they implied, had allegedly suggested that they may take their swimming business elsewhere if conditions and standards failed to improve.

Their supervisor, Thomas, took the matter to the local mayor.

Like a game of bureaucratic telephone or Chinese whispers, what started as an overheard conversation between two overly concerned ladies at a municipal pool became a national incident. After all, it concerned the weighty matters of morality in public spaces, scientific ordinance, and, crucially, French pride itself.

It wasn't long before a crisis report was drafted and delivered to the desk of Édouard Cheville, the mayor. At the encouragement of his team, and his own instincts that this could become a national emergency of aesthetics and morality, he created a commission called The Committee for the Standardisation and Preservation of French Aquatic Aesthetic Integrity.

It was shortened to TCFTSAPOFAAI, and a public campaign was launched, with Marie Curie and Coco Chanel bringing the brains and glamour alongside Marcel Proust, Auguste Rodin, and Claude Monet.

While Curie and Chanel showcased stunning, slimline, curvature-enhancing one-pieces, they spoke at length of the science and aesthetics.

Marcel Proust wrote a lengthy passage encouraging the French to reignite their pride, while Rodin sculpted a Monet clothed in what is now known as Speedos.

Excerpt from Proust's writing:

"For centuries, though time does feel at times to be at a standstill and full of forward motion, the French have been renowned throughout the world for the importance they place upon aesthetics and geometrical marvels like the golden ratio. Just as a flower appeals when its petals are tightly wrapped in leaves and the stems are elegantly elongated, so too should our bodies be dressed as such."

Though there was some pushback by the renegade elements of French society at the turn of the century, the law was passed, stating that Speedos, or similar slips de bain for men, and one-piece bathing suits for women, were the preferred standard.

The law stated that these styles of clothing for patrons in any swimming pool throughout France were legal due to:

• Aesthetic coherence and elegance

• Hydrodynamic quality

• Comfort

• French elegance in silhouette

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Thanks for reading.

This is for Harper's There Oughta Be a Law . . . dumb laws rogue challenge. You can find out more about it below.

This is based on an official and still upheld law in France, where most swimming pools require patrons to wear fitted swimwear and restrict loose-fitting shorts and similar garments.

Though the real reason seems to revolve around hygiene, mine involves geometry, Proust, and a national aesthetic emergency.