The Science of a Winkup by Dr. Lester Simon

1. Science thrives where there is doubt, uncertainty and unanswered questions. Can we use science to answer the challenging question: Why does a respectable woman or man engage in a lewd winkup in public during carnival?

2. Let’s start by ignoring those couples, mixed or unmixed, who are carrying on undercover within or without the band. They are having sex or getting off some other way. They are not our primary concern in this exploration of lewd winkup at carnival. Neither are we overtly concerned about the hapless man who was told to go aside and “Wet you hand and wait for me.” Poor man. He’s still whetting.

3. We are concerned with the ones in public view. Without the staring eyes of the public,including those doing the winkup and those spectators not doing the winkup, there is no strong impetus to winkup, especially to do the lewd winkup.

4. The science comes in if we regard and try to apply the seminal work on drug addiction by American psychologist, Dr Bruce Alexander.

5. Rats in cages have access to two types of bottles. One bottle has water only. The other bottle has water infused with mind-altering drugs. The rats almost invariably choose the water with the drugs, even to the point of their death.

6. Dr Alexander changed the experiment. He put the rats in cages that have the same two types of water bottles but instead of isolated cages, the rats are in a huge common cage called Rat Park. In Rat Park, they also have cheese, tunnels, other rats to play with and opportunity for plenty sex.

7. In Rat Park, he discovered that the rats use less or none of the water with the drugs and more or all of the water without the mind-altering drugs. A paradigm environmental shift.

8. Can it be that there is something missing in the lives of those respectable women and men doing the lewd winkup? What would happen if they were exposed to regular outings of drama, plays, music and theatre, dance, community gardens and games, public parks, good healthy food and plain water, and some really good, regular kinky or even plain, unadulterated, missionary sex at home? Would they be less likely to engage in public lewdness at carnival?

9. And what about getting away from the incessant use of smart phones, with promenades after lots to park their vehicles, regular street festivals and other real public social media events of different types at different times of the year? Tourism begins at home. Real public access to every single one of our 365 beaches. And learn how to swim. Maybe we need some regular volumes of public Air on the G String, for those who haven’t heard Johann Sebastian Bach. Or they need to hear, see and traverse the Trail of the Boomsie by David Rudder.

10. An alternative view is that we don’t need to invoke science to explain the public lewdness. Maybe it’s a jealous reaction to the alleged goings on at some very exclusive private carnival parties. There are whispers and zippers of private sexual games. Designed for pusillanimous patrons stinkingly full of cash but devoid of basal human love and kindness, thirsting for the quenching waters from the ancient wells of our ancestors and families. Replaced by a cocktail of games with deliberate playful misinterpretations of native songs, such as Lucinda Tight, Tight, Tight; Fire in the Backseat; and the crowd pleaser, Ah Coming Down to Talk to You. Good grief! Your vileness inches to infinity.

11. Whichever is the explanation, there will always be winkup. Winkup will never die. Winkup is the anatomy of being. What if we change the environment in which people live, work, play, interact and interplay in our social intercourse, will we be able to reduce the lewdness and the public addiction to crassness?

12. However, one caveat attends. We may have to face one serious and unhealthy side effect with any such social and environmental changes.

13. The humongous rats in the city may join us!