The reason 'Big Little Lies' could show a penis on telly, but 'Girls' wasn't allowed.

They were both prosthetic penises but only one could be shown on screen.

We’ve discovered why Big Little Lies was permitted to show full-frontal male nudity and Girls was not, even though both shows were aired on Foxtel’s Showcase.

This week, social media had a meltdown over the fake member of Alexander Skarsgard that was seen during a full-frontal shot in Big Little Lies.

The scene involved a violent encounter between Skarsgard’s character Perry with his wife Celest (Nicole Kidman).

Wait did I (or everybody) just see Alexander Skarsgard’s ???? on#BigLittleLies ????????????????????????????

— Juan Carlos De Leon (@carloslaron) March 30, 2017

Last month there was confusion when a key plot point was edited out of Girls because it, too, involved peen nudity.

In the scene, Matthew Rhys’ character Chuck is lying on a bed with Hannah (Lena Dunham). He pulls out his penis and puts it on her leg, where she awkwardly touches it.

In the US, viewers saw the penis and saw her touch it. In Australia, when the episode was also aired on Foxtel’s Showcase, the shot was cropped so you could only see the actors torsos and faces.

The GIRLS episode everyone is talking about. Post continues below.

Why?

According to The Daily Telegraph, it all comes down to what the penis is doing.

Showcase does not show R-rated content and any content that shows an erect or semi-erect penis is automatically rated R.

The prosthetic penis in Big Little Lies was adjusted to avoid this restriction: it was flaccid.

The Girls scene, which was all about consent and sexual abuse, required an R-rated penis.

So to recap, floppy = fine and rigid = red flag.

The more you know….