Is this competition completely insulting or a genius idea?

First, there was the First Extreme Ironing Championships, held in Bavaria in 2002. Then there was the First World Beard and Mustache Championships, held in 1990 in Hofen-Enz, Germany.

Now, in the random competition to beat all random competitions, there is the Smallest Penis in Brooklyn competition – set to be held in New York on the 20th July at Kings County Bar.

It’s the world’s first smallest penis competition (that we know of, anyway) and it’s essentially set to be a wet t-shirt competition for males – only the t-shirts are being swapped out for tighty-whiteys (or even nudity, if that’s what you prefer).

And did we mention that the entire thing has been invented by a girl?

That’s right. The small penis competition is the brainchild of bar manager Aimee Arciuolo. She said the idea was based on personal experience.

In an interview with local NYC blog Gothamist, Aimee said:

The discussion came about after I had an exceptionally fun and amazing romp with a man who was less than endowed—it was actually shockingly tiny, like the size of an acorn. He came right out and said, ‘Yes, I know, I’ve got a little pecker. But don’t you worry, we are going to have fun.’ And it was great! That guy seriously smashed it UP in the bedroom.

After that experience, Aimee and her friends decided to honour small penises and the guys that are making the most of them. As a result, the competition will involve two rounds – swimwear AND eveningwear – as well as a Q&A part with each contestant. Aimee reckons that sharing tiny-penis-related stories will “turn embarrassing stories into empowerment.”

And there are rules, of course, as with any decent competition. Apparently anyone who rocks up with anything over eight inches will be “disqualified and forced to buy a round for the judges” due to being a show-off.

The question we want to ask today is whether the entire concept insulting or completely genius?

Small penises have long been the subject of jokes relating to men and their choices. Oh, he bought a fancy car/drives that car quickly/is rude to women/wants a Tag Heuer watch/laughs too loudly at his own jokes? He must be compensating for something.

Combine that with society’s depiction of penises – the big bulges in advertisements for men’s undies, the male porn stars known for their well-endowned nether regions – and you have a lot of men who are bound to be paranoid about their less-than-enormous penises. Just as some women have grown to hate their “ugly outie vaginas” (thanks for that, Photoshop).

And while the competition is supposed to be funny, it also does make a strong point about empowering men with smaller-than-average penises who might have felt bad about it in the past. This from The Gloss:

I do think this is a good opportunity to remind everybody that men can experience the difficulty of accepting their bodies due to societal pressures, and that they, too, can feel shame for how others make them feel… Sex organs are generally weird but incredibly diverse, so we should all just accept that fact that each and every one of us will probably see something that’s unexpected or odd to us.

And bravo to that.