Shirtless or Shirt-More: Should Soap Hunks Button Up?

Storms are ripping apart entire towns coast to coast, and snow is on the way, but, on soaps, it’s always unseasonably warm. Why else would all those men be walking around without shirts, even as the temperature dips?

What’s that you say? It’s because the fans like it? Fan-service, nothing more? We turned to over 5,000 of you for the real scoop!

Take Them Off – And Keep Them Off
Why is it wrong to want to look at pretty, pretty things, wonder 47% of you? And if those pretty, pretty things happen to be men who also happened to have forgotten to put on their shirts that morning, well, so much the better! And it’s not like going shirtless is always gratuitous.

Sometimes, they have perfectly good reasons for taking it off.

They could be freshly out of the shower. Or maybe they spilled something on themselves. Or, um, they’re in the middle of changing and someone bursts in and a heated conversation breaks out and they just innocently forget to get dressed again. Or they’re having sex. There’s that, too.

Summer Lovin’
All those excuses work in the summer, caution 29% of the audience, but, in the winter, the above just doesn’t wash. Nobody forgets to put on a shirt when it’s below zero outside, no matter how well heated their home is.

Act Right
For 23%, however, beefcake is just a distraction. You watch soaps for the stories and the acting. You want to gaze into an actor’s eyes, not his pectorals. And a washboard stomach can never cover up the inability to walk and talk at the same time – no matter what The Powers That Be might think.

No, there is nothing wrong with wanting to look at pretty things, but they should be employed for a concrete purpose, not just to attract eyeballs that don’t appreciate what soaps are really about.