Before paper ballots, people used the viva voce system, rooted in ancient Greece, where voters announced their candidate to a clerk. In some US colonies, voters would use objects, like corn and beams, to vote yea or nay; and in other states, people would line up on opposite sides of a road to signal how they were voting.

There’s something vaguely embarrassing about nakedness; it is unwanted or self-aware. On the other hand, the nude has an element of intention in its vulnerability. In a painting like Van der Weyden’s “The Descent from the Cross,” the nakedness of Christ emphasizes the humiliation and grace of his human form. Rather than an object of pleasure, his body is a source of discomfort for the viewer … Skin hints at a long history of abuses that have occurred within the use of sex in the film industry.