Making it to the pages of the local newspapers this past week was the fascination with women having large rear ends. Not just large, mind you, but to my way of thinking, virtually deformed, with a backside shelf upon which could rest 5 feet of snow or a tray of appetizers or the folded laundry.

Kim Kardashian, a name I vowed never to print because I think she is the face of societal doom, seems to have gone out ahead of the curve on this matter. I don’t even intend to pun. She has been photographed relentlessly and willingly by the Daily Mail and New York Daily News going on six or seven years now. You just can’t get away from her, and, alas, she is a celebrity for no other reason than being a celebrity.

In any event, our local journals have spared us from this onslaught of the now-fashionable large caboose. Well, until this week, when the Enemy Paper had a story about large rear ends with a photo of, I believe, Nicki Minaj in a crouched position that left me wondering how she was going to haul herself to her feet without throwing her back out.

In St. Paul, my beloved and ancient Pioneer Press featured the societal doom herself, Kardashian, who apparently once took an X-ray, the way suspected criminals take a lie-detector test, to prove that her mountainous behind is natural and not the result of photographic mischief or costume padding or the Brazilian butt lift, in which fat from other parts of the body are sucked out and injected into the hindquarters.

And because the trend is so popular with rappers and reality-TV characters and pop singers who really don’t sing but work out aerobically on stage, the millions of followers of these remodeled and re-engineered entertainers want the same look, believing it will bring to them a kind of stardom, I suppose, when they waddle down the aisles at Target.

This trend is terribly puzzling for those of us who grew up knowing, instinctively, to never, ever, ever, ever make a comment about the size of a woman’s rear end. Not only would that have been considered sexist, but you risked getting hit over the head with a rolling pin if you answered this question incorrectly:

“Does this dress make my butt look big?”

Why, the woman might have a butt on her that you could tie a rope around and have her pull a tree out of the ground and you still had only three possible responses that date from the time of the Flintstones:

“Of course not.”

“Not at all.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

I’ve used “Don’t be ridiculous” a few times, which was to be daring and tempting of fate. That answer could be read any number of ways, but the point being that you never, ever, ever, ever said, “Yes, that dress makes your butt look big.”

Duck for cover. You would get a look from narrowed eyes so powerful that it could weld steel.

Only to now have the tables so turned that when a woman asks that question, I guess you are supposed to say, “Uh, yeah, it really does.”

“Oh, thank you.”

Short of the Brazilian butt injection — doesn’t Brazil have enough to worry about without having had to pioneer the Brazilian butt injection? — I am also confused as to how one would go about developing this distortion. Apparently there are gym classes that have been invented out of whole cloth just to enlarge the hinder.

It’s the damndest thing, to be a well-trained male now suddenly liberated from all restrictions regarding the female derriere. I’ve made it this far by playing it safe, and I still think that the most daring I will get is “Don’t be ridiculous,” which I suppose, given the new liberation, could just as well be, “You are ridiculous.”

Joe Soucheray can be reached at jsoucheray@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5474. Soucheray is heard from 1 to 4 p.m. weekdays on 1500ESPN.