Asheville On International Go Topless Day (pg Images Inside)

Well Bravo for Asheville and the Women of Asheville... . And bravo John.

"Equal rights extends to this issue."

Well you will certainly not get any complaints from me.

However, the word "equal" may apply to their "rights", but anyone can see that not all other aspects of this movement are totally equal.

First, great photos, John. The mother and child nursing especially, just lovely!

Now, I remember a handful of years back when this first started here in Asheville, and the spectators outnumbered the breasts by a huge margin! I did get some really interesting info from a friend who lived downtown at the time about the organization behind the movement.

I have no issue with this rally, and believe if women want to go topless they absolutely should be able to, but for the record, the whole idea was started by a very shady "religous" figure. I mean, it's odd to take your feminist directive from a guy who founded a cult and believes he was abducted and returned to earth to tell everyone how we were created by aliens. He also maintains that female members should be sexually available to him and various other decidedly ANTI-feminist concepts and rules. Nudity and open sexuality is a big part of their ... um, whatever it is they do, and it's a tool they use for recruitment. And it's slowly spreading around the world.

So, really, this is more of a weirdo sex cult rally than it is a pro-women's rights rally. As long as everybody who participates is cool with that, I say tops off to you. Me, I'd rather not show up naked at the behest of a creepy cult leader. I prefer to show up naked as one of the many ways I remind my husband how awesome I am. :)

Love it Cynthia. Sometimes people get involve with things and they don't even take the time to investigate what its all about.

Must be a jarring scene for an unsuspecting tourist who wanders into town. I saw there was going to be a similar thing in Boston. Must be popping up or out around the country.

Heh. "popping out".

"The Free the Nipple campaign, a movement spearheaded by filmmaker and activist Lina Esco which aims to desexualize female breasts, has been gaining steam and celebrity endorsements since a feature film (also directed by Esco) came out in early 2014."

titz the season

"Nipples. You may have seen them before, on men."

Bwahaha! That's awesome. Ok now THIS is the reason to take off your shirt in public.

Forget cult leaders, film makers, activist groups, women's rights -- women don't need good reasons, bad reasons or any reasons to be topless! Not for me, anyway.

John, A Mother's Connection is wonderful. However, I think the backgrounds on the others are too heavy and distracting.


Dan Turner
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online

Cynthia,
Thanks for the back info on this...I wonder how many bare breasted women participating had a clue....

Seems to be a number of movements with the same result.

This is what Cynthia was talking about:

"The event is sponsored by GoTopless, a group formed in the American state of Nevada by former French auto-racing journalist Claude Vorilhon, currently known as Rael, spiritual leader of the Raelian Movement, a UFO religion. GoTopless has supported events and chapters in other countries."

The Raëlian Movement teaches that life on Earth was scientifically created by a species of extraterrestrials, which they call the Elohim.

i ditto Dan...

Women of New York are free to walk bare-breasted through the city!
New York City's 34,000 police officers have been instructed that, should they encounter a woman in public who is shirtless but obeying the law, they should not arrest her. This is a good step towards gender parity in public spaces.

This decision means that breast exposure is not considered public lewdness, indecent exposure, or disorderly conduct. It also notes that, should a crowd form around a topless woman, the officer should instruct the crowd to disperse and then respond appropriately if it does not. Relative coverage is no longer a factor.

This policy shift comes after several years of litigation and protest. In the 1992 case People v. Ramona Santorelli and Mary Lou Schloss, the New York Court of Appeals ruled in favor of two women who were arrested with five others for exposing their breasts in a Rochester park, holding the law void as discriminatory. The ruling was put to the test in 2005, when Jill Coccaro bared her breasts on Delancey Street in New York, citing the 1992 decision, and was detained for twelve hours. She subsequently successfully sued the city for $29,000.

The following cities are officially topless "tested":

Asheville, NC
Austin, TX,
Boulder, CO
Columbus, OH
Eugene, OR
Honolulu, HI
Keene, NH
Key West, FL at Fantasy Fest
Madison, WI,
New Orleans, LA, at Mardi Gras
New York City
Portland, Or,
Santa Fe, NM
South Miami Beach, FL (on the beach)
Washington, DC

Ed,
How unfortunate that he bastardized such a holy name..right from the first line of the Bible....
Bereshit Barah Elohim....

Wouldn't be the first time.

Yes, I know about the cult and the wacko who started the movement. The rallies, however, never mention him and distance themselves from him. They want to make the point that a woman's body is not obscene.

I tell folks who question my support of bare breasts in public (because of the Bible) this: "In Genesis, Adam and Eve were naked and unashamed ... until they sinned. Then they were ashamed of nakedness." So nakedness is only embarrassing to sinners. hehehe (This isn't a religious post but an exegetical look at a literary work known by many.)

Dan: thanks for the feedback. The pics probably won't sell and I don't care - they are here for the ladies I photographed. I gave them each my card after receiving their permission to shoot and told them I would post images here. If they like them, I'll send them a free print from my home printing.

i do wonder how the selling them online angle goes. while they were in public that way, i wonder how it fits into selling them topless would work out.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Mike, it still falls under the street photography laws. "No expectation of privacy." As long as they are not used for commercial purposes, only as works of art, it is all good. At least that is how I understand it and what I have been told. This is not legal advice, though and I am not a lawyer.