‘To free the nipple or not to free the nipple, that is the question.’
Recently there has been an Internet frenzy featuring many celebrities such as Cara Delevingne and Michelle Rodriguez, about women’s nipples. The issue has arisen due to the media’s double standards of allowing male nipples to be shown but censoring female’s. Campaigners are asking why it’s okay for beheadings to be viewed on YouTube but not female nipples? It’s an equality movement to empower females across the world, especially in places where it is effectively illegal for a woman to be topless, breastfeeding included. According to the ‘Free the Nipple’ website, in Louisiana, an exposed nipple on a woman can lead to a jail sentence of three years and up to $2,500 in fines. Even in areas like New York where it is supposedly legal to be topless in public, arrests continue to occur.
The ‘Free the Nipple’ campaign has taken to the streets of New York with women protesting topless against these unequal censorship laws. They emphasise the contradictions in our society whereby violent acts of killing are glorified yet images of women’s nipples are censored. They pose the question ‘what is more obscene: violence or a nipple?’ The campaign has reached celebrities in a big way with Cara Delevingne’s instagram being flooded with images of her showcasing the new ‘nipple bikini’. Scout Willis took it even further by walking down the streets of New York topless, causing a stir which gave the campaign the boost it needed.
In response to this exciting campaign, Bristol University’s television station, UBTV, took to the streets of Bristol to find out what our students think of nipples. Needless to say many were unsure about the idea of women’s nipples being exposed, although some had other ideas. Take a watch to see what happened…