“Why do many women want to let their breasts out of the prison our society has put them in? They want to be comfortable. They want the convenience. They want to further their well-being. They want ownership and control of their own breasts. They deserve equal treatment under the law.” – Topfree Equal Rights Association (TERA)
What would you do if you saw a topless woman casually walking down the street, baring it all? No shirt, no bra, nothing. Would you be stunned into silence? Would you feel completely scandalized? Or would you say, “You know what, more power to her!”
Believe it or not, it is actually legal in certain places for women to go completely topless in public. A few very prominent US cities with female topless rights include New York City, Portland, New Orleans, Boulder, and Washington, DC.
Topfreedom is a cultural and political movement that seeks to further gender equality by granting women the right to go topless in public, a right that men have always had. Most people assume that women are generally equal to men under the law, but topless rights is one area where female rights are almost always restricted. And when males have a right that females don’t share, it is discrimination.
So that is why females around the nation are standing up for their rights through GoTopless, a U.S. based organization that promotes topfreedom.
GoTopless advocates: “As long as men are allowed to be topless in public, women should have the same constitutional right. Or else, men should have to wear something to hide their chests.”
Most women would never consider going topless in public. Most women don’t care whether or not they have the right to go shirtless, because it doesn’t really affect their lives. But it’s not just the right to go shirtless; it’s the concept of gender equality as a whole.
Whether or not you want to walk around topless or whether or not you think this is a just trivial issue, the matter is that women should have the choice. If a woman is comfortable doing so, she should have the choice to be able to walk outside topless and feel the warmth of the sun on her skin. Similar to any other basic right, it’s not about everyone actually doing it; it’s about having the right to. It’s not like gun enthusiasts always walk around carrying guns, but they are glad to have the right to bear arms. Topless rights advocates will not always walk around topless, but they would be glad to have that right.
So keep an open mind, because there is absolutely no shame in the natural female body. While it may not be a prominent issue to you, many females in the US are striving for topless rights.
If you believe in topless rights and want to promote gender equality under the law, every voice counts! Every year, GoTopless hosts an annual protest called GoTopless Day, where women in cities around the world join together for various topless protests that strive for gender equality. It is a day where people that believe in topless rights can join together to promote that right in public. For more information, go to GoTopless.org.