Areolaphobia is about to be codified as North Carolina law, driven by a legislator who was concerned that one of her constituents might wander into a far-away district and trip on an errant nipple.

Relax, strip clubs and skin mags are still protected. Your god-given right to pay for or sell the sight of skin shall not be infringed. It's just giving it away at a woman's discretion that's wrong. (I presume art museums are safe, too, but somehow they didn't make the list.)

National attention to Raleigh's priorities has been predictably sober and thoughtful and positive for the image of our state.

Comments

[Fec]

First Crawley dies and now this. Argh! Totalitarianism marches inexorably on.

[Stephen]

Looks like the pint of the topless rallies in Asheville is being ignored.

[Collards]

The pint? Have you been drinking again Stephen?

[polifrog]

It's just giving it away at a woman's discretion that's wrong.

Hints of gender bias? Really? Can peter be given away at a man's discretion?

The only gender bias on display is that which you promote, Ed.

Can you not see that you are the source of any relevant sexism in this case?

[Ed Cone]

I have no clue what you're trying to say, Frog.

[Jon Lowder]

I welcome the topless law as long as it also applies to men as well. In fact if it doesn't pass for women I hope they pass one specifically for men since I'm sick and tired of being randomly assaulted by the sight of men's hairy, sagging moobs as I travel around the Triad. The combination of years of excessive barbecue consumption and no exercise for decades on end has created a male population that is nauseating to behold.

[polifrog]

My inner Hartzman.

[polifrog]

It's just giving it away at a woman's discretion that's wrong.

If you are in favor of a woman "giving it away" at her discretion, are you then equally in favor of a man giving his away at his discretion?

If not, you are in favor of an instance of gender inequality.
But if you are in favor of men giving it away if they choose, there are a host of sex offender laws that would need revising.

The sexism you allude to (the idea that men governing the state dictating whether a woman can give it away is sexist) is odd in an environment where men can not give it away if they wish.

The fact is that it is the men in Raleigh who are preserving a sense of equality between the sexes while you seemingly support inequality.

You are beating the drum for Ashville sexism.

[Ed Cone]

You're reading things I didn't write, Frog, as you often do.

It's a needless law with a ludicrously harsh penalty, and, also, it was proposed by a woman.

Men can still walk around topless in public, and neither men nor women are allowed to air out their genitalia.

[prell]

Your 21st-century Republican Party, folks. Limited gov't ftmfw!

[Stephen]

Equating a nipple to a penis is like equating an opinion to an anus. Oh wait, I should probably rethink this analogy....

[polifrog]

Why do liberals wish to make sexual arousal a public matter?

Among mammals humans are distinct in that breasts are a permanent feature of females, a feature that evolved to create sexual desire among males. As a result, breasts, among other female parts, are indeed equivalent to male sexual plumage.

Deny the science if you wish, but first be honest with your adolescent sexist desire to have women to bare themselves. Be honest with your passive aggressive chauvinism.

Perhaps once you recognize your own passive aggressive chauvinism you can understand the inequality liberalism is attempting to impose on society.

[Steve Harrison]

"Deny the science if you wish"

If you mean the science that claims female breasts evolved for marketing purposes and not for feeding hungry babies, then yes. I must deny that science.

[Bryan Gates]

This is a law in search of a problem. Currently about once a year 12 or so women show up in an Asheville park and take their shirts off for a little while. Then everyone goes home and forgets about it for another year.

If this bill becomes law, next time the women show up in the park, police officers will have to arrest and process them and the machinery of the court system will be put into operation at mostly public expense. The cases will be continued multiple times and each time the media will show up in court with all the disruption that brings. Eventually some token punishment will be imposed, because it makes no sense to lock the women up. However that whole circus will consume hours of police time, prosecutor time, defense attorney time, judge time, etc. By the time the cases are concluded, probably 100 person-hours will have been expended mostly by public employees.

Is that any kind of improvement over the status quo?

[polifrog]

Steve Harrison:

If you mean the science that claims female breasts evolved for marketing purposes and not for feeding hungry babies, then yes.

You appear to be unaware that there is a difference between breasts and mammary glands.

With the exception of humans, mammals do not have breasts, they have mammary glands. Mammary glands are used for "feeding hungry babies", until weened then fade. Think dog, cat, mouse, etc. To some degree humans follow this pattern, but they have also evolved permanent breasts which act as human plumage and have acted as such before the dawn of marketing. You'd know this if you had visited a house of antiquities.... sorry museum.

The evolutionary argument is this: Not long after, or evolving commensurately with the ability to stand erect, breasts began to develop as new form of enticing cleavage to replace the previous eye level cleavage at the rump. By way of a current reference, some of our more unevolved are still "ass men".

Fact. These protesting women would not be going topless if they were not aware that doing so attracts attention. Think of breasts are fishing lures; Ashville women do.

[Ishmael]

Frog seems to think he/she is an expert on everything. Tiresome stuff.
At first reading about this riled me plenty but I believe it is going nowhere and if it does go somewhere we have some pretty sad representatives in Raleigh. To some people the only good sex is reproductive sex - which means that sexuality is relegated to a smutty corner, even though supposedly our maker intended the human plumage as it is described to lead to a more full and (ahem) productive life.
Leave it to the Reps with their car stuck in rear gear to embrace the fencing of the female nipple as a cause to save the moral lives of the rest of us. There's plenty of immorality to go around but the definition varies with each person. The older I get the more I see two sides of this coin, as have been mentioned here: sex selling everything but human sexuality not spoken of or discussed much. As a nation, we are stuck in a kind of perverse forever adolescence. It is unbecoming of us and leads me to believe that it is in reality an issue brought up solely to detract from important topics that might help us reach adulthood.

[polifrog]

Ish:

Frog seems to think he/she is an expert on everything. Tiresome stuff.

Sorry, didn't mean to distract you from the dancing clitorises with real knowledge.

[titforbrains]

Provable? No. But's it's not like he's just making it up. Makes sense, too.

[Steve Harrison]

"You appear to be unaware..."

I ain't gonna fall for it, froggie. I can see like twelve moves ahead and we're going to end up at Global Warming. That said, you can consider me happily "unevolved"...

[David Hoggard]

Read of the theory before and it does make sense.

What doesn't make sense is the legislation under discussion. Stupid and petty stuff.

And something that surprised me above: frog bolstering his valid point with human evolution as its basis. Probably shouldn't have surprised me, but it did. You upset my stereotyping of you, frog. Stop it.

[polifrog]

Ok. Science has spoken. Breasts are sexual.

Now let's turn to Ed's anti-science loin cloth approach to human modesty. How does Ed's loin cloth cover sexual breasts? It does not. The result of Ed's approach to garments is gender inequality.

The reality is that it is not equality of clothing placement that we are after, but rather equality of sexual modesty.

And that is what the law addresses.

[Spag]

§ 245.01 Exposure of a person.
A person is guilty of exposure if he appears in a public place in such
a manner that the private or intimate parts of his body are unclothed or
exposed. For purposes of this section, the private or intimate parts of
a female person shall include that portion of the breast which is below
the top of the areola. This section shall not apply to the breastfeeding
of infants or to any person entertaining or performing in a play,
exhibition, show or entertainment.

This is the CURRENT law in the enlightened state of New York and it's right wing, Republican controlled state government. Maybe those conservative Republican's in New York should repeal it. I'm sure Republican governor Cuomo would sign such a bill. But that shouldn't be a priority either, right?

This is kind of like the same-sex marriage debate. Laws that approve of same-sex marriage are worthy of attention all of the time, whereas laws that ban it are a waste of legislative time.

It's kind of a stupid law and certainly doesn't merit felony status, but let's quit playing the "dumb ol' backwards Republican South" card. I'm guessing that the bill passes, but stripped of the felony penalty.

[Spag]

Also, if a woman whips it out on a public street and it's caught by a police surveillance camera, do you blame the cops or the woman?

[Frank]

Because there'd be titties all over Central Park in the summer without it. Duh. Rich people in all the overlooking hotels ain't got time for that...and the proprietors gotta rent rooms.

Lawyers.

[Thomas]

I believe the proposed NC law only covers (two meanings intended) the nipple and areola, not the sexual breast to which Frog refers.

[polifrog]

Although I get what you're saying, Thomas, I tend to think of them as a single package. I don't think I am alone in this. If one or the other is missing, the result is either manly or a sign of illness. Alternatively there could be misplacement, in which the distraction would likely overcome attraction.

[michele]

When I read this post, my immediate concern was breastfeeding moms. So I was glad to see this in the linked article:

"'Incidental exposure' by breastfeeding mothers would remain exempt."

[Roch]

Do they have to be breastfeeding children?

[Ishmael]

Ish:

Frog seems to think he/she is an expert on everything. Tiresome stuff.

Sorry, didn't mean to distract you from the dancing clitorises with real knowledge.

Thank you, Buttress Man!

[tk solomon]

call me old-fashioned but unless it's two Buncombe babes expressing their mutual tittifeelia I'm not as frenzied as froggie.

[polifrog]

Hmmm, four...