So, I just saw this trending article on my feed from my local news network, WBOC, asking the question whether or not women should be able to go topless in Ocean City. Here is my answer:
YES.
A lot of people disagree with my stance on this issue, but just sit-a-spell and hear me out. I am sure people will argue with me as they have on my original Facebook post addressing this issue, saying that allowing women to go topless would increase the number of sexual assault cases so they should stay clothed. Here is a radical, crazy thought: TEACH PEOPLE (AND PARTICULARLY BOYS/MEN) TO KEEP THEIR HANDS TO THEMSELVES.
Breasts are NOT sexual organs. Breasts are used to feed and nourish infants. Period. Society's hypersexualization of women has transformed the function of breasts away from this biological function to that of a sexual one. That being said, yes, I believe women should have the right to go topless in Ocean City or any public space for that matter, aside from places like food institutions that implement "no shirt, no shoes, no service" health requirements.
As I said before, breasts are organs used to feed infants. This is a biological fact. If a woman who has recently had a baby and is lactating hears a baby cry, her breasts will often leak. THIS. IS. A. BIOLOGICAL. FACT.
Many people consider breasts to be sexual organs because supposedly only women receive sexual gratification by nipple stimulation whereas men do not. This is a myth. There are men who receive sexual pleasure from nipple stimulation despite popular belief. This false accusation is simply a cover-up for much larger issues: the sexual objectification of women, gendered double-standards, and specifically in American culture the traditional Puritan values this land was built upon.
Females have become so hypersexualized that women and even young girls have become objectified. A middle/high school girl cannot even wear anything that exposes her shoulders because they are somehow sexual distractions and too scandalous to look at. We have gone so far as a society to sexualize SHOULDERS attached to females, so of course the concept of women going topless is absolutely frowned upon.
Onto the double-standard regarding this issue, it is socially acceptable for men to be topless despite the fact that nipples can be used for sexual pleasure, as I stated above. The only true difference between men and women's breasts are that one gender's have no biological function while the other's do.
Also, traditional, prude Puritan values are still heavily ingrained into modern American culture. Women are expected to always be chaste and modest despite the contradictory attitudes reflected in various forms of media. Nudity, even for men, n America is a taboo. Gather a group of Americans together and ask them all how they feel about the concept of nude beaches or nudity in the media, and I can guarantee you that the majority of them would advocate for some form of censorship. These traditional Puritan values of modesty and concealment have morphed nudity from a natural state to a sexual one. Other nations, and particularly France, celebrate nudity and/or do not necessarily always associate it with sex, as seen in the commonality of it in their media and films.
On my original Facebook post, a lot of people agreed with my stance, believing that it would be a progressive feminist movement that would help break down some of the gross gender issues we still face today, but other responses unsettled me.
One guy said that he supports this movement for women to be able to be topless in Ocean City or just in public in general "just to watch." Personally, I wanted to vomit. It is exactly that mentality that perpetuates the objectification of women and, to a more extreme degree, rape culture. I said as much to him, and he responded with something along the lines of if there were topless/nude men, I would watch, too. Yes, I am attracted to men, but I would not actively go somewhere where I knew topless men would be and, as he said, "crack open a beer and watch." There is a difference between preying and observing as a passerby.
Bottom line, yes, I agree that women should be allowed to go topless in Ocean City or anywhere else it is socially acceptable for men to be. We need to desexualize women from sexual objects to people, to human beings.
