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Should women have the right to go topless in America?
Should the government ban, as happens in most places in the U.S., topless women in public? Of course the religious right-wing in the U.S. would oppose any such right by women, because let's face it, they are the anti-sex police. They want to imprison gay men for sex in their own bedrooms, they want to enforce adultery laws, ban sex toys (as they have done in Alabama) and restrict what you read or view. So, of course, they don't like the idea of women exposing their breasts.
But, is it a violation of equal protection to ban women from going topless while men aren't? But, men aren't sexual in nature when they are topless some would retort. Well, men like Brad Pitt, Matthew McConaughey and me of course, have the pecs to turn heads. So should they, and me of course, be banned from going topless?
The fact is, I see how parts of the Muslim world ban women from even showing their faces in public. The most famous example of this is Saudi Arabia. So, they draw the line at one point with no female flesh allowed at all. We just draw it at a different point. But both prohibitions have a religious basis.
When religion was stronger in the U.S. a century ago, a woman in a modern two piece bathing suit would have been arrested. It is only when the U.S. became more secular that women could wear swimwear like that, or heck, even pants instead of a dress. Or also, vote. The religious right-wing opposed that too, of course.
I bring this up, because is Ashville, North Carolina this past week, there was an event where women went topless. Ashville, I have been informed, is much more liberal than North Carolina as a whole. That doesn't sound that hard though. So the question remains, should the government be involved in stopping women from going topless and how much of the reasons against women having the ability to do so aren't religious in nature?


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