I was readind an old magazine about how in the 60s the were able to arrest some hippies in NYC’s Central Park for going shirtless.
When did it become legal for men to walk around with no shirt on? I’m sure in most places it still is illegal for women, but I assume it was illegal for men, even on beaches in the first part of the 1900s or is this incorrect?
Sorry typed to fast that should be
I was READING an old magazine…
If it’s illegal for women but legal for men, isn’t that sex discrimination?
Well I would call it gender discrimination, but whatever you call it, it does seem to fit.
Until the late 1980s, New York State had a law on the books that specifically made it legal for men to go topless in public but illegal for women. The law was challanged by a group of activists known as the Top-Free Seven, and overturned by the State Supreme Court on appeal. The case was People v Santorelli, Schloss, et al (80 N.Y.2d 875, 600 N.E.2d 232, 587 N.Y.S.2d 601).
I presume there are/were similar laws on the books in other states.
Not quite. New York’s top appellate court (the Court of Appeals) gave the statute a narrow reading, thereby avoiding the constitutional challengel. Instead, the Court held that the statute did not apply to “the noncommercial, perhaps accidental, and certainly not lewd, exposure alleged.” http://home.att.net/~saran/sant_op.htm
One Judge concurred in the result, but would have held the statute unconstitutional. http://home.att.net/~saran/sant_con.htm
This page has two other cases: http://www.tera.ca/legal.html
Since in most (all?) cases discrimination statutes use the word “sex” and not “gender,” “sex discrimination” would be the more correct term. “Sex” and “gender” have become somewhat interchangeable of late, which IMHO is the loss of a useful distinction.
Even weirder, if a man get’s breast implants can he walk around topless?
I know nothing of the law in Central Park (or anywhere else), but here in Austin, it’s perfectly legal for ladies to wander round topless (and for guys to prance around in jockstraps)
http://michaelbluejay.com/nudity/
Due prescence of semi-nekkid guys on bicycles, link is disabled.
My 9th grade students: That’s discrimination!
Me: Discrimination is telling the difference between things and making decisions based on those differences. Yes, it’s discrimination. Here, I’ll say it for you, “I’m discriminating”.
Ok, then, how about a woman who’s had a double mastectomy?
Exactly. Seattle v. Buchanan, 90 Wn.2d 584, 584 P.2d 918 (Wash. 1978): http://www.mrsc.org/mc/courts/supreme/090wn2d/090wn2d0584.htm
While the factual predicate is dubious, at best (breasts are only an errogenous zone in women?), the Court explains the reason for its decision in the next paragraph:
Or a young girl who’s breasts haven’t devloped yet (actually I think this is legal, my sister used to let my nieces run around topless when they were young).
I’ve seen men with bigger breasts than mine going topless!
It’s weird to think that they could always do so, but at one time a mother nursing her child in public could be arrested. One person defending this actually told me “Well, if you let people nurse in public, next thing you know they’ll be having sex in public!”
It’s weird to imagine that a court actually said, “The lawmakers no doubt took account of the fact that the breasts can be kept covered in public without inconvenience, since they perform no function which necessitates their being exposed to public view.” While obviously most women nursing in public try to be discreet about it, there’s certainly some risk of incidental exposure of the breast. It seems like this is a rather important function of the female breast.
I don’t think we’ve established this yet. My searched didn’t turn anything up. Anyone?
BTW, here is a link to a good article on indecent exposure law: http://home.att.net/~saran/narvidx.htm
It is not, however, a function that must be done in public. A woman can (usually) easily retire to a non-public place to breast-feed. Similarly, I could urinate in public, and urination is a rather important function, but I can also easily go someplace non-public to do so.
Well, without hijacking into a discussion of breastfeeding in public, there’s often not any appropriate place to go breastfeed your brat, and you can’t put it off for all that long. Unless, of course, you want to feed Jurior in the lavatory, which seems rather unpleasant and uncomfortable to me.
I think it’s only legal for men who don’t make $25 million a year playing baseball.
At least, from the reactions A-Rod got, you’d THINK that was the law…
Just to be specific about New York toplessness law, there are some places where it is illegal by local ordinance for either men or women to go without a shirt. One example is the Village of Southampton on the East End of Long Island (one of the tonier Hamptons), which prohibits men and women from going shirtless in public unless within a certain distance of the beach.
This law is enforcable and regularly enforced within the Village. A little tightassed, for sure, but shirtless is an image the village trustees want to avoid in the public areas of the villiage. Since it applies equally to men and women, it does not run afoul of the Santorelli decision mentioned above.