love seeing revisionism in the wild “free the nipple never meant you can walk around topless every where that’s still sexual harassment it just meant for like breastfeeding and stuff”no it literally means you should be able to walk around topless anywhere because get this. breasts aren’t fucking sexual organs.
I remember when I was about 12, I watched a show on TLC that followed people as they got somewhat uncommon medical procedures.
There was one episode with a trans woman getting different gender-affirming operations, including breast implants. It showed the procedure, and (what I found so fascinating that it’s stuck with me for decades), as soon as the doctor put the implant in, a censor blur popped up on the nipple.
And you just know there was a meeting between the TLC lawyers and the editors and producers of the show to discuss what the difference was between a “man nipple” (can be shown) and a “woman nipple” (no no must obscure, ‘tis naughty). And they decided that as soon as the implant goes in and the nipple has more mass behind it, that’s the moment when it becomes a woman’s nipple and must be hidden to comply with TV rules.
But it’s the same nipple. On the same person. I know what it looks like; I just saw it. But TV and obscenity rules are rules, and the rules say woman nipple = sexual and therefore explicit, but man nipple = neutral, just fine.
“Free the Nipple” was calling out arbitrary bullshit like that, because someone just existing with their body parts should not be considered obscene, and the double standard that men can be topless but women can’t is so blatantly ridiculous. All nipples are just nipples. If you get turned on or bothered by them, that’s on you.
i think part of why the movement stopped was because people got real uncomfortable about the “age” part of that arbitrariness
[[MORE]]“man nipple” (can be shown)
“woman nipple” (must obscure)
“underage girl nipple” (child sexual material. even more important to obscure)
“underage boy nipple” (can be shown, family beach/swimming-pool photos do it all the time)
“baby/toddler nipple, any sex” (can be shown, but exact age at which this stops applying is a matter of debate)
like. the moment you have to start arguing over what things should not be considered CP anymore (or classified as such when they weren’t already), you’re gonna get into a VERY messy fight with others from all sides, and i think lots of people were just too tired to handle it