Mad as Heck? Get Naked!
Not that I’m complaining.
But it does seem to be getting a little out of hand. Ben Reininga reports that German kids are trespassing naked to protest rent hikes.
Everyone hates paying rent. Everyone likes nakedness. A German group, called Hedonist International, has combined the two. To protest the gentrification of Berlin, a city long known for its reasonable cost of living, they have been setting up appointments to view expensive apartments — as if they were going to rent them — but then instead taking off their clothes, blasting techno, and hosting naked dance parties.
Is this an effective means of enacting social change? Probably not. Is it a fun way to spend an afternoon, to the bewilderment — and arousal — of a few realtors? Yeah, probably.
Not to be outdone, the state of Maine appears to be holding a Naked Protest March for a cause or causes unknown. Brian Fairbanks was there and blogged about all the exciting action.
Andrea Simoneau (pictured above) is a pleaseant young Maine girl who works as a cook for ARAMARK and attends classes as a senior at the University of Maine at Farmington. Like most people in her state, Simoneau knows that it’s legal for women to walk around topless… but that didn’t stop her from organizing a topless protest the other day.
So, she did something that’s entirely legal to protest …..? Oh, who cares? She’s nekkid!
Brian also took in a protest in New Hampshire. However this one had a cause we can all endorse; they want looser public drinking laws.
In New Hampshire, there is a strong and determined movement of young people protesting the state’s “conservative” public drinking laws. They are part of the Free Keene movement, which seeks to make ours “the voluntary society.” They say they “are going to accomplish this using peaceful, market-based actions. This is not a revolution. We are not revolving, or going back to the beginning. This is evolution.”
One of their goals is to eradicate public drinking laws entirely — if we can drink lemonade and water in public, why not a beer?
On Sunday, they put this to a test in the town’s Central Square — and threw in a little God-given nudity to raise the stakes a bit.
Yes, the group’s statements are pompous and unfocused, but who cares? They’re nekkid!
In keeping with this fine tradition, Drew Grant reports that people outside of Philly want to have the right to hike naked.
Rangers and police warn that that participants risk criminal charges. But enthusiasts like 28-year-old Andy Williams, of Warren, Pa., say it’s not indecent to enjoy nature in your birthday suit.
Forty-year-old Shane Steinkamp, of New Orleans, says hiking naked makes him feel like a natural animal in its natural habitat.
I have a shiny dime that says Shane is single, lives with his mom and creeps out every woman he meets.
One thing you probably noticed as you wandered through the myriad of links above, after all there’s the possibility of seeing nekkid folks, is that the protesters are primarily female and exclusively white.
I have no idea why that is. Certainly women of color get naked from time to time. I can vouch for that based on first hand experience. In fact, in parts of Brazil, women are naked almost 24/7. To get anyone’s attention they’d need to dress like Carrie Nation. So it can’t be that they’re uncomfortable with the idea.
The other thing you probably noticed is that the majority of woman who rip off their clothes in order to display their umbrage tend to be woman you’d rather not see naked in the first place.
Skippy, my imaginary intern, was very perplexed by this. But, I hung up my leather jacket and finished my cheeseburger so I could remind him to thank God for P.E.T.A.; an organization that has been proudly getting scalding hot models to bare all to protest bear skins.
Skippy then opined that all the naked people seem to be somewhere other than Chicago.
Ah, ye of little faith. Don’t you know me at all?
As Elliott Harris reported on his personal blog, members of the LFL’s Chicago Bliss, stripped down for a local P.E.T.A. ad. Yes, Elliott has pics so you’ll want to visit that link.
A quick side note about the LFL. Oklahoma City recently railed against adding a franchise in their fair city on moral grounds. Having once been stuck in Parma, Oklahoma, where the only book you could get at the bookstore was the Bible and MTV was censored, I can verify the attitude. But, there’s a bunch of hypocrisy there as well since there are 7 strip clubs within walking distance of city hall.
Maybe we should organize a protest.
