“Hey, it's free speech, you know!”
Posted on 12/15/2006 5:24:52 AM PST by King of Florida
Ugh is an understatement. That's one of the tragedies of this life — that the women who are most inclined to bare their breasts in public are always the fugliest ones.
That rule seems to apply on topless beaches all over the world, too.
WTF???
Yes, indeed. But one isn't usually arrested for it.
The sad truth is it seems we are getting to the point where we can be arrested for both.
Obviously she DID break the law unless the law is whatever a judge says it is and in today's world that's they way "progressives" feeeeeel. However there is a long history of breaking laws to protest them. From refusing to pay taxes, dumping tea in harbors, ignoring motorcycle helmet laws, smoking joints to sitting at "Whites only" lunch counters. Bring on the breasts...are we not men enough to take the good with the bad?
“Hey, it's free speech, you know!”
You said, in part: This is about equal protection under the laws, regardless of what we think of women being topless in public. This is no different than the Selective Service, which is also a sexist law.
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The underlying case about the right for women to go topless IS about equal protection (I don't think it is a valid case, however. There are many distinctions in the law relating to gender. Laws against assault on a female are an example of this.)
The issue at present, however, is about the limits of free speech. The example of cocaine use in protest of laws against it is, I think, a pretty good example of how free speech can be abused and allowed to subvert the rule of law. No one has said that this woman cannot protest against the law prohibiting bare female breasts to be exposed in public, only that she cannot violate the law she opposes and call it free speech. To allow otherwise would turn the law on its head. She can protest in other ways, and she can bring an action to find the law unconstitutional. Or, she can violate the law and then attempt to defend herself on equal protection grounds.
She may engage in an act of civil disobedience, but the consequences are potentially being charged with a violation of the law.
It is against the law to touch a woman's breasts when such a touching is not welcome. I wonder how far I would get with the argument that I was merely protesting that law by fondling women's breasts on the street? I don't see a legal distinction between my hypothetical act and this woman's.
I think this revolution should be led by Jessica Biel and Lindsay Lohan. If they refuse, accuse them of being unpatriotic and threaten to have them blacklisted.
She can come to Texas today! It is legal here for women to bare their breasts anytime, anywhere, for any reason.
Well I guess that's a load off her chest.
It may be that the judge in the matter decided to rule that the defendant had not broken the law in order to deny the defendant the required legal standing to have the law changed. If I understand correctly, now that this woman has been declared not in violation of the law, she lacks standing to have the law overturned by (eventually) the state supreme court.
I need to get to Texas more often. I don't have a problem with women baring their breasts as long as there is no law requiring us to look.
You said: It may be that the judge in the matter decided to rule that the defendant had not broken the law in order to deny the defendant the required legal standing to have the law changed. If I understand correctly, now that this woman has been declared not in violation of the law, she lacks standing to have the law overturned by (eventually) the state supreme court.
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I think that is excellent legal analysis on your part. The only trouble with this basis for the judge's decision (if that is in fact what he based his ruling on) is that it leaves a hole a truck could drive through in the law. All anyone has to do if stopped for baring one's breasts is to announce that it is being done as a protest. This woman may have been denied standing to challenge a law that she is allowed to break. Somehow I don't think this is what the state legislature intended. Perhaps I should protest speed limit laws using the same logic.
Your kidding right?
Yes, I would also like to be kept abreast of the events as they disrobe uh unfold.
It is legal here for women to bare their breasts anytime, anywhere, for any reason, BUT some should keep their tops on.
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