Free Republic

WANTED TO WRITE something snarky about Moira Johnston because what she's doing kind of begs for snarkiness. But after hanging with her in Rittenhouse Square - where her bare breasts caught the morning sun, elicited picture-taking and drew a blasting honk from a Roadway Express truck - Johnston won me over to her cause. Which is this: Women should be allowed to go topless anywhere that men are allowed to. Maybe it was the flowered pasties that covered Johnston's nipples. Or the glorious breeze. Or the guy who grinned at Johnston's chest and said, "God bless ya, babe!" Mostly, though,...

THE king of Swaziland has picked a teenage student to be his 13th bride less than a month after more than 50,000 bare-breasted virgins vied to catch his eye at the annual Reed Dance ceremony. King Mswati III, who is 37, presented 17-year-old Phindile Nkambule as his new wife-to-be at a traditional ceremony, where she appeared topless but donned the red feathers worn only by royalty for the first time. Women's groups and political opponents said King Mswati's penchant for multiple young brides ill befits a country with the world's highest rate of HIV/AIDS, but the monarch said polygamy is...

ENYOKENI PALACE, South Africa (Reuters) - Thousands of bare-breasted Zulu girls paraded outside the palace of their king as part of an ancient wife-choosing ceremony this weekend, and were told to stay virgins to keep them safe from AIDS.The Royal Reed Dance was once a chance for the head of South Africa's largest tribe to pick new wives from his assembled subjects, but lately King Goodwill Zwelithini has used the occasion to address his subjects on morality and development.His shoulders draped with the skin of a leopard, Zwelithini called on around 2,000 Zulu maidens on Saturday to abstain from pre-marital...