This Barely Passes as News

Another issue of All the News that's Fit to Bare:

1 in 2 say female toplessness taboo is fair

Research from YouGov shows that Americans tend to be OK with having different standards for men and women when it comes to toplessness. 47% of Americans think it's fair that men can generally go topless places women cannot, but 35% think it is unfair. There is a significant age divide on this question, however, as younger Americans are much more likely to think it is an unfair double standard than older Americans. 49% of under-30s think that it is unfair to hold women to a different standard than men, but 63% of over-65s think it is fair.

The offensiveness of seeing topless women with bare breasts varies greatly based on context. While 73% of Americans would not be that offended by seeing a woman breastfeeding in public, 60% say that they would be offended 'a lot' or 'somewhat' by seeing a topless women walking on the sidewalk. 58% say the same about the front page of a newspaper, on TV before 6pm (56%) and while sunbathing in a park (50%). Most Americans would not be that offended, however, by seeing a topless woman on the cover of a fashion magazine (51%) or on TV after 11pm (60%).

Why feminists are fighting a losing battle over boobs

Rep. Tammy Duckworth, a 47-year-old Illinois Democrat and a new mom, sponsored a bill this week requiring breastfeeding areas at airports. But public spending won't cure public squeamishness about exposed breasts, the root cause of the problem. Meanwhile, the Free the Nipple movement, which for years now been trying to cure this squeamishness, spews so many juvenile and fanciful theories that it has little appeal for mature women.

Giselle Bundchen nursing on the job

The Duckworth bill, dubbed the Friendly Airports for Mothers Act, would require all airports to create lactation rooms — separate from bathrooms — that are fitted with electrical outlets, sinks, and changing counters, and furnished with comfortable chairs for mothers to breastfeed or pump.

But the main problem with the bill is that it offers relief to a small subset of new mothers who frequently travel by air, but at the price of making things more difficult for everyone else. It basically signals to breastfeeding moms that they need to protect their modesty (which is why social conservatives like Rep. Steve Knight, a California Republican, probably are co-sponsoring it), rather than telling men that they need to respect these moms' privacy and avoid subjecting them to lurid glances, which would obviate some of the need for special lactating rooms.

Miley trying to convince you

The Free the Nipple movement (which has already become the subject of a 90-minute, yawn-inducing documentary) tries to cure such attitudes, but in such a ham-handed and shock-jocky way that few real women outside of college campuses can relate to it, other than publicity-hungry celebrities. Thanks to the movement, 100 students — men and women — at UC San Diego took off their shirts last month to fight for the equal right of both sexes to go topless. Likewise, Scout Willis, the daughter of Demi Moore and Bruce Willis, earned her two minutes of fame some years ago when she went strolling topless in Manhattan to protest Instagram's nudity policies barring pictures of topless women. Not to be outdone, Miley Cyrus, who has never encountered a publicity stunt involving her body parts that is too over-the-top, tweeted a picture of her bare breasts with red stars on the nipples to express her solidarity.

Maybe they need better spokeswomen?

Voyeur uses drone to spy on nudists: Furious naked sunbathers say they were buzzed by radio-controlled aircraft that had camera attached

Naturists on one of Britain's most popular nudist beaches fear they are being spied on by a voyeur flying a drone.

A number of naked sunbathers were left angry when they were buzzed by a radio-controlled drone that flew up and down the famous Studland nudist beach in Dorset.

They feared a camera was attached to the device and that the operator, who could not be seen, had the bare cheek to take some shots of the bathers in a state of complete undress. Officials are looking into the matter and have stepped up patrols in case the drone operator returns.

A member of the Studland United Nudist group said: 'Several naturists heard and saw a drone fly over the naturist area including families who are concerned about this new invasion of their privacy and the possible subsequent use of any photographic material that may have been taken.

Studland? Cheeky? That's punny! Still, the idea of using drones to take pictures of nude sun bathers? Seriously, who couldn't have seen that coming?


In Berserkeley, protesters get naked to try to save trees

An estimated 50-75 people took part in a staged protest today at a eucalyptus grove on the UC Berkeley campus, many of them stripping naked in doing so, to make clear their opposition to a proposed FEMA-funded tree-clearing program in the East Bay hills.

The event was orchestrated by the Tree Spirit Project whose mission is “to raise awareness of the critical role trees play in our lives, both globally and personally.” Jack Gescheidt, who founded the project, does this partly by taking fine-art photographs of people, often naked, communing with trees and nature.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency in March allocated $5.7 million to the California Office of Emergency Services to remove eucalyptus trees as part of fire hazard abatement in Claremont Canyon — scene of a devastating wildfire in 1991 — and other nearby areas, such as Tilden Park and Sibley Volcanic Regional Preserve. The funds will be distributed to UC Berkeley, the city of Oakland, and the East Bay Regional Parks District (EBRPD).

They would probably welcome the drones. Eucalyptus (specifically the Blue Gum) are an undesirable invasive species in California, where they were originally imported for lumber. They have taken over huge tracts of land, burn about like regular wood soaked in gasoline (which is approximately true). Still, they can be very scenic, and smell nice. Maybe we should have imported Koalas to keep them under control.

And finally, Huffpo shows its nostalgia for the hippy era with this article: Haunting Nude Photos Bring 1970s Hippie Community Back To Life

. . . in 1969, Howard Taylor, brother of actress Elizabeth Taylor, wanted to get back at the local government of Kauai, Hawaii.

He hadn't been able to secure building permits for his parcel of beachfront land on the island's north shore. Frustrated with the local government and unable to build a home on the land he owned, he bailed out 13 hippies who had been arrested for vagrancy and invited them to set up their tents and live on his property for free.

He then left his new tenants and his property to run wild, and over the next eight years, the small campsite turned into a thriving village known as Taylor Camp.

Young transplants -- surfers, hippies, families, fugitives and Vietnam war veterans -- poured in from the mainland to live at Taylor Camp, free from society's norms. They built multilevel tree houses on bamboo stilts and tended to gardens that grew vegetables and fruits. Marijuana was smoked freely, clothing was optional, and it wasn't uncommon for people to howl at the full moon.

The kids that call themselves hippies now just don't know what it was all about.