2015.10.22 Cosmopolitan
Fort Collins, Colorado, home of Colorado State University, almost became one of a growing number of cities that allow women to be topless in public. Instead, a loud wave of protest got a proposal to "free the nipple" nixed, the
Fort Collins Coloradoan reports.
The city council voted to change local laws about public nudity but still not allow women to go topless in public. The new law exempts women who are breastfeeding, women in locker rooms, or having medical emergencies. Aside from that, it's still a $250 fine if you get caught exposing your breasts below the top of the nipples, according to
The Associated Press. (Of course, that's only if you're a woman; men can do as they please with their nips.)
The hearing on the matter got extremely heated, with both men and women voicing a loud opposition to the whole "free the nipple" campaign. Councilman Ray Martinez said he didn't want "Fort Collins turned into a strip club," one local mom said she'd consider moving out of town if women were allowed to walk around shirtless, and another said that topless women would cause
car accidents. A local
survey found that 60.9 percent of residents didn't want exposed breasts to be legal.
Activists disagreed and have been fighting for the issue in cities across America. In Denver and Boulder, there is no gender-specific language in indecency codes, which means that men and women can be topless without any trouble, and a group called Go Topless Fort Collins fought for that. "Equal but different isn't equal," Samantha Six said at the meeting, speaking out against people with a religious objection to toplessness. "Women deserve and should have the right to make decisions concerning their own bodies."
Even though the ordinance got voted down, activists say the fight will continue. "Allowing only breastfeeding mothers to go topless will prevent Fort Collins from getting sued for breaking federal protection, but it will not grant women the power equality they need to avoid informal harassment," organizer Brittany Hoagland told the
Denver Post.
