It is a fundamental and multifaceted problem.
We cannot police people’s thoughts. We can have anti discrimination laws but those laws don’t change wether a boss or shop keeper Harbor certain feelings or ideas about you, they just act to mitigate their ability to impede your life or give you recourse.
You can’t stop simple from fantasizing about you. Every one of us- no matter how undesirable you think you might be or how much you try to not appear “provocatively,” someone you pass by could masturbate to you later. You can’t stop it and you may never know.
Using women as an example- in most societies fashion has become less restrictive and more revealing in modern times.
We’ve mostly normalized things like crop tops, short shorts, skirts, leggings and “work out” or “functional” apparel- which some refuse to wear and others argue is essentially the same as walking around naked.
If you go out in leggings, you can’t control wether people look and lust after you. Some people wear long shirts or wrap their waists etc- but at the end of the day you can’t control it.
Now to be clear I am not arguing that women shouldn’t wear certain things- I believe people should be able to dress as they like and the place I grew up didn’t criminalize public nudity so people could sometimes be seen walking naked or near naked.
I’m also not defending those who leer and sexualize others.
The point is that no jut laws on earth with present technology Can police wether someone is staring intentionally or wether they are sexualizing something or not.
We can work to create social stigma and values that teach people it is wrong or impolite to sexualize or stare at others, especially specific to things like breast feeding- but that’s about it unless we want a world where you can be locked up under suspicion of lewd thoughts or for looking at someone in public.
In the end it is like wearing leggings or a low cut top etc. if you show your body in public people might look. If you don’t want people to look, don’t show it. That is why homes have curtains. People shouldn’t look, but it is hard to criminalize or even penalize looking at things that people make no effort to hide beyond social reprisals for creeper behavior.
Don’t open a stable if you are afraid of horses amigo. Some women would never dream of going out in a halter top- even if it is more normalized some men would never go shirtless in public if it could be helped. People wear tshirts to the pool etc.
the “simple” solution and the just one is for people to not stare or not be creeps- but my argument isn’t that shouldn’t be the way things are- my argument is that it isn’t the way things are.
You SHOULD be able to leave your phone on a park bench and have it be there when it comes back or to not lock your doors to your house without worry someone will rob you. It should not be on you to have to protect those things and people SHOULD just be decent. But… that isn’t how it is. You CAN leave your door unlocked, you CAN leave your curtains open and bank on the decency of your neighbors not to watch you change or shower- that said if you are very worried about it- you probably shouldn’t.
There is a personal perceptive aspect to this implied by all this. Mind set. This isn’t all about us and it isn’t all about other people. There is what other people should do or would be kind to do and then there is us.
The social components of this go deep. In order to “free the nipple” without concern we need two things. As a whole it requires society to desexualize things like breast feeding and even the breast. Many societies now and in history have much less sexualized concepts of breasts.
That also means the ones showing their nipples need to be ok with showing them.
It is generally legal and acceptable, at least contextually, for men to bare their chests in public. But… men are sexualized too- and we can’t make it an issue of gender where one makes arguments for differences between male and female sexuality or expression because gay men exist- so men can and do sexualize other men.
So what is going on? Surely at multiple points in history and multiple places a man walking down the street shirtless would be quite a spectacle. Scandal even. In the modern western world on a hot day or in a beach town etc. topless men would be a common sight many places. How did we get from A to B? If men are sexualized- then topless men, unless oblivious to the fact, either accept that they may be sexualized- or in many cases embrace it. Many men go shirtless specifically because they want to show off their bodies, while for others it is functional- they are hot or doing things that clothes might impede or might soil or ruin clothing etc.
Regardless of feminism and all the liberation and such- we cling to various traditional ideas about men and women and sexuality. While women have more sexual autonomy and social freedom sexually, we still face “stud celebration vs. slut shaming.” Despite increasing adoption of views that women can express themselves sexually and that women have sexual desire and can have pleasure and sexual aggression, our social roles still generally see men as sexual aggressors and women as sexually passive. Men “always want sex” and for women sex is a sort of nuisance. Women are “weak” and need protecting is a stereotype that many have worked hard to dispel but we still see the underlying principles in law- we still see it with divorce and child custody. The woman as the nurturer, the woman as the one needing protecting or who is harmed disproportionately by divorce etc.
Enter a certain type of paradox. Women DO face predation and all sorts of issues unique or relating to gender and gender roles- because society infantilized and marginalized women, culture, customs, laws, practices, and perceptions reflect that and so we do often need special protections or considerations to attempt to balance out these things, but those dale special protections and such often reinforce the ideas that women need protecting or help beyond what a competent adult can provide themselves. A self perpetuating cycle of sorts. When we factor in the problematic but present biological realities- that men on average are stronger and more physically suited for exerting force and other primitive advantages, that pregnancy and related things are a biological reality that impacts women and defects their ability to function the same as men etc. we run into uncomfortable problems. The terminology doesn’t matter beyond our feelings.
As a species we need to reproduce to survive. With the way our society runs we need to increase generational population to thrive. Child bearing is a net social benefit and on the whole it is a far more demanding process for women than for men. But- we also have this duality. We mystify the process. It is considered a right or a goal for many.
There is inherent contradiction there. A general argument is that a woman shouldn’t have to choose between a career and having a family- but that assumes inherently that having a family is some fundamental right or purpose of women.
So much if that is social and so much of it is personal- mental.
We decide what is important to us. If one wants to have children, that is no different than wanting a boat or wanting to build a house. You want it, but what you want and what you do to get it etc. are what they are. Lots of people die without having kids. Through history. Lack of opportunity or ability or desire or because their priorities didn’t allow it. Now to be clear- because we control society we can change the “rules” and we can make many “mutually exclusive” goals not mutually exclusive. We can’t change reality but we can change aspects of the world and we control society. So I’m not arguing against accommodations merely presenting that the thinking is inherently contradictory.
It shows that not just society, but many women themselves consider it a priority of existence to be a parent. Not just to have offspring, one can always surrender for adoption or donate sperm or eggs etc. but to hold the role of “parent” and “caregiver.”
In this same vein, while society sexualized the nipple, so do many women. Think of it this way- many people would be embarrassed or feel awkward etc. to be naked in front of strangers even if those strangers didn’t find them attractive or care. If I don’t care if you are naked, you are the one who cares right? What can I do about how you feel? Well- technically I can do some things right? I Can do things to make you feel more comfortable or assured in that situation right?
But then we have a mini paradox again. If you won’t be naked because I make you uncomfortable to be naked with my behavior, but I behave that way because I’ve grown up in a society where nudity was sexualized, not getting naked serves to reinforce that social view of nudity.
People could change their behavior to make others more comfortable, but we can also choose to normalize a thing by doing it.
Even after desegregation, many people of both races often felt (or feel to this day) uncomfortable or odd doing things that were once socially taboo.
Of course Rosa parks and others could have waited until society made her comfortable to sit at the front of a bus, but instead they decided to normalize it at the cost of their own comfort for the sake of social change.
People should accept nudity and especially breast feeding and not be weird about it, but what if they don’t? Do you want to be able to breast feed or not? If you want to do something and society makes it awkward, your choices asides from giving up are to either wait for society to do something about it or to do something about it yourself. In most places in the US to most people today there is nothing odd or shocking about seeing a POC sitting at a diner counter waiting to be served or seeing an interracial couple or seeing women wearing pants or driving a car or walking alone. The first times people started to do these things publicly you can bet that it could be awkward for those seeing as well as those doing.
Women can wear pants because enough women decided they wanted to wear pants and weren’t going to let what other people said or did stop them. Society pushed back and they pushed harder and eventually they won out.
Men still struggle to be accepted for wearing dresses and “feminine” clothing in most of the western world.
We all have our battles.
Even in Islamic fundamentalist countries where women are covered head to toe there are creepers. It isn’t someone’s fault that others are creepy or rude, it isn’t your responsibility to have to educate them or change them or accommodate them. They just are. They always have been and they likely always will be. You decide what you want to do and you do it or not.
We cannot police people’s thoughts. We can have anti discrimination laws but those laws don’t change wether a boss or shop keeper Harbor certain feelings or ideas about you, they just act to mitigate their ability to impede your life or give you recourse.
You can’t stop simple from fantasizing about you. Every one of us- no matter how undesirable you think you might be or how much you try to not appear “provocatively,” someone you pass by could masturbate to you later. You can’t stop it and you may never know.
Using women as an example- in most societies fashion has become less restrictive and more revealing in modern times.
We’ve mostly normalized things like crop tops, short shorts, skirts, leggings and “work out” or “functional” apparel- which some refuse to wear and others argue is essentially the same as walking around naked.
Now to be clear I am not arguing that women shouldn’t wear certain things- I believe people should be able to dress as they like and the place I grew up didn’t criminalize public nudity so people could sometimes be seen walking naked or near naked.
I’m also not defending those who leer and sexualize others.
The point is that no jut laws on earth with present technology Can police wether someone is staring intentionally or wether they are sexualizing something or not.
We can work to create social stigma and values that teach people it is wrong or impolite to sexualize or stare at others, especially specific to things like breast feeding- but that’s about it unless we want a world where you can be locked up under suspicion of lewd thoughts or for looking at someone in public.
Don’t open a stable if you are afraid of horses amigo. Some women would never dream of going out in a halter top- even if it is more normalized some men would never go shirtless in public if it could be helped. People wear tshirts to the pool etc.
the “simple” solution and the just one is for people to not stare or not be creeps- but my argument isn’t that shouldn’t be the way things are- my argument is that it isn’t the way things are.
There is a personal perceptive aspect to this implied by all this. Mind set. This isn’t all about us and it isn’t all about other people. There is what other people should do or would be kind to do and then there is us.
That also means the ones showing their nipples need to be ok with showing them.
It is generally legal and acceptable, at least contextually, for men to bare their chests in public. But… men are sexualized too- and we can’t make it an issue of gender where one makes arguments for differences between male and female sexuality or expression because gay men exist- so men can and do sexualize other men.
There is inherent contradiction there. A general argument is that a woman shouldn’t have to choose between a career and having a family- but that assumes inherently that having a family is some fundamental right or purpose of women.
So much if that is social and so much of it is personal- mental.
In this same vein, while society sexualized the nipple, so do many women. Think of it this way- many people would be embarrassed or feel awkward etc. to be naked in front of strangers even if those strangers didn’t find them attractive or care. If I don’t care if you are naked, you are the one who cares right? What can I do about how you feel? Well- technically I can do some things right? I Can do things to make you feel more comfortable or assured in that situation right?
People could change their behavior to make others more comfortable, but we can also choose to normalize a thing by doing it.
Even after desegregation, many people of both races often felt (or feel to this day) uncomfortable or odd doing things that were once socially taboo.
Of course Rosa parks and others could have waited until society made her comfortable to sit at the front of a bus, but instead they decided to normalize it at the cost of their own comfort for the sake of social change.
Men still struggle to be accepted for wearing dresses and “feminine” clothing in most of the western world.
We all have our battles.