Pamville News: Just put it all back on

For socially conscious people unsure of what cause to champion this weekend, HuffingtonPost.com reports that Sunday, Aug. 25, is Go Topless Day.

The Go Topless event — which HuffPo reports has spread to more than 40 cities in the U.S. and sympathetic countries — encourages women to go topless in public, while men supporting the movement cover their chests by wearing brassieres, bikinis or pasties.

Organized in 2007 by the Raelians, a UFO-based religious group started in Nevada by a man who claims to have had an extraterrestrial experience, the event is often made light of by the media and the general public despite the movement’s serious message.

Go Topless Day is meant to highlight inequality between the men in women in society through its focus on the simple fact that men can legally go bare-chested in public while women cannot. It is held each year on the Sunday closest to Aug. 26, the nationally recognized Women’s Equality Day, which honors the day in 1920 when women won the right to vote in the U.S.

Among the 40 cities holding Go Topless events this year are Los Angeles, Detroit, Denver, Chicago, New York, Vancouver and Washington, D.C.

While event organizers are thrilled to see the movement expand, officials in one U.S. city are relieved to have dodged a bullet this year.

An anonymous source in the San Diego City Council told Pamville News that the council, the entire city even, is grateful that no Go Topless demonstrations will be held there, or anywhere near, San Diego’s Mayor Bob “I can’t keep my hands off chicks or make my sexist mouth shut up” Filner.

“We just couldn’t trust our elected boob to stay away from their bare ones,” the source said, adding that “at this point we couldn’t even guarantee the men in bras would be safe from Filner. It’s a nightmare.”

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After a motorcycle crash earlier this week, Wisconsin police told Pamville News that they are cautioning women in the state who plan to demonstrate in support of Go Topless Day to please use caution and only demonstrate their bare-breastedness while walking on the sidewalks and city streets.

BaysideNow.com reports that a woman was arrested after law enforcement officers eyed her driving a motorcycle erratically — and completely toplessly. Before they could get the woman to pull over safely, she wrecked her motorcycle.

The woman was reportedly not badly injured by the low-speed crash, but police records say that she was lying topless on the ground mumbling something about religion and was subsequently arrested for driving under the influence.

Claude “Rael” Vorilhon, founder and leader of the extraterrestrial Raelian Movement, and mastermind behind Go Topless Day, beamed himself into the Pamville News room to tell reporters that he applauds the Wisconsin woman for being an early and enthusiastic supporter of Go Topless Day, but recommends women not put themselves in danger for the cause.

“Women need to temper their enthusiasm for topless equality with some attention to personal safety,” he said. “If you’re going to go bare-breasted in public, wear sun screen, and if you’re going to go bare-breasted while drinking and driving a motorcycle, at least wear a helmet and pasties.”

You can never be too safe reading Pamville News where our motto is: “Why just report the news, when you can enhance it.”

(Pull up a chair, stay a while at http://viewnorth40.wordpress.com.)