Actually, they have been able to legally go topless since 1992, when a New York court of appeals ruled that a law forbidding women to go topless was discriminatory. That case, People v. Ramona Santorelli and Mary Lou Schloss, was put to the test in 2005 when Jill Coccaro bared her breasts, was arrested and held in custody for 12 hours and then successfully sued the city for $29K. But apparently NYPD cops were still hassling women who took advantage of this freedom.

Not anymore. The NYPD has now been instructed that if they see a topless woman who is otherwise not breaking the law, they are not to arrest her. If she draws a crowd (a likely event, one imagines), they have been told to:

“… give a lawful order to disperse the entire crowd and take enforcement action” against those who do not comply. Whether the individuals are clothed is not a factor in making a determination about whether the above-mentioned crowd conditions exist.”

This issue is back in the news again thanks to performance artist/photographer Holly Van Voast, who is known for doing just this quite often. She has filed a lawsuit against the city of New York for incidents in 2011 and 2012 where she was arrested in violation of the law. Ten times during that period, Van Voast was detained, arrested or issued a summons for doffing her top. After one of the incidents — outside a Hooters (oh, the irony!) — she was sent to a psychiatric hospital for evaluation. All of this in direct violation of the 1992 law. Those complaints were dropped but the fact remains that Van Voast was unlawfully detained ten times.

The New York court was right: the law against women going bare-breasted was and is discriminatory. Men are allowed to go topless in public freely, save for private institutions who can, of course, have their own dress code. But everywhere else in America a woman’s bare boob is cause for alarm and humiliation up to and including arrest. Just look at how many people freak out when they see a woman breast-feeding in public – though public opinion has tipped in the right direction, 40 percent of people are still uncomfortable with it. As if that’s not what breasts were made for in the first place.

As feminist writer and Anti-Coulter Kimberly Johnson points out:

“Facebook considers breast-feeding pictures to be inappropriate and cause for shutting pages down, yet pages dedicated to nude women and rape are just fine, according to Mr. Zuckerberg.”

Why is that? Seems that Americans have a real hang-up about sex (I know, news flash that is not) and view breasts only in that context. As if men will automatically lose control if they see one, turning into one of those animated wolves in the old Warner Brothers cartoons. This is, after all, the reason given by Islam for why women must wear a burqa: that seeing a woman’s body will make men lose control. And, to them, that is completely the woman’s fault. It’s stupid and, frankly, unfair to men.

Here we are in the 21st century, yet we still view sex from the 12th. I know that we will never get our act together on this subject (thank you patriarchal religion) but its high time we started to try. That this law is being recognized in NYC is a step in the right direction. But we have a long way to go. Cue the right-wing freak out in 3…2…1…

T. Steelman is a life-long Liberal. She has been writing online about politics since 2007. She lives in Western Washington with her husband, daughter, 2 cats and a small herd of alpacas. How can anybody be enlightened? Truth is, after all, so poorly lit…