topless Instagram protest draws more eyeballs than action
Scout Willis's topless Instagram protest draws more eyeballs than action
As someone who tested out New York's topless law herself, catering to the male gaze doesn't really change social problems
Anyone following the celebrity "news" cycle is aware by now that Scout Willis, daughter of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, has been waging a topless twitpic campaign to protest Instagram's "no female nipples" policy and the patriarchy en générale. Because what better way to stick it to the man than by showing him your boobs?
It all started about a week ago when Instagram suspended Ms Willis's account because she posted a photo of a sweatshirt she'd designed called the "babe bomber" which features, yes, a photo of two babes showing off their enviable fashion tits. Scout was annoyed, and said so. She then made a new Instagram account for the express purpose of posting "beautiful, artistic nudes", changing her middle name to "Areola" in solidarity with said nudes. "Let's just see how long they let me stay this time," she tweeted. (It didn't take long.)
Since then, Scout has taken to the less oppressive environment of Twitter to vocally protest Instagram and American prudishness under a simple hashtag: #FreeTheNipple. She even took to the streets of New York City, topless, to demonstrate just how absurd it is that women are (technically) allowed to go nude in the Big Apple but not on the big photo-sharing site. She pointed out how hypocritical it is that people are allowed to post images of drugs and violence, as well as images that seem to objectify women, so long as there are no female nips present. Fellow Instagram refugee Rihanna has voiced her support, among others.
"Now that every1 is listening, let's talk about root of what is happening here, stop sensationalizing and talk about what's really at stake," Scouttweeted. "It's so much bigger than @instagram now ... This is about helping women feel empowered to make personal choices about their bodies not dictated by what society says is decent."
Whose apps? Our apps!
But does "freeing the nipple" actually help with any of that? As someone who once walked around topless in Central Park ostensibly as a means of testing out New York's law but mainly because I thought it was funny (and because my bosses offered me a sizeable bonus), I feel qualified to say: eh, probably not.
Do we live in a society that's simultaneously sex-obsessed and puritanical? Why, yes. Could the United States stand to work on some of these issues? Sure! It would be great if the virgin/whore dichotomy would just realize it's drunk and go home.
But can this type of protest – one that mainly involves showing off a body the male gaze is likely to enjoy – ever be terribly subversive on this (or any other) front? And how high on feminism's list of priorities should "the right to be topless in every corner of public space" be, especially when the internet already seems to devote quite a bit of bandwidth to that?
When I did my stunt piece, I got a ton of fan mail from "top free" groups whose reason for existing was to free the female breast from its patriarchal shackles. They applauded my bravery, which I thought was funny. I don't think it's all that brave or feminist for someone like me – a young, white, cisgender, able-bodied, acceptably curvy woman with a history of getting nude for money – to move through the relatively safe environment of Central Park and to take her top off for some photos. There's a certain level of privilege there.
That is a criticism that's been leveled at many topless and/or sexy protestors, from European group Femen to the Slutwalk to Peta – and one that carries some water.
When your protest results in images that look like they could be in Playboy, is there any way to distinguish the progressive from the status quo? I think this applies doubly when the images are an end unto themselves and not merely a means of drawing attention to a more serious cause. At least the members of Femen are using their boobs to protest important stuff, like oppressive dictatorships and female genital mutilation! But then again, the members of Femen have been accused of intervening in cultures that are not their own in ways that are less than respectful.
One group’s pitfalls aside, I hope that as Scout Willis gets older, she realizes that feminism is about collective rights and not just a very privileged kind of self-expression – and devotes her considerable mouthpiece to causes that are more, well, political. There's nothing wrong with nipples, but they're hardly the only entities that need freeing.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/31/scout-willis-topless-instagram-protest
posted by Satish Sharma at
03:23
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