Here is Sarah B.’s Comment of the Day on the post, “Oh Yeah, THIS Will Work Out Well: Minnesota Rules That Women Going Bare-Breasted in Public Isn’t Illegal.” There isn’t a thing I could say as an introduction that would improve on it….
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For most of history, the idea of modesty had nothing to do with the idea that the human body or sex was evil. The idea was that the penis and vagina, as well as the female breasts (the focus of which is the feeding of babies) were indeed focused on reproduction, life giving, holy, and thus reserved from public consumption. Avoiding public showmanship of the reserved and holy has been a common theme throughout most cultures, religions, and peoples throughout history. We have a time, place, and occasion for every action in our lives. Why do we not urinate/defecate in public? I don’t want to see you do so, and frankly, nor do I want to see your sexual characteristics.
Though this is not a phrase thought well of on this site, we do need to think of children. There is measurable harm that occurs to children who are exposed to the sexual before puberty. Modesty, such as not going around bare breasted, is a protection for the children. We don’t expose sexual characteristics to protect children’s innocence. Sure, kids know they have these parts, but for the most part, what is not in sight is not emphasized. We focus on teaching kids about their private parts and how to avoid excess attention focused on them for their safety. We don’t want more teen pregnancies, child sexual abuse (which includes inappropriate exposure), or normalizing sexual attraction to minors, especially in the form of pederasty, which focuses on the fully developed sexual characteristics, like breasts, that the judges seem to be suggesting we should allow to be in full display.
There are things we cannot change. The vast majority of men are wired to be visually attracted, and women’s sexual characteristics are things they are visually attracted to. There have been studies about the visual nature of men’s attraction. Men’s brains are wired so that the sight of a woman, especially a less clad one, causes certain reactions in their brain at a speed that is faster than conscious thought. This means that a secondary sexual characteristic, like breasts, is going to cause men to be visually distracted and possibly attracted. Men have to overcome their mental state or accept it, just from a woman walking by in that partially unclad state. Women can show respect for the men around us by not displaying these characteristics publicly.
Something the women who demand that nudity be allowed seem to forget is that if we go around topless, we will attract plenty of attention. Sure, it is nice to get attention from men who think you are attractive, but getting attention from the wrong men is very uncomfortable. A study I was reading shows that women are getting less attractive to men, in part, because of the hormonal birth control methods we are able to use. They suppress the pheromones, which mean that women are not getting men’s attention in a normal and desired way, which often leads to crazy actions like going around topless. However, instead of attracting a good man, women tend to forget that if you act outrageously for a culture, you tend to have good odds of getting attention but the goods you get will be odd. No sane woman wants to attract a creeper.
That leads to another facet of society that we need to consider. If nudity becomes common place, what does that say for sexual harassment and assault laws? Unwanted sexual attention can quickly turn to sexual harassment, but if we are displaying our sexual characteristics, how can we claim that we do not want certain people being attracted. We are practically demanding that all men should be attracted to us. One sign of agreeing to sexual interaction is to decrease the clothing worn, which has been a common sign for a long time. How can we hold sexual harassment and assault are important to fight if we send mixed signals in our dress or lack thereof?
Men are not women and women are not men. There are physical and mental differences between us. Accepting these differences and respecting them should be the goal of our interactions with each other, rather than trying to eradicate them. In this instance, just wearing appropriate clothing should not be difficult. If we really want to focus on the issues that a few women are visually attracted to men without shirts, maybe we can turn the tables and ask men to, like in the time of my grandfather, wear shirts in public too. Instead of seeing what sex is allowed to be the least modest, make it a race to the top, with respect shown for everyone rather than just demanding people allow anything and everything.
Of course, while I am encouraging modesty, I want you to note that I am not saying that we all have to wear burkas. There can be middle ground between having our sexual characteristics hanging out for all to see and showing nothing but our eyes. As children, we learned that no one should see or touch the area covered by our swimsuits in safety classes. Why not keep that as a basic rule for modesty, to wear enough clothing to cover those areas?
Ethics Alarms 
Modesty has long left the public forum. One merely has to go to an airport to see that or just walk the street in an urban environment. It is my opinion that the world would be a better place if there were more mirrors.
“It is my opinion that the world would be a better place if there were more mirrors.”
Oh, there’s enough mirrors, it’s just that some people have been raised to believe they’re truly special, their choices (however misguided) simply can’t be questioned or judged, and their $#!t doesn’t stink, fact-based Reality be damned.
PWS
Mirrors won’t help when the person looking in the mirror is deluded about their self image…
Great comment Sarah. It got me thinking back to how the left’s apparently view modesty and general decency when it comes to things related to the human body and sex.
The political left has shown me over and over again over my lifetime (65+) that they really don’t give a damn about decency. Why do I think this, because they’ve shown me that if they support decency it means they are agreeing with status quo conservatives and they cannot do that, but more importantly, enforcing cultural standards of general decency reduces their power to indoctrinate our youth to be anti-conservative. These people have shown me that they are anti status quo, aka anti socially traditional. These people literally fight to keep “sexually explicit” materials in K-12 school libraries, so why wouldn’t they fight to be able to walk around bare breasted.
Here is a perfect example, What Happened To Common Decency When It Comes To Exposing Minors To Sexually Explicit Materials?
Being modest in the way you dress would be considered to be socially traditional and thus a showing a more conservative value (favoring traditional ideas) and being “conservative” in any way, is considered evil to progressive anti status quo anarchists. So what do these people do, they go completely over the edge of reality and argue the complete opposite of modesty to be completely normal thus flushing decency down the porcelain throne.
The progressive anti status quo anarchists using the following argument is intentionally stepping on a very slippery anti-decency slope “…the State has not met its burden of proving that Plancarte’s exposure was lewd, because none of the evidence in the record suggests that her conduct was of a sexual nature”. That exact same anti traditional decency argument could easily be used to rationalize being completely nude anywhere in public, or being completely nude in front of a K-12 classroom. I can hear it now, “I wasn’t masterbating in front of them, I was just teaching mathematics, therefore it wasn’t conduct of a sexual nature”. Other deflection arguments to accept public nudity and ignoring decency could easily be “this is anti-constitutional suppression of my freedom of expression”, “I was just going to the grocery store, I did nothing wrong, I can’t control what abnormal sexual deviant people think”, “it’s not my problem if abnormal perverts automatically think about sex when they see a natural human body”, “if a person is shocked by seeing a natural human body then they’re a prude”, “if all a person can think of is sex when they see breasts, then that person needs psychological help”, etc, etc.
The extreme political left will do everything they can to undermine the status quo of our culture and society. Yes being “progressive” and challenging the status quo go hand-in-hand, these progressive fools think any change they propose is needed a evolution for society.
Steve,
Decency is a red-herring in all of this. In order to transform society, the fundamental unit of society, the family, has to be broken. One of the best ways to destroy the family is to insist on profligate sexuality. Encourage promiscuity. Make it easier to divorce. Provide contraceptives and abortion. Subsidize single moms. Sexualize children from an early age, so they will be sexually active early and often, major predictors of living broke lives below the poverty line and thus in need of government assistance.
I’m not sure that this can be attributed to just running against a conservative mentality, trying not to “be conservative”. Conservative mentalities naturally try to keep old structures in order, and if the structure is what is being assailed, then conservatives will defend it. So conservatives have to be attacked, discredited, etc. But the hypersexuality is specifically designed to shatter the nation so that it can be rebuilt into a secular progressive utopia.
Spot on, Ryan. This, I believe, holds true for the military, which is why transgender ideology and benefits in military service were promoted by the Left. Same with school and education in general.
jvb
You do not have to be socially conservative to object to (semi)nudity in public. Simply speaking as a man I prefer not to run into a situation where as women creep-shames me for throwing a glance at a women for one second too long. The problem is that women who underdress or dress provocatively do that to attract male attention, but only for men they deem attractive. If a man she deems unattractive, then you might be in big trouble.
Gym bro influencer Joey Swoll highlights this problem via many videos at YouTube and TikTok, calling out female influencers filming themselves at gyms in tights spandex clothes that leave nothing to the imagination, and then go on to publicly shame men at Tik Toke who happened to walk into view watching one second to long. The phenomenon of shaming men at gyms has led to declining gym membership of men, and in turn gyms turn to banning things as banning filming at gyms as an invasion of privacy.
A second realm that needs attention is the work place. Most jurisdictions have laws to protect us against sexual harassment at the work place. At TikTok and YouTube there is a harmful trend going on of videos advising women on how to be the office siren. There are many counter videos from people with HR jobs explaining that women who dress that way may get themselves terminated as they expose the company to sexual harassment complaints and litigation.
The Minnesota Supreme Court ethically daft decision has it completely wrong because it disregards the right of the public in general (including children) not to be confronted with unexpected nudity. If Minnesotans want to be nude in public, they should limit themselves to places where this is explicitly permitted such as an official nude resort or beach.
Sarah’s COTD was remarkably good, as we’ve come to expect from her. And the responses here have been outstanding as well.
Thank you all!!
Ryan Harkins wrote, “Decency is a red-herring in all of this.”
I really don’t think it is, at least not in the context of this particular story. Modesty and decency in our society go hand-in-hand when discussing a woman going topless in public. I think calling it a red-herring might play into the hands of progressive rationalizing arguments.
This is a good response to the comment of the day. I have seen allowing female breast display argued for from a libertarian perspective. Specifically equal protection under the law and government overreach. However given that this is a decision from the Minnesota supreme court, I believe you are correct this is judicial activism from the left side of the political spectrum. This level of judicial activism is alarming aside from the ridiculous consequences of this decision.
Writing for the majority, Justice Karl Procaccini, quoting Chase’s verdict, noted that the Olmsted County judge determined that Plancarte had not engaged “in any type of overt public sexual activity.”
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/05/01/womans-indecent-exposure-conviction-overturned-by-minnesota-supreme-court
So it’s OK for a man to walk out in public pantless with an exposed flaccid penis?
Here’s what this cucked soy looks like:
https://www.karlforjustice.com/
This COTD and follow up comments caused me to think about a tangent subject; politically exploiting feminine sexuality. I know this is based on some stereotypes but here it is.
Does progressive propaganda actively target women on an emotional level? I think it does.
Does progressive propaganda actively target men on an emotional level? I don’t think it does.
Could it be that progressives have actively chosen to sexualize just about everything and target women emotionally for political gain?
Sex is hard coded into human beings and if progressives think they can control people by controlling sex and what fires them up sexually, do you think they would intentionally exploit it?
Let’s face it, sex sells and that’s been blatantly true since at least the sexual revolution in the 1960’s & 1970’s, if not longer. For advertisers, using sex is about gaining sales. For progressives, using sex is about gaining political power. Could there be a devious progressive plot to turn most of the females between the age of 18-45 into raging progressive activists by targeting their core emotions that way they can use their sexuality to drag their sexual partners into the progressive fold? Think about it, there are loads of testosterone driven men out there that would likely follow their favorite vagina straight over the cliffs of reality and into the waiting arms of brainwashing progressives.
Again, I know this is based on some stereotypes but there it is. I’ve presented a theory, good or bad, and presented it here for open discussion or to completely ignore. Feel free to chop it to bits with contradictory information and opinions or agree in part or in full.
Steve,
I am underwater today with an accident prone kid, so I don’t have the leisure to expound upon your mostly correct hypothesis here.
You should read Carrie Gress’s “The End of Woman: How Smashing the Patriarchy has Destroyed Us.” I found it to be an interesting read.