Boulder DA Wants to Make Streaking Illegal

Any sane person knows that it's sheer stupidity to force streakers to register as sex offenders. Under current Colorado law, anyone caught running nude in public could be forced to register as a sex offender, and Boulder County District Attorney Stan Garnett wants to make streaking and other "Pumpkin Run-type behavior" a petty offense instead of a class 1 misdemeanor.

Don't let this fool you - streaking is a harmless prank, a bit of devil-may-care fun, and should not be any type of crime.

Judd Golden, chairman of the American Civil Liberties Union's Boulder chapter, said his organization doesn't believe that public nudity -- by itself -- should be against the law at all.

"That is regressive," he said. "It's going back to the Victorian days when body parts were considered immoral."

If a person runs nude through a football game, Golden said, he or she should be charged with disrupting a public event. If a naked person walks into traffic, he or she should be charged with obstruction.

"But our position is that public nudity in and of itself -- absent aggravating circumstances -- should not be a criminal offense," he said.

Boulder Police Kill Naked Pumpkin Run

The threats of arrest for indecent exposure apparently worked because only three people were reported to have participated in Boulder's annual Naked Pumpkin Run, and they were not nude. Officers were reported to have descended on the area when they heard of the three runners.

Some used their costumes to poke fun at the police, including two people wearing jack-o-lanterns on their heads in reference to the Naked Pumpkin Run of recent years and SWAT vests over their shirts.

Michael May and Gerry Callejo carried naked, inflatable men with jack-o-lanterns on their heads and a sign reading "Free the Pumpkins" on their backs. Beckner, watching from nearby, cracked a wry smile.

"The absurdity of how the police reacted needs to be mocked," May said later.

The Daily Newds 1/28/09

• Kudos to Amy Winehouse for enjoying topfree equality, and looking healthy.
• NBC has nixed a PETA Super Bowl ad for containing a "level of sexuality" which exceeded their standards, but naturally you can see it on the Internet here.
• Caliente might have lost the Lingerie Bowl, but dancers in the 43 strip clubs around the Tampa area are looking forward to big bucks from the Super Bowl. Officials say that there will be no stepped-up enforcement of the six foot rule.
• Here's a rare article supporting Facebook's banning of breastfeeding photos.

  Think about what would become of our favorite social site if Facebook started making exceptions in their policies. We don’t need a domino effect of cases defending themselves against the nudity rule.

• The Yorba Linda chapter of the Red Hat Society have jumped on the nude calendar bandwagon.

  The Red Hot Tomatoes did it, 12 photo shoots, all very discreet, and (photographer) Gordon pretended to be blind. At the end of the day, everyone had forgotten all of their nerves and their shyness, and we had laughed away the ills of the world.

• The Florida Players, a student-run theatre company, is seeking an event permit to stage a production of "Hair" with the original nude scene.

  Although the scene has been considered controversial, (director Jennifer) Shorstein described it as a beautiful and powerful moment.“It is shocking not just for the sake of being shocking, but to show that the body can be beautiful in a not sexual way,” she said.

• In conservative Singapore, a couple went on a 15 minute nude stroll in a section of the city with many nightclubs. "They looked really comfortable walking down the street, which led to many curious stares," wrote blogger Leonard Tan. "Singapore is getting more and more exciting."
• An attorney declares that the Boulder Naked Pumpkin Run is perfectly legal and that participants should not be prosecuted.

  The police had no probable cause for arrest. Boulder, unlike Colorado Springs, has no ordinance against public nudity, except within 500 feet of Coot Lake. The district attorney's office should not have charged the runners with a sex offense, and should not have used the fear of a sex offense conviction to extract pleas to an irrelevant charge. The prosecutor wisely exonerated some runners that carefully questioned whether the police reports contained probable cause for arrest. Unfortunately, the prudish police may have won the war because Boulder citizens are worried about participating in next year's run.
  
  The Pumpkin Run is a great community tradition. Running naked with elaborately carved masks is a form of artistic expression. It is a tradition far safer than Spain's Running of the Bulls, and it is more fun than a typical parade. We should make sure that the tradition continues, and we should never allow the police and prosecutors to squelch a legal form of expression enjoyed by thousands of participants and spectators.

• Catherine D'Lish holds more than 30 titles in the striptease industry, including Miss Nude USA, Showgirl of the Year, and Miss Nude International.

  "There are many people that will stand on their soapbox and sanctimoniously proclaim that the neo-burlesque performers are superior to modern strippers headlining in strip clubs and more true to the burlesque performers of the past. I have been privy to the secrets of both worlds," D'Lish says, avoiding comparisons between the two.

• Whatever happened to sex in Scandinavia?

  During the late ’70s and ’80s, as both those feminists and many of the male activist/artists represented in the Oslo exhibition moved into positions of political and cultural power in what by then had become the mainstream culture, their disinterest in or even hostility to sexual liberalism came to be the new norm. And so we end up with a renewed reassertion of state investment in its citizens’ sexual behavior, and with the concomitant efforts to ban cable channels that broadcast pornography; laws that empower the internment, without a criminal trial, of people with HIV who have unprotected sex; and that criminalize consensual sexual activity between two adults if one of them receives remuneration.

• Gersh Kuntzman was seen nude by forty people last week.
• Finally, some common sense in the sexting phenomenon where kids exchange nude photos of themselves with cell phones. The Utah House voted to reduce the penalties for those younger than 18 to a misdemeanor. It shouldn't be a crime at all, but at least this is a step in the right direction.
• Members of the indie band Black Lips had to cancel their tour and flee India after guitarist Cole Alexander stripped naked and jumped into the crowd.
• Several British rugby players have posed nude for Powerade ads "to illustrate that what players put inside their bodies and how they prepare - their InnerGear - is just as important as their sports kit."
• The economic downturn has not affected the cosmetic surgery industry, with more people than ever in the UK seeking body modifications.
• Yet another nude calendar project will raise money for Epilepsy Action.

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

The Daily Newds 12/27/08

Catching up after a very busy holiday season...

• A Seattle columnist is "all for nudity", but...

  ...there's the morality issue. Is it in any way possible to justify nude bicycling on the basis of morality? The most adept philosopher would be hard pressed to make this argument. After all, is it morally acceptable for a physical specimen replete with rippling muscles and firm curves to flaunt his or her charms to the remainder of us who may be challenged in the same areas? I don't think so, nor do I think that those who thoughtlessly parade their physical perfection would think so if they gave it a little thought. Have a little consideration is all I ask. Leave the imperfect among us some pride at the end of the day.

• A New Zealand man has been sentenced to four months in jail for taking off his clothes on National Nude Day.
• Here's a video link to the annual UC-Berkeley student library streak.
• Here's a brief history of nude dancing and the First Amendment.
• One Australian man is trying to make a difference in getting Little Congwong declared an official free beach.

  "Naturists are a good, honest crowd," he said. "Nobody hides anything. I've never come across the bad behaviour or rudeness that you sometimes get on clothed beaches. We love nature and the freedom of just being yourself."

• NPR has a short audio link to a story about one of the Nude Pumpkin Runners who will have to do community service, six months probation and pay $27 in court costs for streaking in public. A blogger on the Denver Post website says that the runners are getting what they deserve.
• A writer is distressed over nudity in locker rooms.

  ...all the skinny people are back from their work-out and strutting their naked thin bodies around the changing room. That seems to be the latest thing. Take off all your clothes and, irrespective of who's behind you, bend down to put on the knickers and shove your bottom in somebody else's face, often mine.

• Here's a photo gallery of celebrities who have taken it all off for PETA.
• A nude portrait of a breast cancer survivor will go on display in The Louvre.
• The staff of Amazon.com reportedly resisted a call for them to drop trou for mass mooning photo.
• Amy Winehouse has been added to the list of celebrities who enjoy topfreedom.
• Naked Rambler Stephen Gough is going back to jail for another 12 months.
• Women are protesting Facebook's decision to ban images of breastfeeding.

  "What about a baby breast-feeding is obscene? Especially in comparison to MANY other pictures posted all over Facebook that really are obscene?'' the event organizers asked on their Web site, called "Hey Facebook, breast-feeding is not obscene!''

• More stories on the Facebook censorship can be found here, and here.
• Marisa Tomei talks about her role in The Wrestler where she plays a stripper.
• The staff at a UK store stripped off for a Christmas card to raise money for Alzheimer's research.
• Two Louisiana elementary school children were suspended from school for viewing a nude photo on a school computer. The Superintendent compared the incident to fights, guns, knives and drugs.
• The Chicago bar which gained notoriety with a nude painting of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is now planning a nude portrait of embattled Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich.
• Naturists are saying that there are fewer places to go bare in Orange County.

  "There are fewer places than there used to be," said longtime naturist leader and Huntington Beach resident Allen Baylis, an attorney who is leading the San Onofre State Beach fight. "Because of the prejudice and marginalization we've long suffered, we've kept losing ground."

• A children's charity has turned down the funds raised by doctors who posed for a nude calendar.
• Fifteen artists' models stripped down in front of the Paris cultural affairs bureau to protest a ban on tipping for their services.
• SCNA (Southern California Naturist Association) is rallying supporters for the right to be nude.

  Members have begun a sly campaign to raise awareness among local business owners of their numbers and purchasing power. Armed with fistfuls of $2 bills, naturists use the questions generated by the unusual currency as an opportunity to explain their mission and demonstrate that for a troubled economy, there is profit in numbers.
  
  “We’re trying to say if there were more people down at the beach they’d be buying more hamburgers,” Wilkinson says.
  
  So far, says Ricc Bieber, an activist who has worked to maintain nudist beaches since 1976, “practically everyone has been really positive. They understand the economic consequences.”

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

Tickets Issued at Boulder's Naked Pumpkin Run

Police issued tickets for indecent exposure at Boulder's 10th Annual Naked Pumpkin Run because the huge crowd threatened to "get out of hand". Hundreds of costumed revelers started chanting “Let them go!” and telling officers to “find real criminals.”

Sorry, but I fail to see how a police crackdown on nude runners is an effective means to quiet a rowdy crowd. In this case it apparently just riled them up even more, and could have resulted in someone being hurt, or worse. Better to set up a police presence and let the runners have their fun. After all, it's not really indecent exposure if nobody is offended, is it? All the tickets that were issued should be challenged.

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

The Daily Newds 10/30/08

• After Gok Wan's Miss Naked Beauty parade, one finalist felt "degraded, confused, and very, very tearful."
• A New Zealand naturist club's open house brought in zero new members. It is also reported that memberships are dropping at all naturist clubs across the country.
• "Naked Las Vegas" is a new book which shows people from all walks of life both with and without clothing. "The book is about comparing. Compare the homeless guy to the CEO," (photographer Gary) Friedler says of two people in the book. "See how they're alike and how they're different. Naked, they're equals. But you put the clothes on and they take on completely different roles. And people respond to that very differently."
• An advice columnist agrees with a 15 year-old boy that his sister's penchant for home nudity is "inappropriate", and that there is no room for discussion on the matter.
• Please stop referring to creepy people like this one as "naturists".
• Are you ready for Boulder's 9th annual Naked Pumpkin Run on Friday?
• A new book by photographer Naomi Harris explores the world of the swinger's lifestyle in America. The article is accompanied by 14 photos which resemble many nudist images but with sexual activity added to the mix. Is nudism simply too tame for people now in our pornography infested world?

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked