“We’re here for equal topless rights,” said Marcella Wiegand.

“I just want it to be equal,” Graycie Usher said.

“I believe that men and women should have equal rights as far as their bodies go,” Sue B. said.

These three women, among others, were part of a protest Aug. 28 in Bremerton. The women said they were fighting for their right to exercise their freedom as adult humans to go topless.

Part of the GoTopless national campaign, Wiegand and her husband Carl organized Bremerton’s protest in an effort to make bare female breasts normalized, not sexualized.

“Women should be able to be topless anywhere a man should be able to,” Wiegand said. “Per the 14th Amendment, you cannot have gender discrimination. So any crime that you arrest a woman for, you would have to arrest a man for doing the same thing.”

On the issue of legality though?

Revised Code of Washington 9A.88.010 says, “A person is guilty of indecent exposure if he or she intentionally makes any open and obscene exposure of his or her person or the person of another knowing that such conduct is likely to cause reasonable affront or alarm. The act of breastfeeding or expressing breast milk is not indecent exposure.”

On that, Carl Wiegand said, “I believe the law written is misleading. It makes women believe that they don’t have the right to go topless when in actuality, they do. I’ve had that told to me by the Bremerton City Prosecutor’s Office, Washington State Patrol and the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Office. All said there’s nothing illegal about it.”

Kira McKelvey said she joined the protest because, “Ever since I was a child, I’ve been told I can’t go outside without a shirt on, and I never understood that. (Breasts are) sacks of fat on our chest. I don’t know why we can’t show ours if men can show theirs.”

Usher joined the protest for similar reasons after seeing a notice on Facebook.

“I think it’s completely asinine that we get in trouble for things that men don’t, and for God’s sake, it’s just skin,” Usher said. “The whole censorship of our bodies is entirely formed by a patriarchal society, and it needs to stop. We’re just people. It’s just skin. I don’t see any reason why we need to hide it.”

Ready-made signs were available for newly arriving protesters. Photo by Michelle Beahm

Amber Nguyen, who was at the protest with her husband Tuan and one of their three children, emphasized that breasts are designed to provide sustenance to babies.

“Back when I was a little girl, this, breasts, that was your personal spot, you don’t show anything. My family was even against breast feeding,” said Nguyen, who breast-fed all three of her children. “I might not be showing mine, and I’m a very modest person because of that upbringing, but I feel like, we should all be equal. Even my kids believe that. They’re like, ‘Mom, why can’t you go out topless? Why do we get to?’ … I can’t. I will get in … a lot of trouble. And they’re like, ‘That doesn’t seem right.’ And I feel the same way.”

When asked how she feels about female toplessness around children, she said, “I have kids. They’re breasts. My kids, they see them as, like, milk. They see them as food, as nutrients.

“We as a society are the ones that are making them sexualized. Other countries, they can go breastfeed their kids … anywhere, and nobody’s like, ‘Oh my God, she’s showing her breast.’ That’s normal. But us as a society have made it the dirty no-no. And that’s our fault.

“You should just educate your children and say, ‘That’s what they were there for.’ Yes, sometimes they can be used as a sexual thing, but that’s not what they were made for.”

As Carl Wiegand said, breasts “are no more a sexual organ than a set of lips.”

But despite the efforts to normalize, not sexualize, two counter protesters stood across the street Aug. 28 to express their point of view.

Wishing to remain anonymous, the protesters (we’ll call them Alice and Carl) argued there was no reason for women to be topless in public — or anyone, for that matter.

“I don’t think men should have their shirts off, either,” Alice said, asserting that asking about the difference was “kind of an unfair question.”

“They should put their shirts back on,” Carl said. “We’re a rich nation. Everybody can afford clothes in this country. If they can’t, I’ll buy them a shirt. I’ll put a shirt on their backs myself. It just seems inappropriate that we have to walk around without shirts on. It seems unkempt.”

Alice, a woman, said, “We have topless beaches all over the place. We do have equal rights. I don’t see why we need to show our breasts in a public place.

“We’re not afraid of the female form,” she continued. “We think it’s beautiful. But you don’t need to expose it to everyone, especially not to the elements.”

Both the counter-protesters and protesters said they were receiving a lot of support from motorists passing by, getting waves, honks and calls. Since the protest was at the intersection of Riddell Road and Wheaton Way in East Bremerton, the stop light even enabled short bits of dialogue between passersby and protesters on both sides of the issue.

“I think our message is pretty clear,” Carl said. “Most people want modesty in our country. People want America to be like it was in the past.”

Sue B. said, “What I’ve been seeing of cars driving by — on this side of the street, anyway — has been pretty much positive.”

Usher, who shared the information about the protest on Facebook prior to the event, said a Facebook group about empowering women “thought it was pretty cool,” and she had a few friends who were planning on attending the protest later.

“It’s kind of mixed depending on who you talk to,” Usher added. “I definitely have family members who don’t like that I’m here, but I’m not going to let that stop me.”