This resulted in a weekend of relaxation, of letting-go of social practices that serve no or little beneficial purpose to humans as such, like wearing bras or any clothing for that matter, and similar things. It's hard to mention all accounts of this phenomenon, but the festival was free from the norms of our modern world. One the one hand, it was run under an anything-goes mentality, but on the other hand, that 'anything' was restrained to acts of kindness and love and peace. Mean words and negative behavior were not acceptable, but that was an unspoken rule that everyone naturally abided by. The 'anythings' that were accepted could be anything from unconventional clothing, 'normal' clothing, no clothing, piercings, tattoos, dreads, died hair, no hair, dancing, sitting, laying down in the middle of the dance-floor, meditating, yoga, swimming, having children along, having pets along, an array of substances, or no substances at all, sleeping in tents, in hammocks, on tarps, in cars, not sleeping at all... Anything and everything was completely okay as long as it did not cause harm to anyone else or to nature. Quite frankly, these unspoken rules should be obvious to every human on this planet, and our modern social rights and wrongs should be put aside, though as they are a construction of a material society, I see why they are in their place today.
My point being, everything was alright and nobody would judge you for it. I decided that this was the perfect opportunity to do something that I have been struggling to find the courage to do, and that is, to go braless. I know, it sounds silly but to be completely truthful, I have grown up with the most fucked-up image of how women should present and feel about their bodies. Aside from struggling with my own body image since like the age of 4, I feel like there is a constant buzzing of judgement in my ear when it comes to what's appropriate and not. My whole life I've been abiding by different dress-codes that have been set up by various institutions, schools, workplaces, parents and so on and so forth, and as a quite busty and rounded individual I have been a multiple-time dress code offender and suffered from being the example of the broke rule, by wearing something as normal as a t-shirt. How? Well because breasts, in our society are objectified and over-sexualized and showing them is deemed a vulgar act of prostitution or whorishness or whatever you might call, it's been classified as inappropriate and even illegal (I've been called out by a beach ranger for tanning topless and was told I'd be fined if I didn't cover up. Asshole.)
In my school it was against the dress code to wear the following, spaghetti-strap-tops, mid-drift revealing shirts, shorts that were shorter than the length of your arms down to your fingertips, more than three earrings per ear, heels higher than 3", hair died in a "un-natural" color, clothing was ripped or had any holes in it, even if done in a stylish way, showing too much back, shirts that revealed any cleavage, though the rule was technically three fingers-width below the collarbone but I never got away with that, too big earrings, too much makeup, any other body or facial piercings, god forbid tattoos EVEN if above the age of 18, and the worst of all, the rule that makes me want to vomit on my school for instilling in me such a negative view and treatment of my own body. Are you ready for it? Hold on tight...:
"Bras must always be worn but never be seen."
Bras must always be worn: This applied to all flat-chested students who had nothing to hold up, as well as students that didn't want to wear bras for whatever reason. If you had a halter shirt you wanted to wear, wearing a bikini underneath would not suffice, no it must be a bra. Nipples were a clear offense, so if your bra was silk or lace or didn't dampen the effect of a protruding nipple, even if you were just freezing under a blasting air-conditioner and even your thickest padded bra didn't conceal them, well then you were out of dress-code and eligible for detention or whatever other punishment was on the menu. Bras must always be worn, but never be seen: This meant bra-straps were a sign of the devil and teachers went around harassing students for every little slip up. I had a shirt that was SO in dress code that I thought I was golden, until it slipped over one of my shoulders while I was bending over in a strange position for some class (art or some science experiment or whatever), revealing a strap, and then it became a serious problem. If your shirt was slightly see-through and your bra didn't magically camouflage into the color of your skin then you knew you better put on a jacket quickly, because if a teacher came around the corner and saw—oops, she caught you before you had a chance. Detention.
According to a french study, bras actually cause breasts to sag prematurely, and being a person with big boobs, I am infuriated that for so many years I actually didn't even have the choice—if I had wanted to at the time—to ditch my bra and go all-natural. No, even if I had read about this study when I was 15 and decided to let my jewels jiggle I wouldn't have been allowed to make that call. A decision that directly affects my own body. Furthermore, being told to cover up my whole life has been psychologically damaging and devastating to my self image. This has caused me to run into a store to buy a bra when I realized I forgot one in my change of clothing when going to the gym. That is totally insane. Who has such a fucked up view of exposing their nipples THROUGH A SHIRT for 20 minutes to go home, that they go and buy a new bra? This negative view on my own breasts has come to my attention over the past two years. I've started to realize that it's such bullshit and I'm not going to play along anymore.
Sometimes bras offer support and when I feel like I need or want that, I'll wear them, but I've begun to figuratively burn my bras and do as I please. And lately I've actually been forgetting that bras were ever an essential, can't-leave-the-house-without-them part of my wardrobe. I refuse to be told that MY nipples are an offense when men's nipples are totally acceptable. There was quite a hilarious internet revolution that went around, suggesting to censor out female nipples in photographs with male nipples. Brilliant!
The first time I decided to ditch my bra while wearing a thin, single-layered black tank top I didn't have far to go. I went on a 15 minute walk to the grocery store, with the intention of buying some vegetables and eggs and I was sweating the whole way there with nervousness, feeling like I was outing myself as the town slut. I rejected all gazes, felt terribly exposed and judged and considered turning around and going home to change my clothes the whole way there, but I never turned back and walked straight into the heart of our neighborhood, where there are LOTS of people, LOTS of men, and did my groceries with dignity. I still felt like a dirty whore and wore a defensive attitude on my shoulders, ready to spit at anyone who dared make a comment. I finished my groceries and walked all the way back home and nearly died of relief when I got into our building. Relief from all the stares, and relief that I actually did it. I walked all the way to Tensta Centrum and back without a bra. Let me be clear. I wear a 34DDD. That's no joking matter. I have big boobs and they wiggle and jiggle around when I so much as giggle and there's nothing I can do about it. Even at the peak of my anorexia I was still a C-cup. There's no way around it. My boobs won't ever be small or perky or petite but I am so over being told that my breasts need to be locked up in a tower of back pain and misery and that's FINAL. I am DONE being ashamed of going to the beach and trying to cover up to reduce likelihood that I will be regarded as a slut. I'm no longer going to buy clothes that hide my cleavage and let people tell me to hide it all in there because it's both uncomfortable and psychologically unhealthy. It's over. There's no more shame in this. My boobs are mine and no fucking laws or school rules will make me look down on my own body with shame and disdain and tell me where to put them. It's my body and I only have it for 60 more years so I'm going to do as I like with it, thank you very much.
During this festival some friends and I went down to the lake to take a dip, naked of course, because that's so normal here in Sweden that it's a non-issue. But after the dip we just laid down on a wooden boat and hung out naked for hours. And more naked friends came. And then some more. And eventually we all got chilly and put our clothes back on, but from that moment on I promised myself that being naked or being free or being that human body which we all have been given is the best feeling in the world, and understood, truly, how ridiculous all these dress codes and societal rules are. I wish we could all always be naked or something similar. If it takes moving out to a hippie-commune, maybe that's what I'll have to do, but I'm convinced that we can change this norm in our society without such drastic measures.
After 5 days out at this festival I've completely changed my attitude and have been all around town, at restaurants, cafés, running to catch the train, to the doctor, to the dentist, shopping, you name it and I've done it braless. Today I threw on a dress, considered a bra for a second and then laughed at myself for even having the thought. Out the door and straight to the immigration office and then the tax office without a second thought of the happenings of my chest. I got hit on a few times and didn't think much of it at first, until my sister pointed out that I wasn't wearing a bra. That made me kind of mad. Kind of furious, as a matter of fact. Because that's exactly the point I'm trying to make. Breasts have been over-sexualized to a point where when they are shown, it's clearly an act of sexual enticement or arousal. In other words, I'm a slutty bitch who wants some action, or a bitch who wants attention, if I go braless. I had to disappoint two guys today that I'm in a loving relationship and well sorry, not gonna work. I'm not seeking any attention or action, just personal freedom. There's still work that needs to be done, clearly. We as a society need to move away from this obsession with female breasts as being a vulgar body part and stop this hysterical behavior of insisting that women cover up. Breasts are for feeding babies, and sure, they are erogenous to some degree, but any body part can lead to arousal. Nibble an ear and get hard, but we sure aren't requiring people to wear ear-covers are we? No. Thank you. Point made.
Me and my boobs aren't playing by any stupid rules anymore and I encourage schools, parents and other adults to stop this breast-shame-cover-up-game. I hope that idiotic and harmful rules like "bras must always be worn but never be seen" vanish from the dress-codes of schools and that our hypercritical view on breasts changes collectively to something sound and healthy. Women shouldn't have to feel like they have anything to hide. And I don't see why our culture spends so much time stressing and worrying about something as small as a nipple. Seriously, don't we have bigger things to worry about...like droughts, climate change?
Well, me and my boobs are gonna go make dinner now. Thanks for reading. Ta Ta for now :P Hehe..
Yay, hang loose baby!
ReplyDeleteI never felt compelled to enforce school dress code and always deferred to other teachers. The only dress attire I do insist on though is for safety in my shop.
Pssst, I was a bit of a nudist for years in the states. (Not sure I'd be doing anyone any favors going around in my all-together these days though.)