Topless women advocates stroll downtown Asheville:
Topless women advocates stroll downtown Asheville: A bill in the NC General Assembly would have made it illegal for women to expose nipples in public. It appears to be dead, but topless activist Jeff Johnson is still concerned. Krystal Nickoles and Lacy Bone stroll with him downtown.
Written by
John Boyle
It’s nipple season again in Asheville.
With all the nutty, power-grabbing bills the General Assembly foisted on the state this year, it’s mildly amazing it did not have the stomach to pass the nipple exposure bill.
State Rep. Tim Moffitt, R-Buncombe, entered the bill early in the session. It would have modified the existing indecent exposure law to include a woman’s nipple.
If passed, it could have put an end to the annual GoTopless rally that has become a boisterous, bawdy downtown event the past two summers. But a provision in the bill that could have made female nipple exposure a felony apparently scared legislators off, and they let the measure die in committee.
At least that’s where it resided Friday, missing the key date for “crossover” to the Senate.
That didn’t stop toplessness advocate and Huntsville, Ala., resident Jeff Johnson from bringing a pair of young ladies to downtown Asheville on Thursday to “assert their rights” to go topless. That’s right: It’s already legal and will remain legal to go topless, but Johnson wanted to re-emphasize the point, in case the bill “came off the shelf” and miraculously became law.
I’m starting to suspect the dude just really likes women’s breasts.
Doing my journalistic duty, I shadowed Johnson and the two ladies for bit Thursday. I’ve got to admit, the reactions Krystal Nikoles, 27, and Lacy Bone, 25, got were overwhelmingly positive and good-natured.
“Are you paying them?” Edna Zuraw asked me with a laugh. “I think they lost their clothes.”
I asked her if she was offended by the half-naked ladies.
“No, it’s just amazing they think they have something to show that no one has seen,” she said, noting that she was much more offended by the drunk guy in Pritchard Park she claimed was openly selling pot.
“Is it any good?” a man standing nearby immediately asked.
Ah, you’ve got to love Asheville.
Charlotte resident Ben Happach, in town for a concert, eyeballed the women near Tupelo Honey and basically shrugged.
“There’s so many more things to be offended by,” he said. “Is that offensive? No. It actually makes me mad when people get offended that women breastfeed in public.”
