If there’s any state in our great nation equipped to make judgments on taste, it’s definitely New Jersey. That’s why it’s super-appropriate that their courts have taken on the issue of female toplessness and its impact on the virginal Jersey Shore beachgoers.
In 2008, Jill Coccaro — an East Village artist also known as Phoenix Feeley with a history of standing up for the rights of boobs — was arrested while sunbathing topless at a New Jersey beach. She appealed the charges, claiming that men and women have equal rights to bare their nipples. But a New Jersey judge disagreed, claiming exposed breasts are a threat to "the public's moral sensibilities." I can't even bring myself to make a joke here about Jersey Shore and its constant assault on human decency.
Inequality surrounding toplessness is almost complete in the United States. With a few notable exceptions (New York being one), it's almost universally illegal for a woman to take her shirt off in situations where it's acceptable for a man to take his off. It's absurd how we treat women's breasts like some corrupting force, or like objects inextricably linked to sin, lust, and desire.