An Introduction to the Church of the Free Boobs

Cerise expands on a previous post:

The Church of the Free Boobs

This new, universal Church is hereby established to further the acceptance and appreciation of unbound, braless breasts, in all their shapes, sizes, and forms.  The need for such a denomination is abundantly clear.  Not only are braless breasts maligned in the media, but braless women are attacked verbally and physically without cause or provocation.  Natural breasts are unappreciated, mocked, and abused.  This Church will offer a refuge and support for those who suffer from this abuse, and will espouse the cause of self-acceptance to all the world. 

Sacraments of the Church

1.     The sacrament with which neophytes should first acquaint themselves is the Revelation.  This is the actual removal of a bra from previously oppressed breasts.  For many postulants, this sacrament will be needed daily, as the wearing of bras is all too common in this tarnished world.  The Revelation may be performed alone or with the assistance of another member of the Church.  Sighing and singing generally follow the Revelation, but are not actually required. 

2.     It is a widespread misconception that the Burning of Bras is the principal rite of the Church.  This is not true.  Burning was never common, but its theatrical nature attracted much notice, unfortunately eclipsing many of the other activities of the Church.  Today this ritual is primarily observed for its historical significance, in honor or our courageous foremothers.  The Burning of Bras should only be performed carefully, with due regard for safety and environmental correctness, and on rare occasions.  Burning is not forbidden, but is not encouraged.  Many bras can be recycled, either to perform their original function or to serve other purposes (slingshots, kitten hammocks, skullcaps, etc.)  Paper effigies of bras may be burnt to prevent waste and avoid expense. 

3.     One of the highest sacraments of this Church is celebrated in dance.  Dance has long been associated with the sacred feminine and with the expression of ecstatic emotion.  As such, it is particularly suited to the rituals of our Church.  The particular sacrament performed during the liturgical dance is sometimes called the Shoulder Shimmy.  Although the sacrament appears to be centered on the breasts, the dancer will soon learn that the movement begins with the shoulders and is then divinely manifested in the breasts.  It is not necessary for this sacrament to be performed in the nude, although bralessness is encouraged. 

4.     Another sacrament dear to the maternal, nurturing heart of this Church is often maligned and attacked by the less enlightened.  This sacrament is the nursing of a child.  For obvious reasons, some members of the Church may never have the opportunity to perform this sacrament, but they can support and assist in the ritual by such actions as fetching drinks and pillows for the celebrant.  This sacrament may be performed in any and all places where there is a nursing mother and child present, and is protected by law.  Do not allow anyone to intimidate you or others in the celebration of this sacrament!  It is to be embraced and respected, not hidden.    

5.     A less well-known, but no less sacred, ritual is generally performed in private rather than public.  This is the rite of Self-Acceptance.  It varies with the needs of the individual celebrant, but it may include going naked, looking in the mirror, and positive self-talk.  Wearing perfume, jewelry and body paint may enhance the experience.  The neophyte is encouraged to embrace this ritual as the first step toward enlightened freedom. 

Clarifications

Breasts are defined as the area on the frontal side of the ribs.  There is no limitation on gender, sex, or size.  All breasts are welcome in this church, male or female, and all are equally beautiful.  No breasts are privileged above any others. 

The wearing of bras is not forbidden by the Church.  However, the requirement that bras be worn is anathema to the Church and violates the very principles upon which it is founded.  If breasts of all shapes and sizes are accepted as equal, then perky, firm, or motionless breasts are in no way to be favored over saggy, jiggly, or braless breasts.  It is a firm belief of this church that what you wear under your clothes is a personal decision and must remain your choice.  That choice is far more important than any shred of lace or scrap of elastic. 

It is important to remember that many members of the human race are not as enlightened as the members of our Faith.  Their ignorance should be met with patient forbearance.  For instance, if an ill-informed woman maligns the state of her own breasts, she might benefit from a patient statement of the core beliefs of this Church, but she should not be attacked just because she is not as far along the path to Enlightenment as some others might be.  Of course, those who attempt to interfere with the lawful and proper practice of any religious beliefs, including those of this Church, should be either ignored, scolded, or sued, as appropriate.  The Church does not encourage physical violence.  Two wrongs do not make a right, and winning a large settlement is so much more satisfying, anyway. 

Do bras prevent sagging? And who cares?

Cerise writes:  Continuing my theme from last week:  you should be free to go without a bra, even if you have very large breasts.  (Like my 46DD’s.)

Oh, God, aren’t you uncomfortable you might ask?  Only when I feel obligated to wear a bra.  My breasts are happy breathing, jiggling, and just hanging out, thankyouverymuch.  It doesn’t hurt when they bounce, I promise.  When I have to wear a bra, they are not happy, and neither am I.

            Oh, I have tried all sorts of bras, fitted by professionals at all different sorts of stores.  I have spent over $100 on a bra.  I have tried altering bras to make them fit better.  Even if they fit perfectly, I still find them terribly uncomfortable.  Maybe because I have something called fibromyalgia, which causes me pain in my sternum, ribs, and shoulders.  Yeah, pretty much all the places that a bra presses on my body.  I used to attend a fibromyalgia support group and every single woman there said “Oh, my God, wearing a bra is so painful!”  (Uh, why do we do it, then?)  But even if I didn’t have this condition, I don’t think I should feel obligated to wear a bra. 

What if my breasts get droopy?  This is the question my mom asks, and it makes her crazy that I go out of the house without a bra.  So what?  She claims I will soon be able to tuck my tits into my belt, and then I won’t have to worry about a bra.  Well, then, our disagreement will be resolved, won’t it?  Actually, I am not terribly concerned about the threat of sagginess.  If they sag so much that it bothers me, I will then decide if I am willing to hoist them up with a painful bra.  Or I will just live with it. 

In fact, dear reader, bra salespeople may be scamming you.  Bras may not, in fact, keep your breasts from drooping.  They may even make it worse.  Gasp!  No, really.  To summarize the study, there seems to be more sagging in the bra-ed breasts than in the braless ones.  The theory put forward to explain the lack of sagginess in braless women is that their muscles adapt to supporting their breasts and the muscles of bra-ed women atrophy from lack of use.  If this sounds crazy, talk to someone who was a nurse in the 1950’s.  (Like my Grandmother.)  Women back then wore serious girdles all the time.  Some even slept in them.  When they went into the hospital for surgery or childbirth, they often had terrible back pain because, for the first time in years, they weren’t wearing their girdles.  Their back muscles had atrophied from lack of practice at supporting their own torsos!  It seems possible to me that the same thing could happen to chest muscles.  Use it or lose it, baby!  Okay, I admit this study only included French women and only went up to age 35.  Maybe my bralessness will come back to bite me when I am 80.  (But will I care?)

Believe it or not, not all cultures expect middle-aged women to have tits like a Barbie doll.  Why should we want to have teenager breasts when we are well beyond being a teenager?  Isn’t there something a bit odd about an 80 year old woman whose breasts are the same shape on top as on bottom, with no hint of drooping whatsoever?  I suppose that having perkier boobs makes you look younger.  But at some point, wouldn’t it just make you look ridiculous?  Sort of like a 75 year old woman in a neon mini-dress?  Who says that a mature woman with children should want to look like a skinny fifteen year old, instead of like the beautiful, experienced woman she is? 

Not all cultures admire perky, youthful breasts.  Some prefer a certain softness, even sagginess, because it shows maturity and implies a level of sexual experience that is seen as very, very sexy.  Surely you have seen the pictures of bare-breasted women in National Geographic?  There they are, braless and topless, totally unconcerned.  The men are not turning into ravening beasts, raping and humping like mad, by the sight of the breasts.  Nor do they seem disturbed or disgusted by the older or sagging breasts.  And the women are not embarrassed by their breasts, whether they are perky or saggy.  The breasts are just there.  Sort of like noses.  Just sticking out.  And it is no big deal. 

If anything, hiking your breasts up with a bra makes them stick out more.  It draws attention to them, makes them more obvious.  If that’s what you want, go for it.  But don’t try to tell me that a bra is more modest than no bra.  Bra wearing is a cultural construct that bra sellers have somehow made mainstream.  It is not a universal perception that bras hide your breasts and make them less conspicuous.  In her lovely cookbook/memoire, Bitter Almonds, Maria Grammatico recounts that the convent school girls were not allowed to wear bras because the nuns thought it was shameless to make your breasts stick out unnaturally, as a bra would certainly do.  I observed a similar attitude toward bras being unnatural and flashy when I was growing up in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, where the Native American population is around 30%.  My point is that bras are not inherently more modest than bralessness, it is merely our culture (with the help of underwear advertisements) that has decided it is so. 

           

            Oh, dear.  I had planned to discuss breast feeding in public today.  But it seems I have ranted on long enough.  Okay, breast feeding will have to wait for another day.  If you have any stories or comments on public nursing, feel free to leave them here and I will look a them before I write my next post. 

Other sources claiming that bras do not prevent sagging breasts:

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/sports-bras

Three studies, summarized in English, with citations: http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=15913.0

Free the Boobs!

Cerise writes:  

            It has been over ninety degrees this week, so I feel this post is especially timely.  I won’t mince words:  I hate bras.  Now, I don’t have a problem if you want to wear them, collect them, or decorate them.  I just don’t want to wear one.  And some people have a big problem with that.  Especially since I am a 46 DD.  But, you see, I feel very strongly that I should be free to go braless, regardless of my size and shape. 

            Why would anyone else care whether or not I wear a bra?  I think I missed the day in school where they explained why women’s bodies should be subject to the control of others.  Because I totally don’t see why that should be the case.  Now, I admit, going braless is not as big a deal as, for example, being able to choose birth control, but I do think it is symptomatic of some rather awful things going on in our society. 

            One of these awful things is called “slut shaming.”  This is the pressure put on women to tamp down their sexuality, shut their mouths, and generally conform to the patriarchy.  If you embrace your sexuality, speak your mind, or rebel against traditional gender roles, you must be a slut.  And, apparently, being a slut is bad.  It means you deserve to be raped, beaten, or even murdered.  That you asked for it.  This slut shaming says “Well, of course she was raped.  She was alone.  In a bad neighborhood.  And she was dressed sexy.”  WTF?!?  I think a woman should be able to saunter down a dark alley at 2 am stark naked and the only thing anyone should say to her is, possibly, “Are you cold?  Would you like to borrow my jacket?”  Slut shaming not only denies women the right to flaunt their sexuality, it also robs them of their voice.  It says that if you are a slut, you don’t deserve to be heard. 

            So, does skipping the bra make you a slut?  Silly me, I think that how you dress has nothing to do with your sexual behavior.  I think they are two totally different things.  I think that they are both NO ONE ELSE’S BUSINESS.  And, really, even if going without a bra did make you a slut, who cares?  If you want to be sexually promiscuous with other consenting adults, that’s none of my business.  If you think that running around with my boobs free makes me a slut, I really don’t care.  That is a matter for me and my sexual partners. 

Oh, you think that my braless state implies that I am sexually available to you?  Um, no.  If you are the type of person who would think less of me because of my underwear choices, then I really don’t think I would ever be interested in engaging in any type of sexual activity with you.  No, not even if you look like George Clooney or Olivia Wilde.  You are definitely not my type, sweetheart. 

Equal Opportunity Gratuitousness, Olivia Wilde

Gratuitous George Clooney Picture

Perhaps you think my husband should tell me to cover myself?  Or that he might be embarrassed by my boob bouncing ways?  Allow me to digress with a little story.  A friend of mine wears hijab, the head scarf worn by some Muslim women.  She has worn it for years and has an assortment of cute, fashionable scarves to match various outfits.  Her husband gently suggested that, at least while they lived in the US for grad school, she might consider skipping the head scarf.  She was nonplused and asked him why.  He said that people might think he was oppressing her and that her choice to cover her head might make him look bad.  She snorted at him and gave him her unconditional answer:  “My head, my business.”  Being a smart man, he never brought up the matter again.  And, yes, my husband is also a smart man and he would never try to tell me how to dress.

Won’t men be distracted, though?  Even uncomfortably aroused, if they have to see my braless breasts?  How will they take me seriously at work, or even pay any attention to anything I have to say, if my breasts are just hanging out there, flaunting themselves?  Well, I do wear a shirt, for crying out loud.  It’s not as if the actual bare flesh is showing.  Also, breasts do not exist for the visual consumption and enjoyment of men.  Last time I checked, they were baby feeding devices.  The sexualization of the breast is just something our culture teaches.  If thinking of breasts as sexy is something you can learn, then you can just bloody well unlearn it. Or at least learn to contain your wildly rampaging sexual thoughts in the presence of my braless mammary glands. 

But they are so distracting, those oversized sweat glands.  Yeah, so is parsley stuck between someone’s teeth.  Or blue hair.  Or really cute skull-shaped rhinestone earrings.  But you know what?  Get over it.  They’re just tits.  Half of the world’s population has them. They’re everywhere!  Can’t you learn to think about something else?  Like, just maybe, what I am saying to you?  If you can’t, it really is your problem and not mine.   If you cannot control your body (and your brain), you have a serious problem.  Do you pounce on every bacon cheeseburger that goes by, even if it belongs to someone else?  Do you get out of your car and punch the driver who cut you off in traffic?  Do you scream at the radio when you disagree with the political commentary?  (Oh, wait, I do that sometimes.  Bad example.)  No, you control yourself.  You rein in your id and suck it up.  Because you are an adult human being. 

If it is my job to hide everything that might cause some man, somewhere, to think about sex, I am going to need to buy a tent.  Should I cover my ankles because some men have a thing for that body part?  Or maybe I should wear a veil to hide my lips, which are a much more erotic body part than breasts?  Or cover my hands?  Really?  Because that argument leads to a slippery slope that ends in wearing a burka.  And, even then, some man somewhere will find something to be aroused by.  There is a long tradition of poetry in the Arab world that glorifies things like a woman’s graceful walk, her delicate footprints, the whiff of her perfume—all things that are exposed by even the most concealing clothing.  Oh, perhaps I should just stay indoors, where no man might see me or even smell me, so I don’t risk arousing a man.  Otherwise, I am just asking to be raped.  Wait, where is the SarcMark on this keyboard? 

Disclaimer:  I don’t really think that all men have a problem with braless, outspoken women.  I hold up the generic “men” because they are cited by those who think I should wear a bra.  What will “men” think of you?  How will “men” handle it?   These imaginary ravening beasts fortunately do not represent most males of my acquaintance.  Thank heavens. 

Next time it is my turn to post, I plan to address droopy boobs and public breast feeding.  No, all my posts will not be about tits, I promise.