Changing Hate Laws

Last night I attended the City Council meeting in Tumwater, Washington, which is the city (small town, rather) where I live. My purpose was to speak to them and let them know that as a nudist and representative of Legalize Body Freedom I was not pleased with the wording in the Lewd Act law in the municipal codes governing their city, which means also governing me. I won't go into everything I said, because I'm going to publish the entirety of my speech here for everyone to read. What I am going to do is state that as I read my speech the City Council members were not pleased with what I was saying. I won't speculate as to why they didn't seem to be pleased with my words. I'll allow you to draw your own conclusions once you've read my speech. I will say that the mayor interrupted me before I could finish, obviously not wanting to hear the rest of what I had to say. After all, the truth hurts, and he didn't seem to be the type who wanted to hear about people who want the liberty to "run around naked" within the limits of his city and want him to give them approval to do so. Anyway, what follows is my speech:

My name is Jacob Drake.

I am a resident of Tumwater and have been for many years, and I represent an organization called Legalize Body Freedom.

I have come to you tonight to discuss an issue with portions of the Tumwater city code, specifically:

Chapter 9.06
OFFENSES AGAINST PUBLIC MORALS

9.06.020 Lewd act.

Every person who intentionally performs any lewd act in a public place or at a place and under circumstances where such act could be observed by any member of the public when such act does or is likely to cause reasonable affront and alarm is guilty of a misdemeanor.

9.06.010 Definitions.

For the purpose of this chapter:

A.    “Lewd act” means public:

1.    Exposure of any portion of the human anus or genitals,

2.    Exposure of the female breast lower than the upper edge of the areola; or

3.    Touching, the male or female genitals or female breast, whether clothed or naked;

9.06.030 Limitations.

B.    Whether or not the conduct is obscene shall be judged by consideration of the following factors:

Whether the average person, applying the contemporary community standards, would find:

1.    That the activity appeals to a prurient interest in sex; and

2.    The conduct depicts or describes in a patently offensive way conduct as defined in TMC 9.06.010(A); and

3.    The conduct taken as a whole lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.

We have no quarrel with the rest of the codes in these sections, only those portions I quoted, for they make illegal simple nudity and the simple touching of the human body in an innocent manner, something we all do every day. Every man in here, were he to reach down and adjust himself, even clothed, while in public, could be arrested and charged with a misdemeanor, but the point is that we are seeking to legalize public nudity and these laws stand in the way. We would have to admit that in most cities the “community standards” might be against public nudity, although much has changed over the years in most American communities, so that could be questioned. That word “prurient,” however, poses a problem for the lawmakers, because it means:

1 Uneasy with desire; itching; especially, having a lascivious anxiety or propensity; lustful.

2  Arousing or appealing to sexual desire.

3  Curious, especially inappropriately so.

If you were to see me nude out on the street I can guarantee you would not have any desire toward me and certainly not one that was “itching,” or filled you with a “lascivious anxiety or propensity.” And you most certainly would not find within you any lust toward me. Trust me on this. Likewise you would not be aroused by any part of me and not find me appealing. No matter whether you are a woman attracted to men or a man attracted to men, you would not have any sexual desire toward me.

But this isn’t about me or how society might perceive me, it’s about many more people than just me, it’s about millions more people than just me.

I am part of a worldwide movement seeking to right a wrong that has perpetrated itself for far too long. We are those who recognize that the offensive bigotry in anti-body hate speech and law needs to be challenged wherever it is found. Declaring that any human being is inherently "obscene," “lewd,” or "indecent," or similar hate words by a legislative body is very offensive anti-human hate speech. No human of any kind has ever been harmed by seeing another member of his or her own species nude. There are millions of nudists and naturists in America alone and a great percentage of us are no longer content to keep our nudity locked away in our homes, our clubs and resorts, or our beaches. We are forced by the aforementioned hate speech laws to cover ourselves whenever we leave our homes to go shopping, go to restaurants, go to the movies, get gas in our cars, do any of the typical daily tasks that every other American does throughout their lives, which forces us to violate the very core of our beings, that which fills us and gives us our greatest meaning, because we have no other choice. The unfounded bigotry of one part of this nation is forcing itself upon another the same as it did before the Civil Rights Act gave equality to all Americans of African descent and it needs to stop.

You might ask why it is we have only now decided to come out into the open and make our statement, declare that we demand to be free and equal alongside everyone else when nudism has existed within America for some time and certainly people have been born nude for as long as they have existed. There is a season for everything. The 60s were the season for Equality for black people. The 90s were the season for Equality for homosexuals. Now is the time for Equality for Nudists. We have polled our members and decided that we have had enough. It is time to stop the hate! It is time to change these laws! It is time to FREE our bodies and allow US the same rights as all other Americans, to move about in public freely being ourselves without fear of censure, condemnation, and certainly without fear of being arrested.

A question was asked of our membership, “Where is the one place you would love to go naked?” Of course many replied they wanted the freedom to go anywhere and everywhere, but we received a diversity of responses. I would like to read you a few of them, just to show you how intimate they are and how real the desires of these people are to be free of the constraints of clothing and the laws that keep them locked up in ways others can never understand:

My yard

The beach

I would like to just be able to walk the streets of our neighborhood naked any time I wanted.

At a huge water park with lots of amazing slides.

Outside my own home (We got this one a lot)

I would love to be nude everywhere I want to be without being judged or arrested.

And my personal favorite: I want to stand before Congress and address the nation.

Where would I like to be naked if I could? I would like to take my garbage out. Check my mail. Mow my lawn. Walk my neighborhood. Lie in my yard in the sunshine. Work in my garden, all without fear that someone will call the cops and have me arrested, and why? Just because I am someone who was born understanding that the skin we were born in is the best and only presentation of ourselves we will ever need and that covering it stifles me and makes me not merely uncomfortable, but chokes me to the point that I want to claw my eyes out. This is not some mental illness; it’s simply a perfect understanding of who we were meant to be, who we were born as, an inherent refusal to give in to society’s perversion that demands we succumb to peer pressure and cover what is natural, simply because, “everyone else does it”. It is accepting oneself as one is without the need to dress up and pretend to be someone else.

Human beings are non-toxic, non-harmful, GMO free, and 100% natural. We are all beautiful creatures, the most beautiful species on earth. We simply want to live as we are within our communities, where all the members, all the neighbors, come together and work together in peace, welcoming each other as they are, not as who they might want them to be.

The fundamental justification for any law or regulation that takes away or limits freedom has to be based on some compelling harm to other people. Many appeals courts have said that laws cannot stand without a compelling public interest to justify taking away the freedom from other people. Since no harm is caused to anyone, ever, from seeing another human being nude, there is no valid basis for such laws. I urge you to change these laws freely in order to see justice done. If you do not, then I and those with me will be forced to take our case to the courts. We have already contacted the ACLU, who said that what I am doing tonight is the first step in the correct process. It need go no further than this if you do the right thing and simply change the laws in Tumwater as I have suggested.

Thank you.

Legalize Body Freedom Movement

LegalizeBodyFreedom@comcast.net

Oh, and here is how the State of Oregon words their public indecency law:

A person commits the crime of public indecency if while in, or in view of, a public place the person performs:

(a)  An act of sexual intercourse;

(b)  An act of deviate sexual intercourse; or

(c)  An act of exposing the genitals of the person with the intent of arousing the sexual desire of the person or another person.

That ends my speech. I cannot say everyone on the City Council felt the same as did the mayor, since no one else made their contempt as open as did he, but neither did anyone stop him from cutting me short and certainly no one asked me any questions when I finished. I'm certain this council will not be taking a vote to see if any of them want to do as I suggested and change this outdated, hate-filled, bigoted law designed to deprive a specialized group of their Constitutional and Civil rights, so it will be my job to visit their meeting at least once more and ask them point-blank if they have done so and let them know I intend on taking further steps if they do not want to do the decent thing and change this law on their own.

I suppose an online petition might be the next step. I know others have tried online petitions for legalizing public nudity, but that was a general petition, not one for a specifically localized city. I guess it's worth a try, and so I will get one started and see what happens. I only ask that each and every one of you who reads this blog not only sign the petition, but pass it along and ask others to do the same. If we can get the hate law of one city changed, we can do the same thing and get the hate laws of other cities changed, and perhaps one day each of us will find ourselves living in cities where we are free to walk the streets nude without being arrested or targeted by the hate mongering city officials.

Since writing the above I began the following petition. PLEASE sign it and pass it on to others who will sign and pass it on. TOGETHER we can repeal the hate laws and gain the BODY FREEDOM we deserve! https://www.change.org/p/legalize-body-freedom

As an extra bonus, below are the most recent two additions to my Nekkid Niki cartoons. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed drawing and writing them: