Shirtless.

Someone wrote…

Today I was in the car with friends, and we saw three boys ride past on bicycles, shirtless. I commented that I wished girls could ride around like that on a sunny day. My male friend replied “I’m sure people wouldn’t mind!,” and I just thought to myself, “I wish you meant that the way I want you to mean it.”

What’s your experience?

And what are you thinking about gender right now?


Posted by on August 1st, 2009 at 08:00 am

Category: your voice 10 comments »

10 Responses to “Shirtless.”

  1. Miriam

    If you've never heard it…this reminds me a lot of Dar Williams's song When I Was A Boy.

    [Reply]

    sarahdopp replied:

    I LOVE that song. Thank you!

    [Reply]

  2. BfAM

    The one thing I'm jealous of boys of is their flat, hard chests, and their ability to flaunt them in public.

    [Reply]

  3. julian

    I was going to ramble about patriarchy and men's ownership of women's bodies and blah blah blah, but I should be showering instead, so I'll just stick to:
    There are a lot of places (including Austin, TX, Portland, OR, and NYC, off the top of my head) where it is perfectly legal for a female/female-bodied/female-assigned-at-birth person to be topless along with men.

    I am male-bodied and don't know that I have ever (like, EVER) had my shirt off in public. I am just not comfortable with that much of my body being visible. I kinda think if I had breasts I would do it, though, if for nothing else than to fight the dominant paradigm of female nudity=SEXXXX!!!!/dirty while male nudity=perfectly normal.

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  4. Gabriel Grom

    One thing I never understood about sexuality is how th breasts of a biologically female body become almost equivalent to a sexual organ. It did not completely click with me from the start, because when I think of the breasts, I normally just tend to think of the life they give (i.e. breast feeding). But on a contemplative note, people get aroused very easily by the male nipples and chest. It may be just one more mystery of the human sexuality. Anyway, I still think that the chest of a male body is pretty equal with the chest of a female body. I am actually attracted to the male bodied chest, but everyone should have the same chances at comfort.

    [Reply]

    julian replied:

    I am not a hugely visual person (when it comes to sexual arousal) — it's more about touch/texture…but I do have a thing for bellies, and it's the first thing I look at when I see a shirtless person of whatever gender/sex/expression.

    I don't really understand the appeal of breasts. Not that there's anything wrong with them, I just don't get how/why they are so supposed to be so much more exciting than the lack of (or why bigger ones are supposed to be "better" than smaller ones, etc).

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  5. Rory

    Yeah it's bullshit. I was thinking about that a while ago when I saw a shirtless guy jogging by and he basically had breasts about the same size of mine so it's like wtf, why is that so much different than what I have on my chest. Why is it fine to jog around shirtless with "man boobs" but not with "woman boobs"?!

    I dunno if I would want to go around shirtless though even if i had a flat chest. But when I was a child I totally ran around shirtless all the time so one has to wonder if I would have just kept doing that if puberty didn't make my chest grow?

    [Reply]

  6. BfAM

    When I was a kid I used to go around shirtless, too! I loved the freedom and innocence that accompanied.

    What I miss most though is being able to come out of the shower with the towel just wrapped around my waist. I hated that after puberty I had to come out with the towel wrapped around my upper body too, like my mother.

    [Reply]

  7. Dru

    I believe it is legal for women to go topless where I live (Ontario, Canada)–but no women ever actually do.

    I could ramble on more about how unnecessary the massive distinction made between men going topless and women going topless is. . .

    [Reply]

    Nobody replied:

    I'm pretty sure it is legal here in Ontario…but you never see people taking advantage of that law.

    [Reply]


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