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NEWS ANALYSIS Page 2 TNT!MEN wasted no time in publicizing today's
ruling and announcing how it will influence their
Gay Pride events coming up this very weekend.
Although the legal case concerned an event at The
Barn, the local Toolbox bar had also been warned by
the renegade police about nudity at their Thursday
"Nude Nights." As we went to press, it was unclear
whether the Toolbox would resume that event before
Pride -- namely tomorrow, Thursday 27 June.
TNT!MEN's Nearly Nude Dance scheduled for Saturday
the 29th suddenly became, once again, a Nude Dance.
And the 52nd Division's threat to arrest nude
marchers in Sunday's Gay Pride Parade -- if they
"violate the law" -- instantly seemed a lot more
hollow. If merely being nude (as opposed to being
nude and sexual) was not disorderly, then what law
would the marchers be deemed to be violating?
Arresting peaceful marchers engaging in their
Canadian right to free speech, in the context of a
public demonstration of Gay Pride and
self-acceptance, and in a Pride March whose very
slogan this year is "Uncensored" -- now THAT would
TRULY be disorderly conduct. The charges dismissed today against The Barn
were originally laid over two years ago as a result
of a TNT!MEN-sponsored nude dance. According to
media reports, the renegade officers stormed onto
the premises and headed straight for the bathrooms
where, apparently, they had expected to find sexual
activity taking place. Alas, what they had
remembered about gay culture from their sociology
classes was wrong; restrooms harboring sexual
activities are called "tea rooms" (not tea DANCES),
and they're not typically found in gay
establishments, but in hetero locations like
department stores and libraries. Astonishment that
there were not any sexual activities taking place
there didn't stop the police from citing The Barn
for permitting disorderly conduct on their
premises. All that went down the drain Wednesday as a
result of Judge Bigelow's decision. The Barn's
legal counsel was able to cite a long string of
court and liquor-license decisions which all
underscored the legality of simple, nonsexual
nudity. Eventually, it all boiled down to the
definition of the word "disorderly." The Crown said
that wearing clothes inherently made a bar more
orderly; the judge said that there was obviously
nothing disorderly about being naked. Of course, in reality, it was much more than
that. As one insider explained, "The whole thing
boils down to a popular cultural misconception:
that nudity equals sex. It's very difficult for
ordinary police officers, who are trying to do
their best under very difficult circumstances, to
make distinctions which the rest of their hetero
world doesn't make. To most straight people most of
the time, being naked is equivalent to flaunting
your sexuality. Even some gay guys think so. But
the whole point of the nudist movement -- gay and
straight -- is body acceptance, not open sexuality.
There's nothing wrong with sex, but that's not what
TNT!MEN promotes at their events, and that's not
what TNT!MEN is trying to say by marching naked. If
they were, they'd only allow slim, young-looking
circuit-type 'boys' at their events or in their
Pride March contingent -- but in fact, all men are
welcome. Simple nonsexual nudity underscores the
beauty of the human body, the emotional
attractiveness of having the courage to be nude
when others aren't, and the mental-health benefits
of accepting one's body and oneself as they are: as
divinely beautiful creations of god and/or
nature." And who in our society has an interest in
promoting body acceptance? Certainly not the
clothes designers. Calvin Klein can donate as much
(or as little) as he wishes to gay causes, but his
company's underlying financial interests do not
favor nudity! Will you ever see a Calvin Klein
model NOT wearing underwear? If a Calvin Klein
model is ever nude, will his or her nudity ever
make people LESS likely to buy clothes? Can it be
very long before he starts trying to sell us
pajamas? We're not trying to be nasty and pick on just
Calvin; obviously the genius assholes at
Abercrombie and Fitch are doing the same thing, as
are most clothing designers. But Calvin is a
tempting target because (remember?) he got his
start by selling Calvin Klein jeans, and many of
THOSE ads featured lines like "Nothing comes
between me and my Calvins." Wasn't it Brooke
Shields who slithered around wearing jeans and,
pretty obviously, nothing underneath them? But once
he started selling underwear, that slogan
disappeared. How quickly we forget! |
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NEWS ANALYSIS Page 3 This latest decision is just the most recent in
a long, drawn-out battle between that handful of
renegade police officers and the forces of goodness
and light. You learned back in high school civics
class that when the City Council decides something,
everyone down the chain of command follows their
decision, including the police force, right? So if
the City Council votes that a beach be designated
as an official nude beach, then the police will
allow nudity there, right? Wrong! That's not how back-room dirty politics
works. If the City Council votes a nude beach, and
you're a police officer who doesn't like that
decision, then you hunt up some obscure regulation
from somewhere that the Council forgot to rescind
(or didn't think needed rescinding, or which they
interpreted differently and didn't think was
relevant). And you go to the nude beach and arrest
people for being nude anyway, in spite of the
Council's clearly voted opinion! The hope is either
that other forces of repression will awaken and
help you defeat the nude beach outright, or that if
they case gets referred to a sympathetic judge you
can effectively countermand the Council's decision.
Along the way you may scare enough people away from
the "nude" beach so that it becomes a deserted
beach. Then you can ask your philosophy professor if a
nude beach is still a nude beach if no one goes
there! And that is exactly what some Toronto police
officers tried to do in April, 1999, soon after the
Toronto city council voted to make Hanlan's Point a
nude beach. The officers lost in court then, just
as they lost in court today. But if a bunch of
renegade officers tries, figuratively, to push you
around like this, the only recourse is to push back
if you value your freedom and you believe that
police should be controlled by the city council,
not vice versa. That takes courage, and that takes
resources. And persistence. And brains. Luckily, even though TNT!MEN lacks substantial
financial resources, they've got everything else.
The legal brains to go look for precedents and
historical parallels (in this case very largely due
to Peter Simm, a lawyer and member). The
persistence to keep supporting The Barn for years,
when many other groups and bar owners would just
throw in the towel and say, hey, we're making
enough money with "nearly naked" events; why rock
the boat by trying to go the rest of the way? The
courage to stand up for what you believe in, even
if people around you tell you that nudity is a
trivial issue which pales in comparison with racism
or the other ills which plague our society. The
resources and the connections to make people
realize that body self-acceptance is NOT a trivial
issue. It's related to depression. It's related to
self-medication via illicit drugs and a search for
self-validation via unwise sexual liaisons. It's
related to low self-esteem and the attempt to
alleviate it by spending, spending, and more
spending on needless clothes or other consumer
goods which turn out, in the end, not to make you
happy after all. And luckily, there are enough people in the gay
and lesbian communities to make the connection
between gay liberation and self-acceptance,
including body self-acceptance. Two and a half
decades ago, it took incredible courage for those
first gay pioneers to take up the banner of gay
liberation, figuratively and literally, and march
down the street saying that they're proud of their
sexual orientation, even if society at large said
that a gay orientation is shameful. It also takes
incredible courage for Toronto's first nudist
pioneers to march down the street saying that
they're not ashamed of their bodies, and to put
their clothes where their mouths are by marching
naked. And, finally, it also takes courage to take
off your clothes and dance naked in front of
hundreds of other men. We're not saying that there's something wrong
with you if you march with your clothes on, or if
you stay at home. We here at Jim's Pen is Central
are just saying that there's something wonderful
about those who have that courage and who show it.
Even if the people who see the nude marchers never
so much as take their shirts off, viewers must
confront their own ideals, their own body images,
and their desire to appear attractive to others.
We've been trained since infancy to cover up
certain parts of our bodies, and reading an article
or two, or seeing a nude marcher or two, isn't
going to change that overnight. The social forces
which favor clothing -- both pernicious and benign
-- are powerful and well entrenched. We've been
subject to their propaganda for decades as
individuals, and for centuries as a culture. But speaking out about this is what free speech
is all about in a free country, right? Right! Well, maybe. About a week before Judge Bigelow's decision, a
meeting was held involving the chief of the 52
Division, TNT!MEN representatives, city councilman
Kyle Rae, and a representative of the Gay Pride
committee. The topic? Whether marchers in this
year's parade would be arrested if they were "nude"
-- by which was meant, if police saw any pen
ises. There is, alas, disagreement about what was said
at the meeting. TNT!MEN, backed up by the city
councilman and the Pride Committee rep, claim that
the police promised to consult with their in-house
legal advisors before deciding on their arrest
policy. The police claim not to remember making
such a promise, and imply that there is no need for
them to do so since they will simply arrest anyone
who breaks "the law." But in the light of today's
decision, just what IS the law? Understand that the police are between a rock
and a hard place: they have to be responsive to
community concerns, but different community
conservatives want police to clamp down, whereas
community liberals want police to be rational and
reasonable. The police have to justify their
actions to both groups of citizens while trying to
appear unbiased. This leaves a lot of leeway for
back-room political maneuvering and the application
of pressure, both obvious and subtle. There is
evidently disagreement within the police department
about what course of action to take: some cops want
to arrest, others want to permit. |
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NEWS ANALYSIS Page 4 So each interest group takes actions which are,
in due time, either endorsed or rejected by other
parties to the process. If arrests are made, will
the prosecutor's office prosecute vigorously or
half-heartedly? Can a judge find a way to ensure a
particular result, or is he hemmed in by precedents
or actions taken by the attorneys involved? Does a
judge's decision seem rational and reasonable, or
is it strained and thus more easily attacked by the
city council or by appeals courts? The Crown's prosecuting attorney today was a
poorly prepared fellow. He lost his train of
thought at least three times, appeared to be
unfamiliar with many aspects of the case, and had
some of the lamest arguments ever seen this side of
a kangaroo court. This is not in itself a shameful
thing; every prosecutor has to acquire experience,
everyone has to have practice. But politically
savvy observers agree that the back-room political
message is unambiguous: The Crown did not send
their best people to this trial, and that must be
because they don't agree with the actions of the
renegade police. (Indeed, that's how we know that
these police should be called "renegade" in the
first place.) By not sending their best people, the
Crown is (a) satisfying the legal requirement for
them to prosecute cases triggered by police
actions, and (2) indirectly telling the police not
to bring such actions in the future because they
will not be permitted to succeed. Now nudity behind the closed door of a bar is
different from nudity openly on the street in a
parade. Perhaps the police will be hoping to set up
a test case this Sunday by arresting a nude marcher
or two and letting the courts have their say in the
coming months. If the courts rule against the
police, then they can justify not making more
arrests to the conservatives. "We did our best,"
they can say, "but our hands are tied." The problem is that anyone with any brains knows
that the police will fail. Failure was likely even
before Judge Bigelow's decision; now it is
practically assured. The Pride Committee is not an
enthusiastic proponent of Pride nudity, but they're
not opposing TNT!MEN's position, they're not
throwing TNT!MEN out of the parade, and the theme
for this year's parade ("Uncensored!") was
practically tailor-made for TNT!MEN's benefit. The
gay newspaper in town supports the marchers, even
going so far as to post a prominent News Update in
their storefront when news of The Barn's acquittal
missed their deadline by a matter of hours. Every year, the reactions
of the crowd watching the parade are hugely
positive -- cheers, smiles, overwhelming applause,
cameras using up miles of film. From coast to
coast, gay citizens are complaining that Pride
parades have lost their zip and are no longer
addressing really important political issues... but
no one is saying that about Toronto! Toronto is
where the action is, where the smart people go,
where real issues are really being debated and real
actions are being taken. TNT!MEN has all its political ducks lined up in
a row, but the renegade police are in disarray. It
is, obviously, a waste of taxpayers' money to spend
time and resources on a few swinging pen ises
visible in public. Frankly, if I were the director
of Toronto's 52 Division, or Toronto's police
chief, I'd use today's court decision as the
perfect excuse. Sorry, my conservative friends, our
hands are tied. There is really no chance that the
courts -- or even the prosecutor's office! -- will
back you up on this one. We can't draw the line
between pen ises and no pen ises anymore. Instead,
we have to fall back and draw the line between soft
pen ises and hard pen ises -- between nonsexual
nudity and open fornication. And I'd top off the argument with a 9/11 kicker.
In the context of September 11th, it is a dangerous
distraction to look for pen ises instead of
terrorists on the streets of Toronto. Even if it is
true that Al Qaeda agents are unlikely to target a
Canadian city or event, it would be tragic and
embarrassing if the investigation of a future
terrorist episode showed that some operative
slipped into North America through the Toronto
point of entry while the cops were preoccupied with
TNT!MEN's genitalia. It's a simple matter of the
deployment of limited police resources. Sorry, my
conservative friends -- the higher-ups have made it
clear that we will get far more mileage out of
fighting terrorism than we will from fighting
nudists. In the long run, it is far more likely
that we'll secure increased staffing and more
resources if we assign 52 Division officers to the
anti-terror squad instead of the nudism patrol. Real TNT -- dynamite -- kills people and
destroys buildings. Toronto's TNT!MEN may have
explosive ideas, but no one ends up in the hospital
or the funeral home as a result. When it comes to
clamping down on "disorderly conduct," the correct
priority is unquestionable: go after the terrorist
group, not the terrific one. |
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