No need to go into too much detail on this one. The topless protests that have been held in Asheville the past two years or so, have provided much fodder for cartoon and juvenile humor (which I am not above engaging in, hey I like me some juvenile humor!) but the reactionary voices against the horrors of public display of human female breasts made themselves another easy target. Therefore, though I don’t like to repeat subject matter, particularly not close together, I did two cartoons on both subjects within a few weeks of each other. One was just a bunch of boob joke puns:
The other was a second iteration of the first Calvin and Hobbes style parody about the two protest opponents:
… and then another, the next year, this time focusing on the Raelian cult that is alleged to be behind the organization that initiates these protests, along with a caricature of a local opponent of the protests tied with the then-current Chik Fil-A controversy:
(Also, when legislation appeared to counter the protest specifically, I even did a cartoon comparing it to the current gun show incidents and lack of any legislative discussions for those:)
It was the third cartoon that was not appreciated by one particular “conservative portal.” In the words of the webmaster:
Asheville’s Mountain Xpress found that women and some teens taking off their bras in the town square was simply an issue of humor of course, dissing people who were offended such as in this cartoon the pub posted on page eight of its September 4, 2012, issue and drawn by artist Brent Brown. The artist, of course to be politically correct, left out any drawing of the events where strangers were actually photographed fondling the breasts of women while young children were videotaped with their naked moms on the street.
Now, I would like to just point out that although the puritanical opponent is probably being dissed here, the people he is protesting are not exactly exalted either. The fact that many “supporters” were present only to ogle and catcall them some nekkid women parts is clearly manifested in the cartoon with the non-committal signs and the leering, lecherous dudes taking photos and otherwise showing “support” for more nudity, not whatever their actual message was supposed to be. The crazy-looking, glassy-eyed cult members are not faring well either, so deriding the cartoon as some kind of partisan exercise in blind political correctness is logical incorrectness as far as I can see. They are correct in that I consider the whole thing to be simply an issue of humor. Both the protest and the reactions to it. Everyone in it, however is being made fun of and what could be more egalitarian than that?