Femen take their protests to the next logical step

Uncensored version here.

Nude protest worlds are colliding. Ukrainian topless activists from Femen have joined forces with "Nude Photo Revolutionary" Aliaa Magda Elmahdy to protest the referendum on Egypt's new Islamist constitution and its poor stance on women's rights.

This time, however, they've gone full monty. And in wintry Stockholm, of all places.

(NUDITY IN VIDEO)



From their media release:

Today in the snowbound Stockholm the world has seen apocalyptic picture.  

International women's movement FEMEN and antiislamist Egyptian activist Alia al-Mahdi have called to say NO to Sharia constitution in Egypt! Before the decisive day of the referendum in Egypt activists came to the Embassy of Egypt in Stockholm to support Egyptian heroes who are resisting the sharia-dictatorial draft of the constitution of the president Morsi. FEMEN calls people  of Great Egypt to deny this religious bondage of newly appeared prophet Morsi and to give the chance for Egypt for the rightful democratic development. 

"Sharia is not a constitution" - it has been written on Alia's naked body. Her genitals have been covered by the poster shaped like Koran. The three posters in the hands of activists are the symbolic  religious books. In that way  FEMEN warns the world about the danger of the transformation secular constitution into religious. FEMEN warns muslim brother Morsi, if he gave an orders to shoot at his own people then his last resting will be the Nile with crocodiles, not the pyramids.  

Fuck off religious slavery! Viva freedom and human rights!

Both Femen and Ms. Elmahdy (the transcribed version of her name varies) have become polarizing figures in the women's movement. Some see them as shock tacticians who are exploiting their own sexuality for attention. Others (myself included) see them as activists who are acting out of desperation, using their bodies as weapons in their respective, extremely sexist, cultures. Their message is, "men think they own this — but it is mine to do with what I please."

Femen has been getting more extreme of late, lashing out against organized religion in their homeland. As a result of legal troubles, they recently moved some of their operations to Paris. I'm just happy to see them all somewhat safer in Western Europe.

Nude activism continues to take over the internet

First PETA. Then FEMEN. Then, last month, Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda Elmahdy posted naked pictures of herself online to protest sexist oppression.

Now it's Chinese supporters of dissident artist Ai Weiwei who are dropping trou for a cause.

According to Shanghaiist,  Ai Weiwei announced Friday that Beijing police were now investigating his assistant Zhao Zhao for "spreading pornography online" for posting a picture of the artist with four female models, all nude. (Link)

The site, "Listen, Chinese Government： Nudity is not Pornography" is packed with homemade nudes from both well-known outspoken Chinese cewebrities and well-wishers.

What I really love are the group shots censored with AWW faces:

There is no doubt that this will get attention. Naked people always seem to, no matter how many billions of artistic, scientific and erotic nude pictures are available at the stroke of a Google. But as the shock value diminishes with the increasing ordinariness of seeing other humans in their altogether, will the efficacy of the tactic also fade?

I guess we'll just have to see. But as long as places like Egypt and China (not to mention many Western democracies) continue to harshly fight the normalization of naked displays of the human body, there will still be someone to scandalize.

(Thanks to FEMEN for the tip)