Artist Seeks Transparency on Rules on Partial Nudity (8)

Published: 26.09.2011 17:06

Fideelia-Signe Roots ( Photo: Postimees/Scanpix )

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A woman recently arrested for walking topless in a town in northern Estonia has contacted the Gender Equality and Equal Treatment Commissioner to draw attention to what she says is a grey area.

Artist Fideelia-Signe Roots wrote this week to the official, Mari-Liis Sepper, telling uudised.err.ee that she wants to bring about real as opposed to theoretical gender equality.

"I want it written specifically in the rules governing public order whether being topless is or is not an infraction and whether it only applies to women or men as well," said Roots.

Roots said if such a statute only applied to women, it would be against the Gender Equality Act.

"As it is, I'm confused: my behavior was considered a breach of public order, but the law that I violated is non-existent," she said. "My question, why was the police called and why did they act as if I were a criminal?"

Roots's stunt was part of an action she designed namely to draw attention to this grey area at the time of her arrest.

It worked. As it happened, she was more than halfway into a 150-odd-kilometer walk from Tartu to Karepa when the incident - or non-incident, as Roots would have it - on August 10 was phoned in to the police by good citizen Indrek Kesküla, elder of Väike-Maarja municipality, among others.

The police decided not to press the case, but documented the incident as a breach of order.

Roots considered unraveling the legal threads of that seeming contradiction, but after consulting a lawyer, decided to take the case to Sepper. She is seeking an official position from Sepper, which is expected to take at least several weeks


Kristopher Rikken.

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Comments (8)

  • mart mang

    26.09.2011 20:53

    From what I know about the Commissioner and her high standards, she will be an excellent advocate for Estonans and they are fortunate to have her on their side...

  • Frank

    27.09.2011 08:53

    First viagra counterfeiters were getting stiff sentences, now topless artists are seeking transparency... :o)

  • avatar

    knut_albers

    27.09.2011 10:48

    Regardless of the act, it may be counted as somewhat Germans would call an 'indecent behavior' (Erregung oeffentlichen Aergernisses). Funny though, in Germany only males get cought for criminal behaviour when they perform 'exhibitionism', in Estonia this seems to be vice versa? Well, you may argue if there should be made legal differentiation between the body parts of females and males. On the other hand, I do not mind if females would run around naked, even in the middle of a snow storm (after all, their cystitis is not my problem). I just think that some men might misunderstand this. More importantly, there should be a law that requires sanitariness and soberness for all kind of sexes when entering public transportation. Because smelly people are a great deal of annoyance to all of us.

  • observer

    28.09.2011 17:30

    So many places in the world like Afghanistan, etc where women suffer unimaginable gender inequality, even in developed nations women have still issues with equal pay etc, and this woman wants to make a "stand" for gender equality for the right to be topless.

  • Upiter

    03.10.2011 02:40

    Topless men are much more disturbing to see than topless women. And their behavior tends to be more disturbing too.

  • cindy

    03.10.2011 15:38

    The walking part of the stunt sounds a bit self-aggrandizing, but I have to wonder about someone (the Vaike-Marja mayor) who would call the police over something like this. "pepole different from the rest of us" indeed.

  • avatar

    knut_albers

    03.10.2011 16:49

    I am little bit worried about this new generation of self-proclaimed feminists. Yes, nudism is defenite an "eye opener" that guarantees to transport some feminist ideas to the public, but I see here a tendency to extremes that put feminism into a bad light. Let it be the radicals around the DSK case and the other alleged rapers around public figures that turned out to be untrue (in a legal sense at least) or females that say it is feminism when women demand for 'gender-appropriate' porn. It is like be-friend with the enemy within for female rights (as porn is one of the most degrading forms of female rights). To my opinion, this has nothing to do anymore with feminism, nor it promotes female rights anyhow when women do worse than men ever did. Same logic as the demand of more females to the top management levels by quotas, but let's not even bother that most assets are still in hand of men (the actual issue of the problem why men still are widely in control over females). In this regard, it is almost comedy, when supposedly self-confident women dancing in the free entrance for women nightclubs to songs like "bl** my whistle" and "shake you a** bit**", a clear message for what women are suitable for at best (and get sponsored by men through their entrance fees and through drinks). This is all very short thought and lacks of any responsiblity for their privileges obtained.

  • mart mang

    04.10.2011 17:54

    The logical solution is equal pay. If you can pull that off, some of those other gender issues should just fade away...