Athena in Portland's naked protest

[vivariumvivariumsvivaria]

This page is full of clever minds - anyone want to help me pick through this woman's naked protest? nationalpost.com/news/protester-strips-naked-in-front-of-anti-riot-police-in-portland-she-was-incredibly-vulnerable

She's in a stand-off with riot police during the anti-racism demonstrations in Portland. She strips naked, strides in front of the police who were firing rubber bullets, and starts doing yoga for 10 minutes. She sits and spreads her legs. The police leave.

I think she's incredibly brave - being hit by a rubber bullet on a naked body is bound to hurt.

Part of me wonders what would have happened if she was not a slim, fit white woman - if she looked like me (too old, too heavy, too hairy); or was a black woman, or a man.

Was it just her startlingly zero-fucks that changed the mood of the evening? Or was it the shock of a vulva, light up by the glare of the police lights, that took the tension out of the crowd?

It's an amazing photograph.

I might have found the image striking if I didn't know anything about the context. But the thing is, I do know. The context is Antifa. And as soon as I see that word, I see other images too: images of violent, misogynistic arseholery, and no amount of posturing about iconography or invoking Trump can airbrush them away.

What was brave about it? She was in no danger

I agree with everything Floisme has said.

I would just also add that what Trump has said about Portland and Antifa is correct. I wonder how this will play out come the election?

I've got no issue with the peaceful nature of her protest. I just don't think it was as deeply profound as the eloquent cheerleaders on thread are suggesting.

I agree with floral.

And I have to admit that I know jack shit about antifa.

@Floisme

I might have found the image striking if I didn't know anything about the context. But the thing is, I do know. The context is Antifa. And as soon as I see that word, I see other images too: images of violent, misogynistic arseholery, and no amount of posturing about iconography or invoking Trump can airbrush them away.

Nicely summed up.

This article discusses "Athena" and naked protest. The photographer who took the image often works for Playboy
unherd.com/2020/07/the-shock-of-the-nude/

I like Sarah Ditum. Thank you for posting that link.

The male gaze business is always just the male gaze business.

Yep.

‘Women seeking liberation for yourself or others take your clothes off’ wonder who that benefits? Maybe I’m a cynic.

She was in no danger
That's not true. Everyone who takes part in a protest is in danger of being hurt by protestors and police. A badly aimed missile, a misfire will do damage. She may have been taken into custody or to the hospital by strangers whilst naked. She did her protest knowing that it would be on the news/internet and knowing how hostile and personal anyone who opposed her protest would be. She has become a target for misogynists, anti-Americans, right wingers and others who reduce her to nothing more than Tits and Vag.

So yes, I do think she was brave.

She has become a target for misogynists, anti-Americans, right wingers and others who reduce her to nothing more than Tits and Vag

Oh bore off with the claims that anyone criticising this silly woman is right wing etc etc.

If she has turned into nothing more than tits and vag that is of her making, in the absence, in my view, of any engagement by her brain.

She is a narcissistic show-off. She and the other "protesters" (aka looters, rioters, criminals, thieves and vandals) are doing no good whatsoever for cause they claim to support.

They have on the other hand demonstrated that even Donald Trump can occasionally be in the right and speak sense. What an achievement.

My first thought was that it was a powerful/poetic image.

Second (from the part of my brain that watches a lot of reality TV) was "I bet she's really annoying".

If she has turned into nothing more than tits and vag that is of her making

Precisely. There just happened to be a Playboy photographer around at the exact moment the naked protest took place.

It’s almost as coincidental as a bat coronavirus turning up at a seafood market just down the road from the only lab in Asia studying bat coronaviruses.

If she has turned into nothing more than tits and vag that is of her making
I disagree. Those who reduce women to Tits and Vag do so for their own reasons.

Oh bore off with the claims that anyone criticising this silly woman is right wing etc etc.
I don't think that all the criticism has come from the right wing. She has also been criticised by left wingers, those who abhor nudity and misogynists who will put down any woman who stands up and call her names.

The Playboy connection is most unfortunate.

Why @Floisme?

Why?

Call me a killjoy but, if I were that young woman and I discovered that my idealistic protest had been captured and sent around the world by a 'men's lifestyle' photographer, I would be none too happy.

Or as you put it yourself:
Those who reduce women to Tits and Vag do so for their own reasons.

I don't think he's a photographer. AFAIK he's a writer from Portland who has been previously published in Playboy.

I going from Sarah Ditum's article which referred to his own Twitter biography. If you know more or otherwise then why not tell us?

Portland protests: why Trump has sent in federal agents

I wonder why that report didn't mention the executive order signed a month ago by Trump to give special powers to protect federal property:

www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-protecting-american-monuments-memorials-statues-combating-recent-criminal-violence/

That's a key enabler of what's happening now.

"the first credit he boasts of is Playboy."
As a writer.

If I forget about the context and put aside speculations about what this women's motive might have been, I'm still not seeing what's particularly remarkable about the image. Women getting naked for cool girl points is everywhere. What important message is this woman sending us? What does a naked white woman doing yoga say about Black Lives Matter?

And whatever she was doing, it wasn't Yoga. I'm really sick of white women using Yoga for their own narcissistic ends.
As for the comparisons with the Chinese demonstrator and the napalm girl -- I have no words. (Or I do, but they don't really express what I feel.)

Ok but I'm not sure how your point is as critical as you seem to think it is?

Soz that was to Dione.

@TheRealMcKenna

The male gaze business is always just the male gaze business.

Yep.

Exactly.

Maybe all GC feminists need to do is take our clothes off and march on Parliament?
Maybe then they'd listen?