I think the headline says it all, right? PennLive.com has reported that Ocean City Maryland will allow women to go topless on their beaches… kind of.
The article below makes it sound like toplessness will fall under some “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. It’s not 100% true.
PennLive.com: “This summer, the Ocean City Beach Patrol says it is taking a new “hands off” approach when it comes to women sunbathing topless in the sand. Now the question is just how many women will take advantage and go topless on Ocean City beaches? And how will the rest of the beach-going public there react to what could become an R-rated day at the beach?
In a break with a more modest past, the Ocean City Maryland Beach Patrol will look the other way this summer when it comes to women sunbathing topless in the sand.
As WTAE-TV in Pittsburgh reports, the new beach patrol policy regarding women who doff their bikini tops on the beach was memorialized in a memo issued Tuesday by Capt. Butch Arbin, head of Ocean City Beach Patrol.
Under the beach patrol’s new policing rules, workers should document complaints of toplessness, but they shouldn’t approach topless women – even if beach-goers request it, WTAE reports.
In the past, the Ocean City Beach Patrol took a more active – some would say, prudish – approach to women caught sunbathing sans their tops.
Upon any complaints from more modest sunbathers, the patrol would approach the topless woman and “scold” her to cover up, saying, in effect, “hey, you can’t do that.”
Imagine working at the Ocean City tourism office today, when this came across the wire? The mayor had to just take his phone off the hook.
Turns out, they just want the life guards to worry about saving peoples lives and not policing breasts. The police will now respond to toplessness complaints.
Man, PennLive really got this one wrong. That’s Harrisburg’s biggest main new source. Ouch.