The mayor of New York is vowing to ban topless women from posing for photos in Times Square, it has been claimed.
Bill de Blasio slammed the current situation where women wearing nothing but body paint on their upper bodies stop for snaps with tourists as unacceptable.
The women are frequently seen at the tourist hot spot and stop for photos or selfiesin return for a fee.
Calling themselves 'desnudas' - Spanish for naked - the women have been operating in the city for a number of years without problems.
Although being topless is not a crime in New York, begging and aggressive solicitation are and Mayor de Blasio has pledged to crackdown on the women.
He told the New York Daily News: "As a progressive who believes in civil liberties and who believes in our First Amendment, I understand the legal challenge here.
"But I don't think that's the end of the discussion. We are going to look for every appropriate way to regulate all activity that involves either begging, or asking people for a contribution based on the opportunity to take a picture for example.”
The mayor's spokeswoman Karen Hinton backed this statement up recently, saying that it was a quality-of-life problem and that city agencies were working on methods to tackle it.
Any action that arises will come after a number of people complained about the growing number of desnudas in the area.
American news network CBS2 last month quizzed people in the area, with one mother saying: "It’s supposed to be a family place to be", while another woman said: "I personally don’t think it’s appropriate."
A street vendor was also questioned about the area, and he said he believed the city was slowly deteriorating.
He added: "Who doesn’t want to see naked women? But there’s a time and place for everything.”
Police have said there is nothing they can do about the women under current legislation.
No comments:
Post a Comment