THE nip of a chilly winter day couldn’t stop these women from getting out their boobs while roller-skating through Fremantle last weekend.

Before you arc up in puritan outrage or go all pubescent boy and snigger, the women ask Herald readers to think about just why it is you’ve been conditioned to believe women’s nipples are so offensive.

“This is a protest about ridiculous double standards,” Hilton’s Tiffany Barton says. “Men’s nipples are acceptable but women’s are somehow offensive.”

The women got their boobs out and wrote their message on bellies as part of the global Free the Nipple equality movement.

• While most people were putting on extra layers in the lead up to ice skating at Fremantle’s Winter Garden Festival, this trio—Tiffany Barton, Alicia Asic and Vinny Shanti—did the opposite. Last weekend they rolled through Fremantle wearing skates but sans tops, boobs jiggling, as part of the international Free the Nipple equality movement.  Photo supplied | Tony Gajewski

Ironically, their nipples were covered up with gaffer tape during Fremantle’s topless run, “so we could share photos on social media,” Ms Barton, 45, says. This is no joke but Facebook allows all sorts of images to be shared but women’s boobs, including breastfeeding, can end up with swift censorship.

The women skated for about five minutes from X-Wray on Essex Street to Pakenham Street, passing The Monk on South Terrace.

A crowd at the Monk cheered and reeled at the sight of the “empowered” women, who say the Freo public reacted positively and there were “no pervy blokes”.

Free the Nipple began in Iceland as a social media movement against “slut shame”, embarrassment about the female form and the stigma of public breastfeeding.

by EMMIE DOWLING