Naked Woman In 'Yoga Protest' At Parliament [Blast From The Past]

20th May, 2010 - A naked woman stopped traffic near the Houses of Parliament yesterday, by clambering on to a black cab for a five-minute ‘yoga protest’.

She yelled ‘Troops out of Afghanistan’, as the cabbie tried to shift her and tourists looked on.
Police finally managed to move the woman.

Witness Carl Backland, 50, said: ‘She jumped on the cab when it stopped at the lights – the driver wasn’t very please

SOUCRE: Metro.co.uk

Getting Naked For Ai Weiwei [Art, Protest, Censorship]

Back in mid-Novemebr, when artist Ai Weiwei disappeared, supporters made online appeals for his return. When authorities handed him a £1.5m tax bill, they sent money to help pay it. And now that he faces an investigation for spreading pornography – his admirers have stripped off.

Internet users began tweeting their nude photographs after Ai announced that authorities had questioned his cameraman over pictures which showed the artist and four women naked.

Many Chinese contemporary artists have taken pictures of themselves without clothes, and the pictures of Ai that have emerged so far do not appear sexually charged. Some suspect that it may be an attempt by the authorities to smear the artist, whose 81-day detention this spring caused international outrage (read the full story here).

According to hyperallergic.com's An Xiao:

Netizens** wouldn’t stand for this. Quickly, a meme emerged: post pictures of yourself naked in support of Ai Weiwei and Zhao Zhao. A few months back,  But this is online assembly. Unable to assemble in person, Chinese citizens in the mainland and abroad are using the power of the internet meme to assemble online.

On Sina Weibo and Twitter, they used the hashtags #艾裸裸 and #爱裸裸, both pronounced Ai Luo Luo. It’s a play on words with Ai Weiwei’s name and can mean something like “Love getting naked.” Predictably, the hashtag on Twitter was quickly flooded (or “polluted,” in Chinese parlance) by spam messages from the 50 Cent Party, a paid army of pro-Party internet commentators, to make it difficult to locate images.

An Xiao states that well over a hundred pictures have been collected at awfannude.blogspot.com and on Wuala. Here’s the Chinese Internet showing the government that they and Ai won’t take these charges with their pants down!

You can see a few of these protest pictures here on iNAKED but rest @ awfannude.blogspot.com.



** Netizens - The term Netizen is a portmanteau of the English words internet and citizen. It is defined as an entity or person actively involved in online communities and a user of the internet, especially an avid one.The term can also imply an interest in improving the internet, especially in regard to open access and free speech. Netizens are also commonly referred to as cybercitizens, which has the same meaning. The term was coined by Michael Hauben and recently developed by a French entrepreneur (Wikipedia).

Ukrainian Women's Rights Activists Stage Topless Protest Against Uefa [FEMEN]

Ukrainian women's rights activists have staged a [topfree] demonstration at Kiev's Olympic Stadium to protest what they say are attempts to legalise prostitution during the 2012 European Championship.

Five members of the Femen group chanted slogans and displayed banners criticising the tournament organiser, European football's governing body, Uefa.

A Femen spokeswoman, Inna Shevchenko, said Uefa was "trying to influence our government" to legalise prostitution during the tournament, which will take place in June and July next summer. Uefa will hold the draw for the finals in Kiev on Friday.

Kiev police arrived at the gates of the downtown stadium five minutes later and the women were dragged into a police vehicle and driven away.

Click here to see pictures from the demonstration.

FEMEN - Main Website

Ai Weiwei Supporters Strip Off As Artist Faces 'Porn' Investigation [Censorship]

This article was taken from guardian.co.uk:

When artist Ai Weiwei disappeared, supporters made online appeals for his return. When authorities handed him a £1.5m tax bill, they sent money to help pay it. And now that he faces an investigation for spreading pornography – his admirers have stripped off.

Internet users began tweeting their nude photographs after Ai announced that authorities had questioned his cameraman over pictures which showed the artist and four women naked.

Many Chinese contemporary artists have taken pictures of themselves without clothes, and the pictures of Ai that have emerged so far do not appear sexually charged. Some suspect that it may be an attempt by the authorities to smear the artist, whose 81-day detention this spring caused international outrage.

Officials accused him of economic crimes but supporters say the authorities are engaged in a vendetta because of Ai's social and political activism and criticism of the government.

Ai Wei Fans' Nudity website:  Listen, Chinese Government: Nudity is NOT Pornography (http://awfannude.blogspot.com/)

While a couple of internet users tweeted full-frontal shots, others have come up with more decorous – and ingenious – variations on the theme. Some posted pictures of themselves as babies; one photo shows a row of nine unclothed women and one man – with images of Ai's head superimposed over their genitals and nipples.

Li Tiantian, a Shanghai lawyer who was herself detained earlier this year, appears partially concealed by a picture of a "grass mud horse", a creature invented by internet users to mock censors; its name is a homonym for a graphic curse.

"It is an expression of support for Ai Weiwei and scorn to the Chinese government. It shows our attitude and anger towards the government's behaviour," she said.

"We are simply using an eyecatching way to attract people's attention. There are so many pornography websites in China: they don't regulate them, yet say that this is spreading pornography."

Wen Yunchao, a blogger in Hong Kong who posted two nude photographs of himself, told Reuters: "This is a matter that has made many people very indignant. The interpretation of people's naked bodies in itself is an individual freedom and a form of creative freedom. Also, we don't see any pornographic elements in [Ai's] photographs. So we are using this extreme method to express our protest."

Zhao Zhao, the videographer who took the original pictures of Ai last year, told Reuters that Beijing police interrogated him about them for about four hours, telling him the photographs were obscene.

Ai told the news agency that police had also questioned him about the pictures. He said they did not have a hidden political meaning and were not meant to criticise the government, but noted that authorities might nonetheless see them as a "rebellious act".

Separately, the artist has encouraged supporters to call bloggers and commentators he described as leaders of the "50 cent" – pro-government – internet users, tweeting their phone numbers.

One of them, Wang Wen, told the Guardian he had received between 100 and 200 calls and innumerable messages since Sunday and that another man had received about 1,000 calls. He complained that posting the number was not fair, but refused to comment further.

SOURCE: guardian.co.uk

SEE PICTURES - 艾未粉果 Ai Wei Fans' Nudity

Ai Weiwei Investigated Over Nude Art [Art]

This article was taken from guardian.co.uk:

Ai Weiwei is under investigation for spreading pornography, the Chinese artist has said, as the authorities turned their attention from political subversion and tax evasion to online images of nudity.

He said police had questioned his cameraman Zhao Zhao on Thursday over pictures Zhao had taken of the artist. "They clearly told him this is an investigation, now, they are doing on me, on pornography," Ai told the AFP news agency.

One of the pictures, One Tiger Eight Breasts, shows Ai posing nude on a wooden chair flanked by four naked women who are giggling and smiling.

"Netizens came to take photos with me, so we said why don't we take nudity photos, then everybody agreed so we did it and they were put on the internet, and that's it, we forget about it," Ai said.

This year Ai has been held for 81 days in a secret location, questioned about subversion and then accused of tax evasion and given a fine of 15m yuan. Several of his assistants have been detained for lengthy periods and interrogated about Ai's political beliefs, business and personal life.

His lawyers say the investigations are politically motivated to silence Ai, who has used his high profile to speak out on police brutality, official corruption and human rights violations.

Police have been reluctant to discuss his case and there has been little or no coverage in most domestic media outlets. But the Communist party newspaper Global Times said on Wednesday that dissidents such as Ai could only exist because of the support of the west.

"For 30 years Ai Weiweis have emerged and fallen. But China has kept rising despite their pessimistic predictions. The real social trend is that they will be eliminated in the rising process of China," said a comment article in the paper.

Ai has attempted to turn the tables by mounting an internet campaign against his accusers. He says 30,000 people contributed a total of more than 8m yuan to his online appeal for loans to challenge his tax fine.

A pornography or obscenity charge based on the pictures revealed so far is likely to incur ridicule and anger among Ai's supporters. Many Chinese contemporary artists have appeared naked in their work.

Ai said police had previously questioned him about the images, but he doubted they understood art. "If they see nudity as pornography, then China is still in the Qing dynasty," he told Associated Press.

SOURCE: The Guardian

FEMEN Protest In NYC Occupy Wall Street

Yesterday, 17 November, the American branch of the women's movement FEMEN carried out an action on Wall Street in New York City in protest against the repressive power over activists Occupy Wall Street. American activist FEMEN appeared at the police cordoned the street at 9 o'clock in the morning and occupied the Wall Street to its topless protest. The girls, with placards in their hands and crowns on their heads, freedom, and demanded withdrawal of the American police in the line of the tent camp occupants. In response to demands FEMEN police attempted to arrest activists of movement.

The women's movement FEMEN, through its American activists, requires the City of New York, Mayor Bloomberg and the police take his hands away from the peaceful protesters and let them back in Zuccotti Park. FEMEN condemns expulsion of Protestant tenants from Central Park in New York and calls for international condemnation of acts of the city authorities and police need to condemn them for abuse, neglect constitutional rights, freedom of speech and protest.

FEMEN-USA condemns the brutal attitude the New York Police in relation to female occupants, many of which expelled from Zuccotti Park and arrested. Activists FEMEN-USA-known instances of ill-treatment of arrested women in police stations. On the streets of New York American FEMEN chanting "Hands off our sisters!"

See pictures of the protest here.

FEMEN - Main Website

[Topfree] Against Christopher Columbus Day

Artistic Director of Dance Theater Group Kandake, Olga El, exposes her nakedness, an artistic expression to relay frustration over Christopher Columbus Day during the Occupy Wall Street protests on Monday October 10th 2011.

Topless Protesters at Occupy Wall Street [Video]