A lot has been happening in the world of those found guilty of sexual assault and sexual misconduct. Brock Turner, as I’m sure everyone is now aware, is being released only after 3 months of incarceration. Jared Fogle, who pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography and paying for sex with minors, is now attempting to sue the family of one of his victims, claiming that her parents filled her home life with unnecessary stress and anxiety which may have contributed to her encounter with Fogle.

In the brief and embittering moments of clarity when I can no longer pretend that these stories are the main features on tonight’s episode of The Twilight Zone, but are, instead, the reality which we all contribute I find myself recalling to memory the exact moment when I first perceived the severity to which women are objectified.

Slightly over a year ago, the Free the Nipple movement began gaining an increasing amount of attention, and it seemed that many women were releasing themselves from the coils of their garments. I have always considered myself to be an advocate for women’s rights, but I must admit that I could not understand the popularity of this particular protest. At the time it seemed trivial for women across the country to hold rallies centered around exposing their breasts before an equal amount of national attention and passion were directed towards topics which I considered more appropriate such as sexual assault or the infamous wage gap. Yet, despite my feelings, the movement continued to gain support and I could not help but feel as though there must be something I was missing.

Eventually certain advocates of the bare-chested crusade began uploading photos of their breasts on social media platforms except with brilliantly terrible Photoshop edits which covered their female nipples with male nipples pulled from who knows where off the endless supply that can be found on the internet. At this moment I became convinced that there was no legitimate or describable difference between male and female nipples, and if this is true then why should women not be allowed to roam shirtless on particularly hot beach days if it means they will be more comfortable?

That’s when I realized that, although there is no intrinsic difference between the two, the segregation of nipples occurs due to the social constructs which humanity places upon them. A female must keep her nipples covered, because it would be inappropriate to have them exposed. But why is it inappropriate? A women’s nipples, just like a man’s nipples, are not reproductive organs which means they have little to do with sex. It is at this precise moment where both social constructs begin to take their insidious form. Women’s breasts, through media outlets such as movies, television, advertisements etc., have been overly sexualized along with many other parts of her body. Now, I am sure for the majority of you this is not exactly groundbreaking news, nor does it take an arduous study to find examples of this happening in our society. However, it is the outcome of this over-sexualization which may be contributing to our nation’s sexual assault epidemic.

The further we sexualize a women’s body the further we begin to objectify her, but let us hover on the word “objectify” a moment as I think it is perfectly telling of the situation. A women’s body becomes an object that, as we lay our eyes upon it, represents sex before spirit, lust before life experience, and pleasure before her own personality. It is through near cultural brainwashing that many see unable to break the correlation of a womanly features and sex, and I now understand the importance of the Free the Nipple movement as they have pinpointed a regular feature common to all women’s body and are doing their best to desexualize the taboo which has cultivated in our society.

So what is to be done, and how may we continue the efforts of the organizations and movements that are already heavily involved in fighting the associations of sex and sensuality with skin? My personal take is that our country needs to be more educated on the subject. We must inspire men and women alike that 1.) Their bodies are not meant to be immediately correlated with sex, and that this is a cultural perversion which much be counteracted and 2.) A body should never be perceived sexually unless in an intimate and consenting sexual situation.

We live in a modern time where people are much more likely to give themselves over to the pleasures and vices which have been debilitating forces of the human race since the beginning of time. It would also seem that people have become more infatuated with sex than ever before. We can no longer deny that sex has once again began to get the better of us, and this is unacceptable in the 21^st century. As humankind continues to advance forward our morals and ethics regarding how we treat each other should follow suite. Sexual assault is a barbarism which has no place in today’s day and age yet it seems to be more relevant than ever before.

Stories such as Brock Turner and Jared Fogle show us exactly how ineffective our judicial systems are at dealing with these tragedies. No longer should we stand by idly while every day we witness people exert dominance over another person as if they are simply claiming some sort of object which is rightfully theirs. As a society we must band together and make a conscious effort to change the ideals of our society so that not everybody which we perceive is not immediately in a sexual frame of reference. We must once again return to the mindset of treating one another with respect as we are all living breathing humans with hopes, dreams, aspirations, and (perhaps most importantly) a pair of completely non-sexual nipples.