I have been wondering is it a sin for women to expose their breasts and/or a sin for me (as a guy) to look at them. I know in Europe women go topless and it is considered totally fine. However, in America it is not considered appropriate (for the most part). So I’m wondering since breasts have no sexual purpose (therefor not likely to temp men to sexual thoughts) they should not have to be covered. (same as a mans chest) Now you could argue that is does temp men, but why is that as breast have no sexual purpose?
should/ could we adopt the European train of thought?
sorry if my question is not so clear its kinda written by my train of thought
also sorry for sounding perverted.
Well, it’s not perverted, and people need to people to discuss sexual things and other bizarre topics on here because these are key moral issues.
I can’t speak to the morality of this, but here are some things to consider.
Some tribes in the equatorial Third World have women with breast exposed. But that’s a more weather related situation than a lustful one. Should they have to wear clothes even it means dying of heat exhaustion?
A Muslim man and I were discussing how women in the West dress. I tell them the first consideration is** usually the weather** since it tends to change. Sure, there’s always the girl who will wear low-cut shirts to show off more cleveage, and people notice. A priest once told that me that if you’re a woman and you’re going to Communion with everything ready to fall out, don’t think that isn’t noticed and not discussed.
In Europe, women do go topless** at the beaches**. That’s culturally acceptable, but not so much so in the USA. The problem I have in Western Europe on these issues has more to do with their rosy-colored idealist view of the world in terms of their immigration policy and migrants coming there and seeing this kind of stuff, experiencing culture shock which frankly has driven up crime. A lot of tourists and immigrants sometimes see this kind of culture as a motive to sexually assault women. That’s where the biggest problem comes in for me.
I mean, if you talk to some of the more conservative elements there, they don’t have an ounce of respect for these women. Some men will even exploit them and use them for practice dating and sex all the while with the intention of marrying someone from their own religion, race and/or culture.
It’s a pretty charged topic, but one I won’t shy away from, and it does pertain to what you are asking about.
It’s not exactly the intention of the women to tempt men when women go swimming or try and survive the tropical heat in say the same sense that pornography is. If it is, then the conversation about morality changes because** sin depends largely on intention,** but be careful here, because as Senior Apologist Jimmy Akin wrote that
you don’t exactly have been relishing the idea of mortal sin to commit one.
Ultimately, I always defer these kinds of questions to priests, spiritual directors and apologists because again, I don’t have the moral authority on this. Because this is so prevalent today, most moralists have techniques for mental discipline that a person can use to tell when its and when its not a sin.
