Police in Wisconsin say that nobody will face any charges in an alleged incident where a young nude girl participated in a "Naked Bike Ride" with adults.
The World Naked Bike Ride is an international bicycle riding event where "clothing is optional." The World Naked Bike Ride is "about protesting oil dependency and celebrating the power and individuality of our bodies."
The first World Naked Bike Ride was held in 2003. By 2010, there were WNBR events in 74 cities across 17 countries.
On June 17, approximately 150 people participated in the World Naked Bike Ride in Madison, Wisconsin. One of the participants was allegedly a young girl.
A local resident notified Dane County Sup. Jeff Weigand that there was a nude girl who appeared to be younger than 10 years old participating in the World Naked Bike Ride in Madison. There was reportedly a photo of the young girl uploaded to social media.
The Wisconsin State Journal reported:
A Wisconsin State Journal reporter who covered the event also saw the girl there, and a different photo of the girl appears on the Facebook page of a World Naked Bike Ride participant. Madison police spokesperson Stephanie Fryer on Wednesday said police received a complaint on Sunday about an image of the girl posted to social media, and on Tuesday a complaint from someone who saw the girl at the ride.
Weigand demanded, "Our law enforcement officers need to investigate this matter and enforce our laws. If a child was allowed to participate in this naked bike ride, any and all adults who supported and condoned this need to be arrested immediately."
Detectives with the Special Victims Unit of the Madison Police Department investigated the case.
However, police said that no laws had been broken and nobody would be charged.
Fryer said that investigators said the incident did not violate any of the state's child pornography laws or violating any harmful material statutes.
According to the Wisconsin State Journal, "Weigand rejected the notion that state criminal law wouldn’t apply in the incident, pointing to state statutes that, for example, bar sexual exploitation of a child, causing a child to view or listen to sexual activity or causing a child to expose genitals. However, those laws seek to protect minors from engaging in sexual conduct or causing sexual arousal, something the organizers of the bike ride have said the event is not intended to do."
Madison World Naked Bike Ride organizer Peter Keating told the outlet that the participation of children in the event is "not an issue at all" and "it has always been our position that minors are perfectly welcome to participate as they please, as long as they are accompanied by parent or legal guardian."
The World Naked Bike Ride website for the Milwaukee event states: "Anyone is welcome to join, but minors must be accompanied by a parent or guardian."
The World Naked Bike Ride website defends children participating in the nude event:
The idea that somehow children are negatively affected by non-sexualized nudity is a myth. Children are more likely to be curious if nudity was discouraged in their family. The only thing prudish parents have to worry about is that their children might want to get naked themselves if it looks like people are having fun. As children grow older they are more likely to resent repressive parents if they think they lack common sensibilities.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel said the naked bike ride is not illegal because it is "technically a first amendment protest, so it is legal as long as riders do not participate in any lewd or 'untoward' behavior."
https://www.theblaze.com/news/naked-bike-ride-child-wisconsin
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