BAGUIO CITY -- The Baguio City legislative council has started to tackle a proposed ordinance prohibiting everyone to go topless or bottomless in public places within the Philippines' so-called Summer Capital.
Titled "Dress Code Ordinance", the proposed local law is aimed at promoting decency and modesty, as well as prevention of harassment in the city, its author, City Councilor Leandro Yangot Jr., said.
The measure was approved on first reading by the council during its regular session on Monday.
Under the proposed ordinance, no individual shall roam around the city naked or wearing apparel covering only the lowermost or uppermost part of his or her body without any top or bottom clothing.
Further, the edict stipulated that it is the duty and responsibility of a parent or guardian to discipline or disallow their minor children from going naked or half-naked in any public place in the city.
Yangot said even vendors in the city's public and satellite markets are prohibited from wearing tattered clothes or going topless, while vendors in the wet and "carinderia" sections must don aprons.
The proposed ordinance has exemptions, though.
Exempted from the measure, which has corresponding penalties for violation, are women who are nursing and feeding their children in public, members of the indigenous peoples wearing ethnic apparel on account of their customs and traditions, artists and street performers who are performing within the standards of their trade, provided that the activity does not exceed the community standards of tolerance and the artists possess special permits issued by the local government for the purpose, victims of accidents who require immediate medical emergencies, water sports enthusiasts practicing or loitering in public swimming pools and rivers, penitents initiating penitential processions during the Lenten season, protesters on account of their school-related traditions, porters carrying heavy amount of load for deliveries on rainy season, and any person who is prevented from wearing his shirt and has to walk half-naked in public places on account of any justifiable cause, unavoidable circumstances, or accidents.
Under the proposal, violators shall be penalized with a fine of PHP500 to PHP1,000 or three to eight hours of community service from the first to third offense, respectively.
Yangot pointed out that decency, through the proper wearing of garments, gives an image of cleanliness that goes with proper grooming and personal hygiene and that the fashion of today’s youth points to the extinction of modesty that is seen as being out of style or old fashioned.
He said going naked or half-naked on the streets ruins the interest of the city as the “tourism mecca" and "education capital of the north".
He pointed out that being topless has serious drawbacks aside from sunburn or cumbersome discomfort.
For men, he noted, going shirtless gives them the image of being thugs. As for women who are scantily dressed, people mistake them for prostitutes and might be subjected to sexual harassment, Yangot said. (PNA)
