Topless bathers fight for rights

UPPSALA , Sweden, Nov. 13 (UPI) -- A network of female Swedish activists is leading the charge to win women the right to swim in the country's pools sans bikini tops.

The group, Bara Brost -- which translates to "Bare Breasts" and "Just Breasts" -- was incensed by an August incident that involved two young women who were asked to leave a pool in the city of Uppsala when they refused to cover their breasts, The Local reported Tuesday.

"It's a question of equality," said Ragnhild Karlsson, 22, one of the women asked to leave the pool. "I think it's a problem that women are sexualized in this way. If women are forced to wear a top, shouldn't men also have to?"

"We want our breasts to be as 'normal' and desexualized as men's, so that we too can pull off our shirts at football matches," Bara Brost spokeswomen Astrid Hellroth och Liv Ambjornsson told Ottar, a magazine published by the Swedish Association for Sexuality Education.

The group has since staged two topless swims in southern Sweden pools. In both cases, the women were asked to leave.

Sweden's Equal Opportunities Ombudsman is scheduled to decide this month whether to back the women's cause.