Pants of protest

Humorous yet shocking, mundane yet intimate – underpants have proved a useful tool for change. Katie Dancey-Downs examines the power of political undercrackers.

The constituency office was empty on the drizzly Saturday morning that artist and theatre maker Lorna Rees strung up her knickers.

‘No-one should be able to photo my pants unless I want them to,’ read the slogan hastily scrawled across the freshly unboxed undies, which had been sewn together into bunting. The banner referred to the ‘anti-upskirting bill’ which Lorna’s member of parliament had delayed in the UK House of Commons the previous day.

The private members’ bill sought to make it an offence to take photos up

people’s skirts without their permission. But Conservative MP Christopher Chope shouted the one word to stop the Voyeurism (Offences) Bill in its tracks on 15 June 2018: ‘Object!’ Rather than passing to the next stage, the bill would now have to go through a lengthy process, involving a debate and vote.

Angered by this, Laura and a colleague decided to take action. The next morning, they pulled over on the main road into the Saxon town of Christchurch in Dorset, southwest England. Lorna, giggling, pinned the bunting around the front door of Chope’s office and hopped back into the

car. Now, nestled between the wheelie bins and council-maintained flower planters, was a metaphorical middle finger to the local member of parliament.

Underwear makes a bold political statement. Take the famous Miss America protest in 1968, where women threw items that they felt represented their oppression – including underwear, wigs and false eyelashes – into a ‘freedom trash can’, sparking the myth of bra-burning feminists and kicking the whole movement up a gear. Organizer of the stunt, Carol Hanish, used words that could be applied to any number of