Thinking about sex and exposing navel to be banned in Bali?

Strange reports about a proposed law against exposing one's navel which were beginning to circulate on bulletin boards have escalated into 2 articles in today's Age. Apparently a special unit of the navy is going to police the impending ban au bord de la mer, and kissing in public is going to be infra dig.

The police didn't wait for the bill to be passed, though, as this 7 February Jakarta Post article explains:

A total of 105 books, 37,000 tabloids and 350 magazines were confiscated recently from newsstands in the five municipalities of Jakarta as well as Depok municipality.

This Indonesienne professor of feminism better be careful of Indonesia's few fundamentalists if she is going to continue saying things like this:

INDONESIANS also have sensuality, says leading feminist and university professor Gadis Arriva. "Women here have always dressed sexily and in tight clothes. This law is something very alien to us. We have bare-breasted women in Bali and Papua, this is part of our culture.

Bare breasted women in Bali? I think not, though it is of course the bare breasts which lured intrepid adventurers there in the first place. Mind you Balinese formal wear for women comprises gauzy embroidered tops which are quite diaphanous and show very clearly the underlying brassieres of inevitably non-matching colour, and this attire has already been raised as an issue in the context of this law.

Indcoup, who has been championing the burgeoning career of Tiara Lestari, Indonesia's first Playboy centrefold, whether out of a desire to boost traffic or out of genuine admiration, will not be pleased.

Thanks to a 20 year old Filipina for the magnificent navel photo.