I’m 27 and don’t own a bra – but don’t call me ‘braless’

I had my first ever bra fitting when I was 12, after making one of the worst discoveries you can make when you’re an insecure preteen – my breasts looked different from those around me. While mine clashed in size and shape like a pair of fraternal twins, my friends’ chests were perfectly round, identical, and miraculously nipple-free.

It didn’t take long for me to realise that this symmetry was not the product of genes or knives, but of a simple underwear upgrade. They were wearing bras, and I wasn’t. And just like that, I was no longer a girl wearing a vest – I was officially “braless”.

Panicked, I asked my mother to book an emergency appointment at a local lingerie boutique. I was convinced that if my uncaged breasts went just one more day in the wild, I’d be arrested for public indecency, or worse, ousted by my social circle. One awkward measurement and a few try-ons later, and I emerged from the shop with the relief of having finally treated an embarrassing condition.

Now 27, it’s been over a decade since I’ve worn a bra and I often find myself forgetting that being “braless” is even a thing.

The word dates back to 1968, when second wave feminists protested a Miss America pageant by throwing a number of “instruments of female torture”, including bras, into a “Freedom Trash Can”. Bra-wearing in the West has been on a steady decline ever since, with increasing numbers of women choosing alternative forms of support, like camisoles and bralettes, or skipping top underwear altogether.

I’d celebrate, but sadly, this isn’t a victory. What should be a step towards a more equal society has been hijacked as yet another weapon to survey women’s bodies – and the celebrity news cycle has become the local battleground.

A surefire way to get clicks, the word “braless” surfaces in UK tabloid headlines on a near 24/7 rotation in 2022. Sometimes it’s capitalised, just in case you missed it on your mid-commute scroll. The term is so inescapable, in fact, that a quick search of it on one of the country’s biggest news sites returned over 30 results in the past month alone.

It is almost exclusively reserved for female celebrities, with names like Bella Hadid and Molly-Mae Hague regularly anchoring whole articles with their bra-free outfits. A sexualized account of the woman’s body typically follows, with adjectives like “racy” and “steamy” appearing so often next to “braless” that they might as well be synonyms.

The underlying message is that the woman wants attention for her breasts, which, by default of being free, must be provocative. But for me, and I’m sure for many of these celebrities, the decision to go “braless” has nothing to do with aesthetics, and everything to do with comfort.

At my first fitting, I complained to the sales assistant that the bra was hurting me. She smiled knowingly and replied: “It always does at the start.” So I soldiered on, pacing around my house like I was breaking in a new pair of Doc Martens. I even slept in it that evening, hoping its clutch on my torso would exhale into a hug overnight.

But the discomfort never lifted. I would have several more bras fitted over the next four years, all of which would be ripped off my body within a few hours. At age 16, I gave up. I was once again, “braless” – only this time, I would remain so for life.

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Today, I fully respect a woman’s choice to wear a bra, but I continue to be struck by the obsession in certain sections of the media with those who don’t. On the surface, these articles on “braless” celebrities read like a celebration of women’s bodies – a harkening back to the “burn the bra” days of the Sixties.

But by highlighting the absence of the bra, we perpetuate the idea that a woman should be wearing one. Think about it. Do we say “beltless” when a woman displays the band of her high-waisted jeans? Do we view the baring of feet in minimal, strappy heels as “shoeless”? Do we gasp at her “coatless” arms when she steps out in a T-shirt?

The implication is that the “braless” woman is lacking something – something so integral to the “presentable” female body, that its omission warrants a headline right next to those on Brexit, Covid and the climate crisis. And just like these stories, the coverage of the “braless” celebrity is delivered with urgency, as if feral breasts could pose an immediate threat to the health of the nation.

Yes, it is becoming more normal to not wear a bra in society. But our liberation from them, a win that should have reaffirmed our bodily autonomy, has cracked open yet another window for us to be controlled. Our loose breasts are being bridled by a culture of surveillance that, unlike bras, can’t be removed with the flick of a clasp. And as long as the word “braless” keeps making ad revenue, the Big Brother of the female body will continue its invisible reign.