David Caton links public nudity to sex crimes. Joe Redner says repression invites crime.
By BILL VARIAN
Published July 19, 2003
TAMPA - There was a little problem when the Tiger Bay Club of Tampa presented its ceremonial stuffed Garfield doll Friday to the author of the best question during this month's luncheon.
Family values advocate David Caton had just debated strip club owner Joe Redner over a proposed antinudity ordinance Caton is pushing. Caton hopes the ordinance will shut clubs like those owned by Redner.
Then it was time for the Garfield Committee to present the stuffed animal.
"I apologize," said committee member Steve LaBour. "I think he's naked."
That brought the last of the guffaws from the Tiger Bay membership after a rip-roaring debate.
In Caton and Redner, the club couldn't have chosen a more sweet and sour, sugar and spice duo to debate such a topic.
Caton has led several campaigns in Hillsborough, including efforts to remove adult magazines from convenience stores. He now wants Hillsborough commissioners to approve a referendum to decide whether voters want an ordinance that would ban nudity in public places, including strip clubs.
Redner is a frequent, if unsuccessful, political candidate whose Mons Venus strip club on Dale Mabry highway is one of Tampa's landmarks.
Caton spoke first, laying out statistics he says show that a prevalence of nude-oriented businesses in Hillsborough has led to much higher rates of rape and other sex crimes. However, he said Friday that the most important part of his current push is not the ordinance itself, but the referendum he believes will compel law enforcement to enforce laws already on the books.
"The concept of the referendum is more important than the ordinance itself," Caton said.
He faced repeated questions from the audience charging that his statistics show perhaps a coincidence, but not a causal effect.
Redner honed in on Caton's comparisons between Tampa and Miami, where rape rates are considerably lower, according to Caton's figures. There're also fewer adult businesses, Caton said.
Redner said there are also nude beaches in Miami, and that the city's strip clubs allow full dancer-patron contact and sell alcohol. He argued that Caton's reasoning is steered solely by his religious convictions. "Faith beyond reason," he called it.
"It's the repression of sex in our society that actually causes sex crimes," Redner said.
Redner scoffed at questions about whether his businesses exploit women. He said his dancers make more than most of the businessmen, women and politicians in the room.
