Los Angeles police detectives are trying to identify a suspected burglar caught in the nude on security video at a Boyle Heights preschool.

School security video recorded March 6 shows a naked man inside an entryway at the facility.

Investigators said he was seen parading around for several minutes while engaging in strange behavior of a sexual nature.

Regardless how crazy or creepy somebody is, it doesn't give a newspaper the right to print such scurrilous trash. Here all pretense of responsible journalism is dashed on the rocks of titillation.

First, what exactly is "strange behavior of a sexual nature"? When you're naked and being sexual in public, is there any behavior that wouldn't be strange? If you and your girlfriend are doing it doggy style, will the cops just high-five you and walk away? Will they write you up a warning if you put your girlfriend's purple thong on your head? If, in the throes of passion, your penis heads toward another opening, are tasers going to appear? Responsible news stories should resolve ambiguity. This one leaves Mormons thinking this dude was beating off, while us New Yorkers assume he was jamming his penis into a pencil sharpener with a can of baked beans up his ass.

Second, the word "parading" is judgmental stuff straight out of Fox News. Saying somebody was "parading" is like saying they were "skulking" or "shambling." No judge would allow talk like that in court.

According to the dictionary, to "parade" is to "promenade in a public place, especially in order to show off." Really, does naked + walking = parading? Can women only parade if they're naked from the waist up? I mean, there's pretty much no way to show off a pussy, even if you've got tiny banners and a book light.

Can't you amble naked? What if you have a tiny penis? Just going by this definition, the Los Angeles Times appears to be saying that this guy has got something worth showing off. And the next time they write about a naked man walking, moseying, or sauntering, it means dude's got a pencil dick.

Clearly, nudity in itself is insufficient to qualify for "parading." "Parading" requires much more ostentation than just an exposed penis, regardless of its pizzazz. "Parading" requires marching bands, or elephants, or clowns on unicycles, and the Times should refrain from making such slanted judgments lest they tar us all with the same brush. For we responsible, upstanding citizens do not parade around the dressing rooms at J. C. Penneys. We do not parade through the bathroom stalls at Arby's. And we do not "parade" from the bathroom to our beds each night, even if we have bleachers set up.