What do Bigfoot and the Occupy Wall Street movement have in common?

Two years ago, performance artist Jonathan Doyle decided to go skulking around the top of New Hampshire's Mount Monadnock in a Bigfoot costume he picked up at iParty. Mostly it was a lark, but the 31-year-old hoped the stunt might bring attention to his other work. So he hiked to the summit, donned the full-body suit and posed for photos with amused hikers. Looking to get some hits on YouTube, he filmed mock-serious interviews with backpackers describing their encounters with Bigfoot. (See the video here.) When he went back a year later to make a sequel, "The Capture of Bigfoot," Monadnock State Park officials put the kibosh on it.

What does this have to do with Occupy Wall Street? Doyle was told that he would need a special-use permit to follow through with his plans. To obtain the permit, he was required to pay $100, post a $2 million insurance bond and undergo a 30-day waiting period--all just to have a little fun in the name of art. No one had complained about the previous filming, which the artist called "socially engaging." Doyle contends that his rights of free speech are being violated. The case is scheduled to be heard in the New Hampshire Supreme Court beginning November 10.

Granted, the right to parade around a mountain top in a gorilla suit and the right to assemble en masse to protest a corporate takeover of democracy seem very removed from one another. But take a look at this video of Naomi Wolf talking about her arrest in New York for joining with Occupy Wall Street protesters. She explains how over the past 30 years government entities have increasingly required permits for activities that formerly could go on without them. More and more rules apply to public gatherings. For instance, there were not always regulations against the use of megaphones in New York City. Wolf calls it a "stealth campaign" to erode citizens' ability to speak out against the government.

Back to Bigfoot. Maybe you think Doyle's art is frivolous. That's immaterial to the constitutional issues. But I rather like the guy. Today's Boston Globe describes a performance by Doyle that endeared me to his efforts:

"Last year Doyle created an elaborate, brilliant-white angel costume with feathered wings, a melancholy Venetian mask, and a gold crown. He wore the costume into St. James Episcopal Church in Keene--smack in the middle of Sunday services--spread his wings, and stood stump-still in the back of the church. 'The preacher, he just sort of grabbed it right away and started to work with it,' said Doyle. 'It was just so shocking. He just started to talk about certain concepts in the Bible and the mystery of God and how God is found in very strange ways and mysterious places'."

I would argue that the same thing is true of the fight for free speech.