As the crowd gathered on Saturday night at Col. Summers Park in anticipation of the annual World Naked Bike Ride, not everyone in attendance were there to have a good time. Photographer Aaron Wessling was on the scene and witnessed a dustup between a couple of homophobic/nude-hating Christians and the WNE crowd. According to Aaron, the crowd was largely ignoring the protesters, who were spewing the type of hellfire and brimstone evangelism that is so easy to either mock or ignore. HOWEVER. When the Christians pulled out a Pride flag and started spitting and stomping on it? That's when the fun stopped.

The Christians were taken to task by the woman pictured above, and when pushing and shoving started, a NUDE ROLLER SKATING HERO thrust himself into the scrum, yanked the Pride flag away from the bigots, and disappeared into the crowd, who happily protected him. As Aaron said in his Instagram tag, "It was beautiful, and frightening, and powerful, in so many ways"

Aaron has more pictures of the incident (as well as the money shot of our nude roller skating hero ripping the flag away) and some very interesting thoughts about what it all means, which you should check out right here.

Nude Roller Skating Guy and "Ride Bikes/Plant Trees" Woman: PORTLAND SALUTES YOU. (And bigots can just hit the bricks.)

Follow Aaron at @aewessling