Gymnophiliac

Alpha the Robot Meets Zorine, Queen of the Nudists

2007-07-10T13:41:00.001-04:00

A fascinating bit of history, via BoingBoing today.

With a little of further research, I also discovered this historical account of Zorine and her nudists at the exposition. By today's standards it seems pretty innocent, but I think Queen Zorine actually qualified as a titillating act in the 1930's - and from that second link it sounds like actual nudists got upset with her. It seems like she was exploiting the voyeuristic urges of people back then, in an environment that must not have provided much opportunity to indulge such urges. At least that's my interpretation - the culture is so alien to me that it's impossible to get my head around how it must have been perceived back then. Which is part of what makes it so interesting, to me at least.

The mainstream isn't always right

2007-07-08T19:42:00.001-04:00

I'm starting to wonder if Nudiarist is just deliberately missing the point of my posts, as he seems to enjoy knocking down strawmen of his own creation that bear little resemblance to anything I write here.

For example, I thought that the point of my last post was pretty obvious and straightforward. It was simply looking at the way society perceives and reacts to different kinds of threats to children, and pointing out the frequent disconnect between the reality and the reaction. The aim was to highlight that the "threat" of nudity is in actuality less than that of other kinds of threats, and that society's reaction to it is totally overblown, especially compared to how it treats these more substantial threats to the well being of children. However, there's no evidence that Nudiarist managed to get that. Perhaps that's the fault of the author, although to be honest I can't imagine how I could have been much clearer, and several others who've read it don't seem to have this trouble understanding the point.

To illustrate, this is his reaction to my point about child molesters, which amounts to no more than an unqualified assertion:

Sorry, Eric, while I appreciate your efforts in attempting to construct what you feel is an important series of arguments, you completely undermine yourself when you say "We live in a society that all but assumes that all men are pedophiles." Even in context this is a foolish and paranoid statement. If you said "we live in a society that all but assumes that all men exposing their genitals in the presence of a child are pedophiles", you might have a point.

Now, in that post, I included the example of British Airways banning men from sitting next to children on flights. Not "men exposing their genitals", just plain old men. Nudiarist did not address that in his objection. I also included the example of Virginia's initiative that encourages people to report adults holding hands with children, again, irrespective of whether genitals are being exposed - it's a program designed to foster suspicion of any adult/child contact. Nudiarist didn't address that, either. I also could have included other links - such as the very sad story of Abigail Raye, whose potential savior opted not to save her for fear of being labeled a pervert, or Brennan Hawkins, who was lost in the woods and actually hid from rescuers because he feared being stolen, or many more examples indicative of a cultural hysteria regarding grown men and children.

There are any number of ways that one could have rationally critiqued my point. Personally, I'd have argued against the generalizability of these extreme examples. But Nudiarist, rather than address either of the original examples or the societal issues raised by them, simply offered his own faith-based assertion that that my statement was "foolish and paranoid", as if that's sufficient to prove me wrong.

Normally I wouldn't even bother replying to this kind of argument (if you can call it that) but elsewhere in his post he actually managed to raise a separate issue, which I'll get to in a moment.

I chose examples in my previous post in an effort to cover the spectrum of real and imagined threats and corresponding overreactions or underreactions. I included sports in the list specifically because it was by far the most non-obvious harmful thing I could think of. Sports are outright encouraged by parents and society alike, often describing them as "wholesome" and "character building", as well as attaching the word "hero" to people who play the game well. Most people are unaware of any negative effects, largely because sports are so popular. As a result, many people react exactly as Nudiarist did when it's pointed out to them - knee jerk disbelief.

Knowing that the assertion that sports are harmful would be met with some skepticism by most of my readers, I provided several supporting links, referencing hooliganism, drug and sex scandals, and an article correlating them to crime. Granted, I didn't delve into it too deeply, but that would have been well beyond the scope of the post. I felt the links provided were enough to support the general idea that sports have ill effects that people don't often think about about.

Given that I did provide that evidence - limited as it may have been - I'm surprised that Nudiarist's only rebuttal was:

There is no point to be made here, it's just random demonizing. Sure, there has to be somebody out there making these arguments, but it's way out of the mainstream and has no bearing on reality.

Now, the "somebody", if he'd bothered to follow one of the links, is economist Stephen Dubner, co-author of Freakonomics (which became a bestseller by arguing non-mainstream ideas), who was sharing an article on the blog of the same name by French political scientist Sebastian Roche. Also mentioned in that blog entry as having discussed the link between sports and crime is author, sports journalist, and NYT columnist Robert Lipsyte, who has written much on the darker sides of the sports business and jock culture. These are all people to whom I ascribe far more credibility on the question than Nudiarist or his argumentum ad ignorantiam.

Further, even if none of those names above mean anything to you - there's plenty of reality-bearing evidence that I'd think should become obvious to anyone considering the idea with an open mind. One need only open the sports page on any given day to find stories about pro sports scandals having to do with drugs or sex. One need only glance at any high school to notice the fact that the computer club isn't ever the ones bullying the football team. Anyone who's taken a general psychology course is probably familiar with BIRGing and CORFing - as well as the fact sports breeds violence & aggression, misogynism, and a sense of entitlement among athletes. While these ideas aren't well known or often thought about by the general public, they're not especially unknown or even controversial among psychologists, either (which again, is what made it such a great example to use in my previous post).

Anyway, my ultimate point here isn't the question of whether sports are good, bad, or somewhere in between, as it's not a debate I have any particular investment in one way or the other (though obviously I have my informed opinion about it). What I found curious is that rather than investigate the issue and challenge my assertion on rational grounds, I guess it was just easier to say that the idea that sports are good is popular and therefore must be right - because popular ideas are always right... right?

I would think that if one wanted to challenge my assertion about sports, they would have challenged the validity of my original examples, or at least offered counterexamples showing positive benefits. That may have produced a real debate and who knows, maybe I would have been proven wrong. Instead, the sole objection Nudiarist offered is based on the popularity of the view that sports are good, which I guess he thought that was sufficient to prove that I was "randomly demonizing".

I find this to be an especially poor argument coming from a nudist, considering that nudism itself is a far cry from mainstream and that the mainstream view is that nudity is offensive, wrong, and harmful - which makes him at best inconsistent and at worst hypocritical to use such an argument. This kind of non-thinking deference to mainstream views and social norms without consideration for evidence or reason is fairly typical among nudists and stands as one of my pet peeves about them. It also gives the appearance of being closed minded and intolerant when nudists need to be about just the opposite. Also, using such arguments also shows a complete lack of awareness of the basic arguments that justify what we do, as well as the relationship between nudists and the rest of society. Nudists, just by being nudists, argue that at least one mainstream view held by society is completely wrong. So then why should nudists ascribe credibility to other mainstream ideas just because they're mainstream? If citing mainstream support for or against something is really a valid argument in of itself, then on what basis can we defend this lifestyle, and what right do we have to practice it?

Further, there's a funny thing about these mainstream views that Nudiarist hinges a lot of his arguments on: contrary to what he implies, these views seldom have much of anything to do with reality. In fact, they're often spectacularly wrong. The view that Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, had no WMD's, and that an invasion of Iraq would be a disaster was very out of the mainstream in 2003 - they turned out to be dead on accurate though. It's only recently that the mainstream view seems to have come around on scientific issues like global warming and social issues like homosexuality - one need not go back much further than a decade to find the majority on the wrong side of those questions. As we go back further in history we find mainstream support for such historical atrocities as slavery, racism, child labor, and the subservient role of women, to name a few. The entirety of scientific progress depends on challenging the mainstream - experiments are designed to prove that the theory being tested is wrong, and people like Galileo, Charles Darwin, and Albert Einstein revolutionized the way we see the world because they threw out some of the most fundamental mainstream ideas of their time. It's also worth remembering how non-mainstream ideas like "inalienable rights" and "all men are created equal" once were.

On a personal level, one of the things that I pride myself on is that I make a genuine effort to overcome my human biases and think both critically and independently about pretty much everything I can. I regularly challenge my own assumptions as well as the assumptions of society, and strive for consistency in my world view and a rational basis to rest it on. Do I always succeed? Of course not. I'll often fail to challenge assumptions that I should have challenged, and many times I'll come to conclusions that are simply wrong even when I do ask the right questions. But I always seek to correct myself and learn, and I simply can't imagine living a life where I take society's supposed wisdom at face value, where we're talking about nudity, the value of sports, or anything else one can imagine.

It's a good thing too, because while mainstream views do (usually) eventually change to more closely match reality, they've historically proven to be a pretty unreliable judge of what's right. Nudists, who challenge one of the more strongly held views of the mainstream, ought to be even more aware of that than most.

Won't Someone Please Think of the Children?

2007-07-06T14:04:00.000-04:00

(I actually wrote most of this post a while ago, but Academic Naturist, thanks to his post linked to below, deserves credit for inspiring me to pull up the draft and finish it)

I have a hypothesis, based on some observations I've made about the people around me: People lose all ability to think rationally when it comes to children.

I don't know what it is about children that creates this effect - I understand the impulse to protect them, both from an ethical and biological point of view, but that just makes it even more mind boggling how incompetent adults are at it.

Take all the very real dangers facing children that parents don't know about, downplay, or outright ignore:

Marketing and Advertising.

The average kid watches an astounding 18,000 television advertisements a year, the majority of which are for candy, junk food, fast food, or sugary breakfast cereals. Advertising is designed to manipulate values, desires, and perceived needs - and it's effective enough towards that marketers spend $70 billion dollars a year on TV commercials alone. Parents will sometimes get concerned over the content of the television programming - how many have you known to show any concern over the effect of the advertisements that accompany it?.
Automobiles.

After the first year of life, accidents become by far and away the leading cause of death under the age of 14 (and continue to be a significant cause of death throughout the teen years and the rest of your life). The vast majority of those accidents involve automobiles. We should all be scared shitless any time we go anywhere near a car, but instead parents think nothing of piling kids into the car as they barrel down the highway yapping on their cell phones.
Global Warming.

It bears mentioning. These kids, we plan on them growing up one day, right? Assuming no change in life expectancy, someone born in 2007 can expect to live to see the year 2080. One would imagine that a responsible parent would seek to fix the world's problems before handing it off to their kids - instead most seem to expect these kids to solve them, at a time when they'll be far more difficult to fix. Rather, what I see is parents driving their kids all over suburbia in gas guzzling minivans and SUV's. The way people are curiously unconcerned with the impact of that behavior is disturbing, to say the least.
Violent Media

While claims about the alleged harm caused by viewing sexual media are specious at best (see below), violent media has been repeatedly shown to have at least minor ill effects.

Then there's the terrible stuff that parents do to their kids and are seemingly oblivious to:

Obesity.

About 17% of children are overweight, which has led to increasing occurrences of in Type 2 Diabetes at younger ages, as well as heart disease and other problems later in life. While some parents do put an emphasis on eating healthy, it's clear that not nearly enough do - especially given that 66% of those same adults are overweight or obese themselves.

No sane parent should feed their kid McDonald's or any other fast food. Nor should they feed them pre-prepared meals from the supermarket that are chock full of preservatives. Nor should they let them drink soda, which is chock full of high fructose corn syrup (and diet soda has its own set of problems). Yet given that peddlers of these products find it profitable to market to children (see the point about TV ads above), it seems that many, many parents don't have any issue subjecting their children to this harm.

Then there's the stuff we outright encourage, but is actually pretty bad:

Sports.

Yes, sports. What, you haven't noticed how they make people violent? How it correlates with crime? You've never noticed the way High School cliques develop around sports teams, forming the basis for in-group behavior and bullying? Or how a school's star athletes can get away with murder (and in the case of pro athletes, sometime literally get away with it)? Rather than encourage great thinkers and people of accomplishment as role models, we teach kids to idolize professional baseball and basketball stars - people who at their best still contribute no more to society than Paris Hilton.

Contrary to the message of every sports movie ever made, there's very little redeeming quality to be found in organized sports, and what value there is decreases exponentially with levels of competitiveness.
Homework.

Despite the conventional wisdom, homework has a lot of negatives and no positives to speak of.
Religion.

I'm not going to expand on that one - because if you'll ever agree with me on that one, you don't need to read the argument here. And conversely, if you don't agree with me, no amount of links is going to convince you otherwise.

Then there's the legitimate threats that we overreact to and in a rather spectacular style, utterly fail to protect against:

Child Abductions/Molestation.

Remember how someone tried to blow up a plane with his shoe, and now we have to take off our shoes at the airport? And then we went through the same thing with bottles of water. These security practices aren't just annoying: they're completely pointless. Yet we do them anyway, because it gives the appearance of doing something, however ineffective.

Now, if there's one thing in this world that breeds even more irrationality than the threat of terrorism, it's the threat of child molesters. Child molesters, like terrorists, are out there. They're bad guys, they mean harm, and they need to be stopped. Sexual abuse of a child is one of the more truly horrific things imaginable. But it's truly stunning how misplaced the fear of it is, and how we wind up not protecting children from the threat as a result.

I mean holy fuck - the state of Virginia wants you to call the cops if you see an adult holding hands with a child. If you live down there, I'd advise against helping a young kid cross the street. British Airways bans men from sitting next to children on flights. We live in a society that all but assumes that all men are pedophiles.

Here's the reality of child molestation though. The vast majority of molesters are family members. The vast majority of the rest know the kid in some other capacity (teachers, priests). And child abductions and molestation by strangers is so rare that every single time one happens in this country of 300 million, it makes the national news.

That latter point probably explains why people are so irrationally afraid that their kid is going to be the next JonBenet Ramsey - if we see it on the TV, we think it must happen more often than it does. (As a rule of thumb, if it's on the national nightly news, it's not actually anything we should waste energy worrying about.)

Here's the thing though: if we want to help make children safe from strangers that would abduct them off the street, "don't talk to strangers" is really bad advice. We actually make the world less safe for them by preaching it.

Now, at the same time that we irrationally fear for the children, there's another group of "children" that we show a completely irrational fear of. Consequently, we place restrictions on them that (surprise!) wind up doing more harm than good. That's right, I'm talking about:

Teenagers

We live in a world where increasingly, teenagers are legally prohibited from doing much of anything. Driving is restricted. A group of teenagers hanging out in a town park, minding their own business, will (in my experience) always attract a cop. Shopping malls are increasingly off limits. Freedom of speech for teenagers, not so much.

It shouldn't surprise anyone that the onerous restrictions and prohibitions we subject them to actually cause many of the behaviors we want to limit.

And then, if there's one thing, as a society, that we've decided we need to go above and beyond to protect all children from above all else, no matter what, no matter how much liberty and freedom we have to sacrifice to accomplish it is:

Porn and "Dirty Words"

It says a curious thing about our culture that the term "adult" can be used as a shorthand for these things, despite the fact that there are any number of other things that separate adults from children in terms of entertainment and activities we enjoy. But these "adult" things are the only ones that need to be kept out of sight of children no matter what.

We can describe gory murders on the 6:00 news, but they can't use the word "fuck" on TV. Oprah can help a con man convince millions of people that magic is real, but any depiction of sexual congress has to be left to our imagination. (Maybe if I wish hard enough, the FCC will go away?)

more than 30% of 14 year old boys are porn users

decline in rape

Nudity

(Yeah, this was a very long build up to the main point, which ironically turns out to be pretty short)

Readers of this blog are no doubt familiar with the "What if a child saw?" type objections to public nudity - but usually, people making these objections can't even define the kind of harm they think would come to a child who saw a naked person. Or, if they do, it's usually some vague mumbling about "corruption" and "innocence" - terms which should be a pretty big tip off that we've ventured into fantasy land.

Whereas the impact of sexual media and pornography is at least arguable, simple nudity simply isn't. No one has ever been able to articulate - let alone demonstrate - how a child (or anyone else) is harmed by the site of a woman's bare breasts or a man's penis. The objections and fears are completely unfounded, and have no basis in research or rationality.

There hasn't been much research done into the impact of simply nudity, but what little there is vindicates it as somewhere between harmless and a good thing - Academic Naturist just posted a great roundup of what research there is on the subject.

In fact, most of the "harm" that one can point to with regards to these last two subjects stems from repression rather than exposure. Porn in of itself is probably has no impact. But when porn is the only medium by which people learn about human sexuality and the human body, then problems start to emerge. Fear of sexual expression leads to a deficit of information about safe sex practices and in turn leads to teen pregnancy. Similarly, acting like nudity is shameful and that there's something wrong with the human body sends the message to children that there's something wrong with their body, which leads to body image problems.

So I plead with you, with parents, with society - won't someone please think of the children?

Something Awful?

2007-06-29T15:42:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite blogs on the web is Naked Jen. Simply because she's an talented writer that infuses a lot of her personality and life into her posts, making each one an enjoyable read. Which is why I cringed a little bit when she was featured on the popular Something Awful blog, which normally features the kind of content that the name would imply.

Much to her credit, Nakedjen already wrote a great response to the post, that embodies exactly why I like her writing and her attitude so much.

I don't really have much to add, especially since she already responded so well herself. But I did want to voice my support and point any of my readers that might not have been aware of her to her site.

Bums in Time Square

2007-06-26T17:52:00.001-04:00

A new ad campaign will feature naked rear ends on large billboards in Times Square:

New York city is no stranger to public displays of nudity, both in public advertising and otherwise. Still, it's a relative rarity in the big apple - so this kind of thing is welcome. Anything that exposes people to nudity and gets them used to seeing it is a good thing.

And hey, we can all hope that it becomes so commonplace that it eventually loses the shock value that makes it useful for advertising.

Study: Men look at a nude women's faces first

2007-06-21T19:54:00.001-04:00

I feel my gender is somewhat vindicated:

Contrary to popular opinion, men are more likely to look at a female's face before other areas when looking at pictures of naked women, according to a study by Emory University researchers. And women will gaze at pictures of heterosexual sex longer than men, the study found.

The study is based on how men responded to "sexy" photos, but I imagine that it's generalizable to how men look at women in general, whether nude or clothed. We're more interested in faces. Women, on the other hand, aren't so innocent:

Men went straight to the face and lingered awhile, but most of the women were more interested in the sexual activity. How much so depended on whether they were taking hormone-filled birth control pills.

The researchers reason thusly:

Wallen and Rupp said their study suggests that men's increased attention to faces may be related to higher activation in the amygdala, a portion of the brain that processes emotional information and excitement.
Women can tell by looking at naked men whether they are aroused, Wallen said, but female bodies don't reveal much.
"It's cryptic, but facial expression is one way of showing an indication of interest in and enjoyment of sex," Wallen said.

It really has very little to nothing to do with nudism, or even nudity for that matter, but I thought this was an interesting bit of research. I love when science defies the conventional wisdom and challenges the assumptions we have about the world.

NY Woman Affirms Legal Right to Go Topless

2007-06-18T14:21:00.001-04:00

My apologies for linking to the NY Post...

Who knew it was legal for a woman to walk around with her breasts exposed in New York?
Well, one woman did - and a cop didn't - and now she has forced the city to fork over a $29,000 legal settlement for illegally busting her when she law fully bared her bosom and went for a stroll two years ago.

Yes Virginia, women can go topless in NY. In fact it's been legal there for the last 15 years. (See previously mentioned Jordan Matter Photography for some pictorial examples of this). I think it's great that this woman stood up for her right and won compensation for the way she was treated.

Stats ahoy!

2007-06-16T15:38:00.001-04:00

Just wanted to share this video, where the host rattles off lots of statistics about the nude vacation business (found via Green Tea and Tan Lines).

Terrific commentary on rec.nude

2007-06-12T20:49:00.001-04:00

I just wanted to highlight a great comment I read on rec.nude today, left by cyndiann (who runs the my nude life nudist forum):

Instead of trying to attract more nudists we should be making nudity so commonplace that nudism won't be necessary any more. I'd love to see nudism as we know it become extinct.
Nudists keep trying to own positive nudity but obviously it's not working. That is why when you go to a nude beach you will find that very many people there don't consider themselves nudists at all. We need to stop thinking that there is something wrong with that.
They resent nudists telling them how they should be nude socially and it's showing in the number of people who belong to organizations. AANR has been losing membership for at least 5 years now. And it's estimated that perhaps only 2% of "nudists" belong to AANR to begin with. Most people who enjoy nudity do not go to our clubs and probably never will.
Let us push nude art, streaking, events like the World Naked Bike Rides and Bay to Breakers.
We also need to stop criticizing people who don't "do" nudity exactly like you do. I'm so tired of seeing people refer to "true nudists". Positive nudity belongs to everyone, not just those who follow the exact same rules you do. (not directed at Bert in any way but to those who are self righteous)

I think she's spot on here. One should not have to be a "nudist" to enjoy social nudity, and I'd love to see nudism become extinct in that regard.

I also think she raises a good point with regards to nudists trying to "own" nudity. The world is a big place. There are a lot of dimensions to nudity, and a lot of ways to practice and enjoy nonsexual and social nudity. Nudists extend the same tolerance and acceptance towards those who don't practice "nudism" the way we think they should that we'd like to have extended towards us by the rest of the world, rather than the narrow minded view that's usually expressed on rec.nude and in some other nudist commentary.

Nudity can be erotic and naturists should not have to deny it

2007-06-06T10:05:00.001-04:00

That's the title of an article that appeared in the Guardian this morning, and I couldn't agree more, as it echoes at least one of the points I made in discussing why Generation Y doesn't get into nudism.

Patrick Barkham seemed unaware that the main reason younger people are not becoming naturists is the inability of modern naturism to engage with the issue of sexuality (A Stitch in Time, May 31). While it is true that "naturism became popular in Germany...as a healthy outdoor lifestyle", this lifestyle also included a recognition that, socially, nudity could sometimes be erotic. It was only when naturism arrived in a more sexually conservative Britain that sexual feelings were censored out to make naturism culturally acceptable. Locating naturist clubs in isolated locations, closing their doors to younger single males, condoning activities that limited views of genitals, and creating strict rules and regulations - all these indicated that sexual feelings had become feared and denied.

Ignoring this historical and cultural context can lead to a simplified view that fails to challenge the well-rehearsed comments which naturists often use in their defence, such as those quoted in Barkham's article: "naturism is not the least bit sexy"; "it's not an orgy"; "there is no sexual tension at all".

The author goes on to state, in much clearer terms than I feel I've ever managed to, what the solution is:

We need to manage naturist environments differently, so that the experience of naturism as sometimes erotic is not stigmatised or criminalised, while those who are experiencing social nudity as asexual do not feel exploited, harassed or abused. How we address this dilemma should be the main focus of any discussion.

[...]

The idea that naturist environments potentially offer a unique space to explore the breadth of sexual feelings, and to experience these in a more balanced and real way, could make them very attractive to a younger generation. And breathe new life into naturism.

The point isn't to sexualize nudism, as knee jerk reactionaries have occasionally accused me of. It's for nudism to allow normal expressions of sexuality and sexual interest. There's a difference between asexual and nonsexual - nudists lean too much towards to the former when all that's needed is the latter.

FCC's "indecency" enforcement suffers legal blow

2007-06-05T14:00:00.001-04:00

This has nothing to do with nudism directly, but free speech and nudism do go hand in hand and it's nice to see one of the last remaining institutions of censorship start to crumble. The best part? The Federal Appeals court actually referenced Bush and Cheney's own love naughty words as the basis for the decision:

If President Bush and Vice President Cheney can blurt out vulgar language, then the government cannot punish broadcast television stations for broadcasting the same words in similarly fleeting contexts.

[...]

Although the case was primarily concerned with what is known as “fleeting expletives,” or blurted obscenities, on television, both network executives and top officials at the Federal Communications Commission said the opinion could gut the ability of the commission to regulate any speech on television or radio.

One of these days, we'll see a court reach the same conclusion with regards to the human body. It'll be nice to finally live in a country that honors the text of its own constitution.

Nude American Tourist Shocks German City...

2007-05-24T20:34:00.000-04:00

Okay, so we all know that Germany in general has a much more tolerant, rational, and sane attitude towards public nudity than we do here in America. But I would suggest that if you believe it's legal to go nude in the middle of a major city, take some care to fact check that assumption before trying it. Oops :)

Still, I can't imagine that the reaction would have been nearly as minimal if he'd done it in an equivalent American city - no doubt it would have meant jail time and sex offender status.

Clothing Optional Or ClothesFree? Why not neither?

2007-05-22T15:18:00.000-04:00

I've developed a fascination with language lately, so the kick off question of Nudist Day's "Great Naked Debate" got me thinking. The answer I gave is at the link; but I want to expand on those thoughts a bit.

Here's what I'm curious about:

We're nudists. We're so named because we like to walk around nude, which makes sense enough. And at any nudist venue, be it "clothes free" or "clothing optional" - you're going to see lots and lots of nudity, and very little clothing. After all, the majority of people who go there go there to be nude. And for that reason I think "Clothing Optional" is a little dishonest; it sets a different expectation of what you'll encounter than having nudity in the title does.

I think it reveals a curious cultural bias that we label our venues with clothing-centric language rather than nude-centric language. It's sort of like having a "penis optional" bathroom instead of a "woman's" bathroom. It seems utterly silly in that context, but for nudists it's the norm.

Why not simply use "nude", as I originally suggested? Or "nudity permitted" or "nudity optional", if you want to preserve the freedom of choice. Or even - *gasp* - use the word "nudist" somewhere in there?

I don't think it's a big deal; it's more of a curiosity than anything else. But it's good to think about these things.

Generation Y

2007-05-22T14:24:00.000-04:00

Originally I'd planned this as part of a marketing nudism series; but discussions elsewhere (and time constraints of late) made me decide to spin this off into its own topic. There's been quite a bit of hubbub around the nudist blogosphere recently which was spawned by an article about Solair's recent attempt to attract a more youthful demographic. This isn't a new concern for nudists - this is something that's long been absurd and gets discussed ad nauseum on fora and elsewhere. And as a representative of Generation Y*, I figure it's finally time to address this.

Anyway, the question at hand is this: why are nudist resorts dominated by baby boomers, and members of Generation Y and even Generation X are rarely seen?

There's a human tendency to try to look for single factor explanations, and I've noticed a lot of the commentary so far tends to focus on one factor or another. I believe the reality of the matter though is that there are many factors at work here, and what follows is my best attempt to list them all.

*Since the definition is a tad fuzzy, here's mine: Generation Y was born between approximately 1977-1990ish, currently aged 18-30. Generation X is older, "Millennials" are in Junior High and High School. Baby Boomers should need no introduction. Also, As coincidence would have it, the current issue of Fortune magazine has a spot on profile of Generation Y. Though it has nothing to do with nudism, it does do a good job of describing the generation and laying out some of the key differences between us and everyone who came before. It provides some insight into the way this generation thinks.

1. It's dominated by baby boomers.

People hang out in their peer groups. Married couples tend to hang out with married couples. Single people hang out with single people. Senior citizens join senior citizen groups. Teenagers hang out with other teenagers, and college students hang out with other college students. And for the most part, these groups don't intermingle with one another. Think about it - in how many activities do you really see different generations hanging out with each other? I'm sure there must be some, but offhand I can't think of any.

From my own experience: I'm 24. I see my parents often, but I don't hang out with them. I certainly don't hang out with my grandparents. I don't have kids, I don't have a house. I don't care about the stock market. At this stage of my life, my social activities revolve around going to bars and meeting girls. When I go to swim nights or mingle with other nudists on the beach, everyone is quite friendly - but I simply don't have that much in common with them.

This is thoroughly a chicken and egg problem, but it is the biggest barrier to getting young people to participate - they don't already have anything to offer younger people, socially speaking. The problem is compounded when you realize that nudist resorts tailor their offerings to their primary audience, and essentially create retirement homes without clothes. Ask yourself "Why don't teenagers hang out at retirement homes?" and you'll have an answer as to why nudist resorts hold such little appeal. To appeal to young people you need to have young people around, and preferably have no old people around.

2. It's the economy, stupid

This is something I've pointed out many times and many ways on this blog, but it bears repeating. The barriers of entry to nudism are huge. It requires a substantial commitment of both time and money just to try it. It's very difficult for people who are simply curious and offers no way for people to just try it out on a whim. Baby boomers have the cash and time to fly to Florida and stay at a resort, or drive for a few hours to spend a weekend at the nearest club. Generation Y by and large doesn't - we're entering a weak economy in a globalized job market saddled with tens of thousands of dollars worth of debt out of the gate. And when we do have the money, it's not appealing enough to justify the investment over everything else competing for our time and money.

3. Individualism

Tom Mulhall made a great point about this the other day. Teenagers love to go bowling; it's one of the few things they can do legally. But they don't join bowling leagues. Nudists tend to be fixated on the "nude" aspect, but ignore the larger social context. If bowling leagues can't gain traction despite the popularity of the sport, what chance to formal nudist clubs have? The Nudist Travel blog expanded on this and described exactly what Solair is doing wrong - it's formal, it's regimented, and acts like a hierarchical organization.

What we have now is the largest generation gap since the dawn of Rock and Roll. There's just something about people under 30 that people over 30 can't seem to get. A lot of this new gap is driven by technology. People under 30 are digital natives - we don't know a world without cell phones, instant messaging and the web. We don't know what it's like to not be connected to our friends 24/7. We grew up with it, it's in our blood. People over 30... they might use these tools, but they're not really part of their culture.

It's more than just the technology though, because the technology has a ripple effect throughout everything else. We're more tolerant, more accepting, and almost totally free of many of the "isms" of the past. Race and ethnicity are non-issues. No one cares if you're gay. While there are still subcultures and groups we belong to, they're not really part of our self identity. Why? Because Generation Y is more self centered than any generation that came before, but in a good way. We're individualistic, and celebrate individualism. It's cool to be different. The idea of an in-group and out-group is fairly antiquated because we all live at the center of our own unique social network. They're flat, highly informal, constantly in flux, and vehicles for self expression.

The nudist world, by contrast, is built on clubs, memberships, and hierarchical regimented organizations. We're offering bowling leagues when all Generation Y really wants is bowling alleys.

4. It's not sexy.

There's one thing that the hasn't changed in the last half century - kids want to be cool above all else. And there's just nothing cool about being a nudist.

But what's cool in the 21st century? Well, as a rule of thumb, being cool is synonymous with being sexy. Every marketer on the face of the Earth that wants to reach the youth demographic tries to make their products sexy. BMW? Sexy. The iPod? Sexy. Coke and Pepsi? Sexy. Concerts? Dripping with sexuality. MTV? 24/7 sex appeal. You get the idea.But nudists - they're so hung up on being nonsexual thing that they deliberately try to make their "product" look as un-sexy as possible. Given that, is it really surprising it only attracts people who've lost interest in sex?

I don't think I've ever read an article about nudism where a defender didn't call it "Family Friendly". I challenge you to find a nudist magazine, brochure, or web site that doesn't have the phrase "Family Friendly" plastered all over nearly every page. As I've noted before, this is a quasi-orwellian phrase invented by the religious right to be synonymous with their anti-sexual notion of morality. But family friendly also means something else, at least in the minds of Generation Y and Millennials. Family Friendly = Lame. Think about it - when was the last time you knew teenagers or 20 somethings to be interested in doing something described as "family friendly"?

These are new adults for whom the freedom to do previously forbidden or taboo "adult" things is still novel and exciting. They don't have kids, and an atmosphere designed to be "safe" for young kids simply doesn't appeal to young adults. They like sexy, they like edgy, they like all sorts of things that you wouldn't want to expose a nine year old to. And when those things aren't present, they're less than enthused.

If we want to attract young people, nudism has to be sexy. It needs to have energy, atmosphere, and most importantly girls. The first question I get when I've invited friends to try out the nude beach with me is "Will there be girls?" - and any interest wanes pretty quickly when I reveal that any there are will be likely be twice our age.

When I've spoken to girls my age about this, the object is different but has the same root. They're not worried that nudism is sexualized. Think about it - girls today wear thong bikinis, flash their boobs at parties, and think nothing of bare midriffs. Does it seem like they're body shy? Of course not - but the reason they do these things is because girls like to feel sexy and that stuff makes them feel sexy. Nudists send out the message "Try nudism! It's not sexy! And it's okay if you're ugly!"

Nude recreation can be sexy without being sexual. The problem I've found is that a lot of older people see sex in a black and white way: it's either completely asexual, or people are having an orgy on the beach. Generation Y has a much more fine grained (and frankly, more mature) view of sexuality. The problem isn't that they can't separate nudity from sex; quite the contrary, they grasp it far more intuitively than many of their baby boomer parents. The problem that nudists try to scrub sex from everything, and that's a turn off.

5. It's boring.

Kind of reiterating my first point, but 20-somethings have energy. College students more so. And teenagers never sit still.

Sunbathing isn't fun. Neither is sitting in a hot tub. Or any "sport" that mostly involves standing around (I'm looking at you, shuffleboard). Swimming can be, but pools at resorts are rarely well suited for rambunctious games.

"Come to our resort, where you'll have the chance to sit around all day and do nothing!" just doesn't work.

6. If it's not on Google, it doesn't exist.

Another biggy; our internet presence sucks (something which I've commented on time and again). A lot of the reason it sucks is because of "nudist porn" and the co-opting of our terms. But we have to realize that we're not going to reach them anywhere else. Seriously. I have no clue how anyone would ever find out anything about nudism if not for the web - I don't know how people did it 20 years ago. The web is our point of contact with Generation Y and Millennials; you're not going to reach them on any other medium.

The thing about this point is that it's the easiest to change, it just takes some initiative, know how, and fifteen minutes on the part of nudists across the web. If you run a resort, look into an Adwords campaign. If you're hosting an event, advertise it on craigslist. Create a Myspace page for your group or organization. Create a web page or blog where you talk about being a nudist, and give link love to nudist sites you like. It'll help exponentially.

7. It's NOT the religious right.

Not culturally anyway. Basically, I just write off 25% of the country as f'in insane and not worth the effort. Most people who aren't the religious right also think they're insane. They do have influence as a voting block; but not socially. The religious right, for all their bitching, have lost every fight they've fought. Homosexuality is more accepted now than ever, with full marriage rights just around the corner. Porn has gone mainstream. People use naughty words on TV. Etc.

Pay close attention to these uproars the religious right causes. For every person who goes "OMG THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!!" at the site of Janet Jackson's nipple, there's another one who doesn't care. For every person who freaks out at nudity, there's people who see it as free speech. We're easily talking about 30-40% of the population here, maybe more. Yeah, the "religious right" is a problem if we're trying to attract young people that are only willing to get naked for the rapture... but that doesn't stop us from attracting the other 75% who think that idea is as stupid as I do.

Now, the negative effect that they do have is over the legal environment. Television and movie censorship has yet to be eliminated entirely, and they're the main reason why. They're the ones who fight to close nude beaches, raise uproars about new venues, and keep skinny dipping and public nudity illegal in most of the country. In short, they create an environment in this country that makes experimenting with social nudity all but impossible; and it's hard to make take the "next step" of going to a resort without taking that "first step" of trying it on your own.

In conclusion

I think the bottom line is that the kind of organized nudism represented by AANR and similar organizations just doesn't have much to offer Generation Y, for the reasons outlines above, and whether or not they'll get into it in greater numbers as they grow up remains to be seen. I actually agree with what Nudiarist said at the end of his post; the future of nudism lies more in beaches and clothing optional public lands than in resorts and clubs. The best way to get more young people into it is by making sure they have the chance to try it on their own terms.

New Feature: The Gymnophiliac Chatroom

2007-05-17T17:37:00.000-04:00

I know I've been light on the posting lately - something which I feel real bad about, as I'd like to spend more time writing for this blog than I have been. Unfortunately I can't promise that will change in the near future - but in the meantime I've created a chatroom (courtesy of Meebo), so at least you guys can talk amongst yourselves.

I don't know how much use it'll get (or if it even has a use at all), but I figured it'd be a fun little thing for some of my readers. Happy chatting!

The Gymnophiliac Chatroom

2007-05-17T17:35:00.000-04:00

French Ad for Naturism

2007-05-15T09:30:00.000-04:00

Here's another video I don't expect to stay up on Youtube for long, so catch it while you can. I think it's pretty good though:

Boobs!

2007-05-09T09:56:00.000-04:00

It seems highly unlikely that this will stay up for very long, given the content and copyright status, but here's a recent episode of Penn and Teller's Bullshit! about the female breast, covering everything from topfreedom to public breastfeeding to breast cancer and more. Well worth watching (Thanks Dan for turning this up):

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

No Pants!

2007-05-04T20:36:00.000-04:00

Hope you all celebrated No Pants Day today. While "no pants" doesn't exactly equal "naked", I'm still supportive of any holiday that requires less clothes than normal to celebrate, and its great to see so many people who did.

Seen any boobs lately?

2007-05-03T14:09:00.000-04:00

This is an astonishing statistic: 62% of British girls between 15 and 30 yo have shown their boobs in public.

FUN-loving British girls have admitted they just can’t help showing off their boobs.

A sizzling 62% of 15-30-year-old girls admitted getting their boobs out in public for fun after a few drinks.

More than half say displaying their bosoms is a daring turn-on, a survey found.

And a saucy 10% of the babes questioned confessed they strip off on evenings out to tempt fellas they fancy.

More than 50% have also revealed G-strings, knickers, stockings and suspenders after a night on the tiles.

Seven in 10 even confessed to posing topless for some home-made sexy snaps.

Though it should be noted that the motivations are mostly titillation (pun intended), it's still impressive that so many young women have engaged in exhibitionistic behavior. Shame and modesty really are becoming relics of a past era.

Celebrating graduation by skinny dipping? Fun idea!

2007-05-01T15:23:00.000-04:00

Getting arrested after running away and leaving your pants with wallet and ID behind? Not so much.

As many as 200 students decided to celebrate graduation at Concordia College by skinny dipping in a murky campus pond early Monday, authorities said.

A security officer tried to shoo the students out of the pond but they wouldn't cooperate, Concordia security chief Sherri Arnold said.

Moorhead police were called after students pushed the security officer's golf cart into the pond.
Police estimated that when they arrived on the scene, about 50-75 students were in various states of undress and fleeing, but no one was naked.

Although no one was arrested, several people could face charges for damage to the cart.
Arnold said 10 people were identified because they left their clothes and wallets behind.

Sunday was graduation day at Concordia.

I just thought that was too funny to pass up.

Sexuality is in the eye of the beholder

2007-04-30T19:40:00.000-04:00

I just wanted to bring to the forefront a comment left by CGHill on the curse of nude modeling post:

Eye of the beholder, indeed. There are some photos which might qualify as "explicit" which wouldn't float my boat in the slightest; conversely, I can get turned on by some stuff which wouldn't raise so much as an eyebrow elsewhere.

As a general rule, there is one thing you can tell about the person who poses nude: at that moment, said person didn't have any clothes on. Anything else is either fantasy, stereotype or projection, or some combination thereof.

I've long been critical of the "nudism isn't sexual" mantra, not because I disagree with it*, but because I feel it's a bad argument. The above illustrates why exactly, if you just generalize "person who poses nude" to "nude person".

The only thing you can say about a nude person is that they're nude. Nudists don't see what we do as sexual. But the important thing is that there are some people who do. Much as there are some people who find being a shoe salesman or dressing like a baby erotic, despite the fact that the vast majority of people see these as entirely nonsexual (or just weird, in the latter case). But the point is that you'll never convince a foot fetishist that feet aren't sexual, nor will you convince some people that social nudity isn't sexual, if that's how they choose to see it.

Sexuality - whether we're talking about nude photos, nude people, nudity in movies, porn, or anything else - is entirely in the eye of the beholder. Which is important to keep in mind when trying to convince someone that nudism isn't sexual if they're set on believing otherwise.

*But do note how I phrased it. Too often nudists will say "nudity isn't sexual", which is simply wrong.

The Curse of Nude Modeling

2007-04-24T12:29:00.000-04:00

From an excellent post on Tara Tainton (warning - link has *horror* *gasp* sexual images and themes!) concerning how society treats nude models:

Sad but true... the nude body is labeled dirty, disgraceful, immoral, unethical, and something to be ashamed of and shriek in terror at as you run from it... at least here in the US anyway. Some cannot believe that a person's private parts have any business being viewed by the public, nor can that evidence of those private bits being publicized possibly be connected to a model citizen who DOES NOT practice or support child abuse, corrupting the world as a whole, or value of immorality.

What am I talking about? Those folks - just like me - who choose to share images of their naked selves with others. We all love looking at those photos of nude women and men, yet some of us believe the actual modeling, posing, or stripping is a horrible sin... and can't be chosen by anyone who's actually moral, decent, caring, respectful, or positively impacts society.

It's very well said and I honestly can't think of anything else to add.

Why are Americans afraid of being naked?

2007-04-19T13:18:00.000-04:00

There's a good article posted on Alternet today contrasting the American and European culture with regards to nudity. I was actually supposed to offer some comments for the piece, but unfortunately my email didn't reach the author in time before she had to submit it for publication. So instead I'll just offer those thoughts here:

The only direct experience that I have with Europe is the more touristy parts of London and Paris - so I really can't say I've experienced the cultural differences first hand. I can offer that when I was 16 I was quite impressed by the billboards and advertisements in France which featured topless women though - and the fact that I was neither blinded nor transformed into a juvenile delinquent by the sight of these seems to indicate that the prevailing American attitude is wrong. I've yet to visit a European nude beach, although it's certainly on my list of "Things to do before I die".

I would agree, based on conversations I've had with Europeans and as well as everything I've read on the subject, that Europeans do have a much saner cultural attitude towards nudity than what we have in the US. It seems that there's more opportunity for public nudity, and more Europeans simply see it as no big deal.

Most nudists will argue that the problem we have is an association between nudity and sex. In general, people (Americans) always see nudity as sexual and they believe that sexuality as wrong, and therefore it follows they see nudity as wrong. My personal view of the subject is that Americans have a really, really screwed up attitude towards sexuality, and the inability to disassociate nudity from sex is just one consequence of that. I believe that if Americans were to hold a more mature attitude towards sex they'd better be able to appreciate and understand nonsexual nudity, or at least stop panicking every time public nudity meets the public eye.

As for the reason behind the difference - I think that the difference basically boils down to religion. The United States has a long history of fundamentalism and a much bigger fundamentalist religious population than Europe. I look at it in the larger context - in addition to nudity, it's also the reason why evolution, abortion, gay marriage, and sex education are much bigger controversies here than in Europe. Though Europe does have pockets of conservatism and a few religious fundamentalists, there doesn't seem like there's enough of them in Europe to strongly influence the culture and politics the way they do in the US.

All that said, I'll also point out that the United States is far from a homogeneous place. The range of difference within the US is far greater than the average difference between the US and Europe. New Yorkers share a lot more in common with Londoners than either one does with Topeka Kansas. While we don't have much weight politically, the US has no shortage of people who hold a common sense attitude towards nudity and are generally every bit as liberal as their European counterparts - we just have more people on the extreme conservative end of the spectrum. Certainly in my social circle, no one was bothered by an anatomically correct chocolate Jesus. And while it's sad to see the way that artwork was received by religious conservatives, we shouldn't discount the artist who created it, the museum that originally decided to display it, and the many, many people on the other side of the debate who defended it.

I'll point out the same thing when it comes to nudity. Yes, we are a country where Janet Jackson's nipple caused a national emergency. But we also boast a few hundred nudist resorts and beaches. Public nudity isn't uncommon in some of the street festivals in San Francisco (or Daytona Beach). Vermont has reasonable public nudity laws, and New York allows women to go topfree legally (though you rarely see it exercised). I realize that that's nothing compared to Germany, for example, where (from what I read) pretty much every beach is clothing optional, and even some city parks - I just want to illustrate that the US isn't entirely as conservative as it's sometimes made out to be in the international media.

Personally, I've never had a negative experience with going nude, although I've been frustrated by the lack of opportunity to do so. I'm lucky enough to live relatively close to a nude beach - but it does seem absurd that I don't have anywhere I can go that's more convenient than the shore (legally, anyway), let alone that I can't go nude in my own backyard without running afoul of indecency laws. But I've also found that there's no shortage of places to go skinny dipping in less suburban parts of the country. Nudists are on the whole very friendly and welcoming people, and I've had nothing but positive experiences since participating socially.

I think writing a niche blog on the topic as I do probably makes me look more zealous than I actually am - I do feel that the demonization of the human body is unhealthy for society and nudism is one way to combat that, but mostly I write it for selfish reasons - it happens to be something that I enjoy, and I feel that any small difference I can make helps to give me a greater freedom to practice it.

Of course, I should say here that these are just the very humble opinions of a guy with a blog, I don't speak for nudists, nudism, Americans, or any other group I mentioned here. Also, it's a complex issue and I despite all I've written I feel like I haven't even really scratched the surface. But I hope I've offered some kind of insight for your article, and I'd be happy to follow up if you have any other questions.

On another note, the Alternet article hit the front page of Reddit (a social news and discussion site) this morning, and the discussion that follows gives some insight into how the issue is viewed by people that aren't connected by any common interest in nudity or nudism.

Chinese nudist off the hook after chatting online nude

2007-04-19T10:49:00.000-04:00

China law blind to nude Web chats

Chinese prosecutors have dropped a case against a housewife who organized online chats in the nude, after discovering there was no basis in law to bring charges, state media reported on Wednesday.

The 36-year-old woman, surnamed Li, had been charged with ”organizing pornographic activities” for using a Web cam to chat with people on the Internet in the buff and for organizing online chats for nudists.

[...]

Once nearly wiped out under the puritanical rule of Mao Zedong, pornography is now readily available in China despite periodic government campaigns against it.

Last week, the public security ministry announced a new campaign against Internet pornography, saying it had ”contaminated cyberspace and perverted China’s young minds.”

I think the Chinese government is going to get a harsh lesson in futility as they continue their efforts to censor the internet. Which is certainly a good thing for the Chinese people.

The woman in this case got off lucky; there's no reason to have thought she would have though. It's interesting to me that even in the restrictive authoritarian environment of China, there are still people who engage in these things. I think it says something about the human drive to freely express ourselves that people are willing to take such risks, which is almost reaffirming in a way.

Links for 2007-04-05 [del.icio.us]

2007-04-06T00:00:00-05:00

Naturist art by Henry Yuen

Links for 2007-03-20 [del.icio.us]

2007-03-21T00:00:00-05:00

Eco Nudes | Reduce the effects of global warming and climate change by taking it off and letting it go!
For the environmentally conscious nudist