Hiking without a net

[Greenbare Woods]

Don't speak of the government in a way that suggests that "they" are somehow different and separate from "the people." Surely you realize that in all places and in all forms of government, the government is made up of the people.

Yes, the government made of people but not people like me.   If people like me ran the government the whole place would be radically less controlled.

Bob

[BlueTrain]

Well, is that good or bad?

[jbeegoode]

Bob thinks that is good, me bad. Some government over control issues we agree on, some not. Exploitation and control by money systems, and abuse of power, conflicts with freedom issues. Lack of government creates the exploitative and controlling framework for a minority to have more influence and control than a majority, or the public good, or overstepping boundaries.

So, putting the politics and economic aside, the ones unrelated to nudity. How does this affect body freedom. Our freedoms, and our culture are dictated by the rich and powerful, if it suits them. We have astroturf, playing to fear and political base and the control of ownership of media dictating to us. Our protection of freedoms is being, has been greatly eroded. If we don't teach the value of the individual, the sense of liberty, diversity, tolerance, then someone who doesn't understand, a minority is going to destroy it, even if for no other reason but profit.

We have discussed and thrown light on clothing manufacturers, media bent, the courts, minority and majority suppression of the more naked body. We have government control messing up freedoms to exploit nature, but we have government protecting nature. We have fluctuating lines drawn to address these multitudes of needs of natural order and environmental health. The money and rich tend to have their way and they will take naked people's elbow room, until there is no elbow room. That is why we have these people giving us these silly unhealthy dress codes. How do we get the word out with a huge political and social machine rolling over us, overpopulating us and corrupting, suppressing our natural naturist selves. Destroying public natural environments, fencing off beach real-estate, fencing off nature, creating what the old royalty had as possession as examples. Where do we draw a line and who gets to do that. We can't even draw voting district lines without exploitative people corrupting and exploiting them.
Jbee

[eyesup]

Well, we are wandering close to the line here on the political commentary, so I'll try to keep mine very broad.

Government is made up of institutions that happen to be run be the people. That is why as people come and go, we see them as monoliths moving under inertia because of the lack of innovation. The party that is out sees it as bad, the party that is in sees it as good. It's both.

We see this all the time in how hard it is to get any sort of change in them. They resist it in the extreme. When the institutions become so entrenched they cannot be controlled, you end up with self serving people running them. Making it easier to modify or curtail advocate behavior in them is the problem.

Limited government is good and necessary and hopefully will be managed by good people.
Click, click!

Duane

[jbeegoode]

I see that as true too, Duane, but I see the only changes being made are for wealth and with it the corporate few. When law making is all said and done, the law's blatancy benefits a few who pay for elections or are being placed in revolving doors, the buying of influence. All change is being made for these entities, a minority's benefit. The melding of the corporate and wealth with the government, is the definition of fascism. Look at Mussolini, look at any South American "democracy" and this is what happens.

The next step is loss of personal freedoms, when government is controlled by these few. To gain and maintain power, certain social cultural issues are exploited, eventually. The people are played against each other. It is distractions. It is a shell game. It is the source of control of our bodies. It becomes like an aristocracy an oligarchy dictating dress codes.

I believe that we could erode the resistance to body freedom, but for the law's enforcement of these abuses to our humanity.

So, I'm hoping to keep this discussion, or my rap , broad and more principle, rather than specific political issues, I hope to keep to the crux of the matter of body freedoms and the human right and need of naturism the issue. Are we to be sneaking off to a spot in the woods getting around cameras and monitoring of our correspondence and discussion to get naked and be humans and to get away from our place in this world which only values us as our benefit to the machine? To strip off our uniforms and our differences, to escape our exploitation and control by the state, like some Orwellian scheme? 
Jbee

[JOhnGw]

Oddly enough the sort of changes which JBee described above do not affect the body freedom of the elite as they have enough power, wealth and land to be able to behave however they choose in that respect.

[BlueTrain]

If governments (there are many, not just "The government") were 100% democratic, there were no parties and no money involved in politics, you seem to think that public nudity would be allowed. That's wishful thinking. The prohibition of public nudity in most places, as well as "toplessness," is not the result of a vast corporate conspiracy to sell unhealthy and expensive clothing on the unsuspecting masses. It just might be that people are generally more conservative than you think. Just remember that people who call themselves conservative are not necessarily really conservative. They are unlikely to be liberal or progressive but they aren't conservative. Reactionary or radical, more likely. Nobody "owns" conservative no more than someone owning "nudist."

The problem is, again, with the label. People and their behaviors are rather more complicated than that. What is the most difficult thing to accept is that not everyone thinks like you yourself do or has the same scale of values. We may say we do but we usually don't. Typically, a conservative is a staunch supporter of law and order, except at the traffic light. Others, conservative or otherwise, also have a strong sense of the law, only it isn't the laws that are passed by deliberative houses of legislation. Essentially, some feel they have the right to make up their own laws. And as was mentioned, some feel that the law doesn't apply to them.

On the other hand, it's not that hard to live your life without feeling much of any government control at all. Naturally, that is provided you don't do things that upset your neighbors, don't do things in the street that frighten the horses, and, hopefully, don't break any traffic rules, because you never do any of those things yourself.

[nudewalker]

There are a lot of forces in effect to maintain the public nudity ban. I would say religion being the largest one, with the effect the so called religious right have sway over politicians. But to say that the textile industry doesn't have a say in public policy is a pipe dream. In 2015 world wide sales in the most useless clothing invented (the bathing suit) totaled $17.6 Billion. In the US alone it was over $8 Billion  and the average woman owned four bathing suits. Believe me when I say that the worlds textile manufactures would be one of the biggest lobbies involved in government if public nudity ever became accepted. Some clothing would be a necessity for sure but the decline in sales would be a disaster for the economy for a time until resources were reallocated.

[BlueTrain]

Are you suggesting that the religious left is not against public nudity?  Your figures equal about $50 a year for bathing suits if all bathing suits were purchased by females. While it might be true that the clothing industry might lobby for a ban against public nudity where necessary, few clothes are manufactured in the United States these days. Where do your number come from, anyway?

[Greenbare Woods]

Clothing is not manufactured in the United States as much as it once was, but clothing retail is a  huge business.  Requiring people to buy your products is a big part of the retail business from malls to wal-mart. 

[eyesup]

I don't see some grand conspiracy by companies to get me to buy things, except when laws are passed to fine me for not purchasing something. 

I have read articles by devout faith practisioners on the subject of private and social nudity, so my guess is that the origins are spread more broadly across all group types and functions. Fear of nudity is rooted more in self esteem, self interest or self centered individuals than any politics or religion. Those things merely provide a justification for seeing the universe from the center.

I don't doubt for a minute that a self centered person is involved with a political or religious group for their own reasons, usually money, power or influence. Lack of reason and critical thinking make their success more likely.

But, as the saying goes, "I can't fix stupid".

Duane

[BlueTrain]

Calling someone stupid never fixed anything, either. Modesty is not a dirty word, either. And not everyone has an agenda, is interested in power or want to tell other people what to think or do.

[Greenbare Woods]

Calling someone stupid never fixed anything, either. Modesty is not a dirty word, either. And not everyone has an agenda, is interested in power or want to tell other people what to think or do.

Yes. Not everyone wants to tell other people what to do, but those who want to put naked people in prison for refusal to buy and wear clothes DO want to tell other people what to do. 

[BlueTrain]

It isn't the refusal to buy and wear clothes that people are arrested for, it is exposing themselves in a way that is over the line, legally, as one of my neighbors were. He didn't go to jail, though. I'm not sure anyone goes to prison for something like that. At any rate, I'm sure you can think of things you would want people put in jail for or at least wish they wouldn't do, aside from asking you to wear something, like wearing bathing trunks on a so-called nude beach.

But we aren't talking about hiking without a net, are we?

[jbeegoode]

There are a lot of forces in effect to maintain the public nudity ban. I would say religion being the largest one, with the effect the so called religious right have sway over politicians. But to say that the textile industry doesn't have a say in public policy is a pipe dream. In 2015 world wide sales in the most useless clothing invented (the bathing suit) totaled $17.6 Billion. In the US alone it was over $8 Billion  and the average woman owned four bathing suits. Believe me when I say that the worlds textile manufactures would be one of the biggest lobbies involved in government if public nudity ever became accepted. Some clothing would be a necessity for sure but the decline in sales would be a disaster for the economy for a time until resources were reallocated.

Yea, the malls full of useless crap, would all fold.
Jbee