Nudes in the news

[jbeegoode]

Only 1% to 3% are offended and will say something on trails according to the experiences of several 15 or twenty representing many hundreds of encounters. These are people who have had nude experience on the trails encountering textiled people. This is not one person's experience. I found it surprising, too.

"Please stop turning everything I say upside down. Everything I mentioned is real. These things happened to me." I'll work hard toward that. I'll disagree when I do. If you say that it happened to you, I can't disagree very well, but drawing a conclusion from what happened to you is up for debate.
Jbee



 

[John P]

I don't exactly know what you mean by "confrontational nudity." We all know that confrontation can backfire on us as a strategy. Perhaps you could explain that.

Well, it can. But some years back there was that British activist Vincent Bethell, who went around naked and was arrested several times. This was before the Sexual Offences Act of 2003, but he still wasn't accused of anything sexual--they called it "Creating a public nuisance". And naturists said all he'd achieve would be setting a legal precedent that nudity is offensive and illegal (but like Steve Gough, Bethell made no claim to be a naturist). To everyone's surprise, though, the jury found him not guilty, and it was a major step along the way to the present situation in Britain, where the law hardly regards nonsexual nudity as worth noticing. It seemed different back then, though! You could say that Bethell gambled and won, but it still doesn't make gambling a wise thing to do.

[BlueTrain]

If I tried something like that and got away with it, my wife would, well, do something. Here, however, you might be jailed for "disturbing the peace." It's a vague offense, rather like vagrancy, but I suppose it's useful.

In my youth, which only ended three months ago when I retired (I'm 71), I did a lot of risky things. Not by some people's standards, mind you, but risky nonetheless. Some, maybe most, of that included outdoor nudity, though not exactly public. Public nudity can be an odd thing. Even then, there can be conventions. Like, you can be totally nude on the beach but not on the boardwalk where the beach begins. I guess it's just a case of manners and we don't get to make up the rules unless your name is Amy or Emily. Anyway, I didn't think I was gambling. I was just taking chances.

It goes without saying that both the law and social conventions (manners) are neither fairly or evenly enforced. That's an issue in itself.

[jbeegoode]

My younger risks were always calculated. I'd whittle it down to as positively safe in the 90 percentile, then throw my balls under my shoulder and go. The unexpected would happen. I had options, contingencies, I prayed a lot. I did things that I couldn't afford to lose. It wasn't taking a chance either. Gambling is calculated, or you are not professional. You are playing odds and have to know those and hope to optimize them. So, this is semantics and I agree with you both.

Bethel had a plan and a passion. It never sounded to me so haphazard as you describe. He seemed to know what he was getting into as I remember. Also, as I remember, he escaped a big problem that he was deep in. He didn't want to be in court. I always thought that he was more courage than foolish.

 I could be wrong. Its wasn't at the top of my radar. Those were the impressions that I am left with. Anybody recall, or have some of the old internet stories?
Jbee

[jbeegoode]

Answering my own question,  quickly looked up this on the net.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/vincents-naked-ambition-696699.html
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2001/jan/11/taniabranigan

Jbee

[Peter S]

Interesting that despite six arrests none of the complainers would give evidence - a very English response, we want “someone to do something” but we don’t really want to get involved. Then Vincent was cleared by a jury, rather than officialdom - when push comes to shove there is still a large streak of British opinion that sees nudity - particularly male nudity - as slightly comical and a subject for naughty seaside postcards.

[BlueTrain]

I've always maintained that people see nudists as harmless eccentrics. I tend to agree, although I hate to think of myself as comical. But the problem is establishing yourself as a genuine nudist. Someone on another forum says, when referring to those who do things in public that should stay in the bedroom (to put it one way), they aren't "real nudists."  But nobody owns the word.

Someone once described the differences between American nudists and German nudists (and others that I've forgotten). An American nudist is always looking over his shoulder, worried. But a German nudist is proud and has no worries about being seen. But that's a poor recollection. The original was much better worded.

My younger risks were probably anything but calculated. In most cases, the risk was more the possibility of appearing foolish than anything else. The risks might be greater now, what with smart phones. But on the other hand, the dangers of simply taking a long (say, ten miles) walk in the mountains was a more serious risk than being nude on the walk, although the risk was low, just the same. I always worried more about a bad fall than anything else. A colleague of my wife where she worked about 35 years ago disappeared in a climb on Mt. McKinley. Fate caught up with him. We happened to learn of it when his mother wrote a newspaper article about it. She was a grief counselor.

I've never done anything that risky--I think.  However, I have realized that most of my nude hiking has been deliberate. That is (and I may have said this already), an outing on which I wanted to hike nude was something that I had planned that way from the start. Only rarely have I done so on the spur of the moment, usually when the weather was a lot warmer than expected. But I've always like to get out in all seasons, although I'm not too enthusiastic about hiking in the rain. I have, though, because it wasn't like I could up and go just any old day. The biggest thing I've learned is that if you want it to rain, plan to go hiking in two weeks.

Another thing I've learned, probably more useful, is to get to the trailhead first. I've tried to arrive just at first light. I usually have the place to myself.

[jbeegoode]

Interesting that despite six arrests none of the complainers would give evidence - a very English response, we want “someone to do something” but we don’t really want to get involved. Then Vincent was cleared by a jury, rather than officialdom - when push comes to shove there is still a large streak of British opinion that sees nudity - particularly male nudity - as slightly comical and a subject for naughty seaside postcards.

It is better than here, where there are those that see it simply as disgusting and a threat to the sanity of children.

Here, we're coming out of an era where a guy in a pair of boxers is funny. A naked guy is a threat, or a topic of sex, because nobody has ever been seen in the context of humor naked. Children think that it is funny because it is out of place, out of the norm, which are things that make people laugh.
Jbee

[Peter S]

https://www.echo.net.au/2018/07/tea-tree-lakes-nude-bathing-case-thrown-court/

This one is from Australia, but the problem seems to be the same everywhere. The police decide on the law and arrest accordingly - in this instance they took it on themselves that the simple act of being naked (at a swimming lake) was lewd behaviour. Happily, the magistrate disagreed.

[Greenbare Woods]

Police are the same everywhere.  The believe their job is to harass, fine, and arrest citizens for every possible excuse.   They are the sworn enemies of free people.

[BlueTrain]

I don't think the police are the same everywhere, not by a long shot. Perhaps you've had bad experiences. However, in some places, the police, here including sheriff's departments, let some people get away with just about anything and at the same time, are constantly harassing certain other groups of people. Yes, it's a form of social control, to be sure, but you can't simply blame the police. It's one group of people doing their best to control and maybe even eliminate another group of people.  Nothing new about that. It even happened before there were police. Often as not, it is also sometimes a case of a minority trying to control the majority. The police are usually in the middle. I'd have to say, however, that sheriff's departments in places where there is no police department, can be a little different, sheriffs always being an elected office.

So what is really happening?  The truth is, I think, that a lot of people are opposed to public nudity, like it or not, for whatever reason. So don't blame the police. They are not the sworn enemies of a free people. It is also difficult to accept that people will accept most anything instead of anarchy, which is some people's idea of freedom. These days, it seems like a lot of people in a lot of places are perfectly happy to live in a dictatorship. I mean Russia, of course.

[Greenbare Woods]

I don't think the police are the same everywhere, not by a long shot. Perhaps you've had bad experiences. However, in some places, the police, here including sheriff's departments, let some people get away with just about anything and at the same time, are constantly harassing certain other groups of people. Yes, it's a form of social control, to be sure, but you can't simply blame the police.

Last night I was at a political rally where the County Sheriff spoke about getting re-elected.   I didn't get a chance to tell him that voters in my neighborhood are offended that one of his deputies has been using our road to rob us of "traffic tax" lately.   There may be other players who are also at fault, but the police deserve much of the blame.  Its what they do.  Its who they are.  They are sworn enemies of all free people.

[BlueTrain]

The sheriff and the police are not the same. You can vote the sheriff out of office. It's up to you.

[Greenbare Woods]

The sheriff and the police are not the same. You can vote the sheriff out of office. It's up to you.

In many US States such as this one, the County Sheriff is the primary police force.  Within incorporated cities, the city also has its own overlapping police force, as does Universities, school districts, port districts, etc.  The elected County Sheriff is pretty much the primary law enforcement officer in each County.   I don't know how it works where you live.

Like most politicians, voting one out is theoretically possible, but almost impossible in practice. 

[BlueTrain]

I realize that in some places, the majority rules all the time. I don't know how that could be changed.