Permanude

[BlueTrain]

Silly me! I thought it was a way for men to control women. What was I thinking?

[Peter S]

I think it’s about control, full stop, nothing to do with gender. There are plenty of people out there who just like to control the rest of us, to be in charge, exercising the “fact” that they know what’s best for us. It’s one reason the choice of nakedness can be so contentious, as we are taking that control back for ourselves. By enforcing clothing, nakedness can be retained as punishment, a method of humiliation.

[BlueTrain]

You are correct, of course, about some people wanting to control the rest of us. I think some people are raised that way. Historically, it is obvious; they're the ruling class. I've been in management positions (and the employees were women, too) but I was never comfortable or very good at telling people what to do, which is what it amounts to. I really don't think clothing enters into it often. Worldwide, though, by and large, men control women, even in monarchies when the monarch was a woman. And even that wasn't and sometimes still isn't in some kingdoms. Even a monarchy is a kind of democracy, the only difference being in who gets to vote. It may happen but I'm not aware of any instance in which nakedness has been used as a punishment. The Scarlet Letter is a case in which public humiliation was used as a punishment, only it didn't work out that way.

[Greenbare Woods]

John P you are exactly right about western culture believing that men are ugly and forcing us to be almost fully covered from head to foot. I recall when I was in the 6th grade, 12 years old, the fashion industry was promoting knee length (Bermuda) shorts for men. Boys in my 6th grade class began promoting a "Shorts Day" for the last day of school in June when temperatures were hot and the school didn't have AC.  The whole idea was quickly squashed by School Admins and parents.  Boys are not allowed to show bare knees or lower legs (except in sports when short shorts were normal).  Women's fashions always show off more flesh than men's fashions, and high fashion makes us men wear tuxedos covering us entirely except hands and faces.  High fashion women gowns can be almost naked, and often show a lot of bare shoulders, legs, backs, and etc.

When men get naked the culture is a lot more "offended" by seeing man's parts than seeing a woman's hairy crotch.  Men are also attacked for having sexual feelings a lot more than women.  The nudist world didn't create the misandry, but they participate willingly. 

[BlueTrain]

Sure could use a woman's perspective here.

[jbeegoode]

Women's perspectives are as varied as the other gender. Some match men's, some women are angry at the crap to endure, others are okay with that and for various reasons. I had a prejudiced woman attempting to lay her ignorance on me, just because of my gender. She required me to take a couple of courses and read a bunch of things, before she would work with me on our Sweat organizations code of conduct. When she found out that I was totally aware of all of it before hand and even I had things to teach her, she was shocked and the chip fell off of her shoulder.

So, some of us require a women's perspective more than other men, some women require a man's perspective. When holding fast to the gender prejudices that is blatant sexism.

I think that both genders are still coming out of a highly repressed and oppressed era. Our sexuality and our sense of gender superiority, we are all victims. Our mix of gender traits manifests in both sexes in various amounts, yet defenders of liberation persist in perpetrating the myth of masculine and feminine qualities as being black and white, cut and dry. For one small example, men wear pants and women dresses and skirts, it is all about covering up and sexualization of the body. Women can now wear pants. One of my old girlfriend's had to go to court to wear pants. Women got harassed. A man wearing a skirt on a hot day, may get beaten, or murdered. Men short hair, women long. I had to do walkouts and organize and prepare for lawsuits just about not being short haired men. Men don't cry, women at the drop of a hat. Men are voyeurs, women don't care about looks. Men will screw anybody, women don't like sex and orgasms are their imagination. The gay issues are sexual stigmatizing. The fact is that most people are on a line with lots of variations in between, on a given day. More? Men are aggressive, women are more peaceful. The crap goes on and on. It is mostly a cultural thing, a family orientation thing, a social belief. I'm saying that bottom line, we are all victims of the gender thing and the solution is equality, acceptance, awareness on an individual basis.

It isn't just a women's lib, women's issues thing. None of us are free until we are all free.

Bob, I remember wearing Burmuda shorts all summer and getting harassed in the Fall in P.E. class for my weird tanlines!...come to thing about it, they were pretty dang weird looking!
Jbee

[eyesup]

I clicked on the Permanude link too, JohnP and came to the same conclusion. Babes, babes and more babes. Very little to do with real naturism.

I went back and reread the posts here. Looking at the stuff online it is mostly teen voyeurism. The stories involve the government as the enabler for engaging in soft bondage fiction. The concept of the government engaging in public shaming harks back to the “olde publicke stocks” of medieval Europe.

Frankly, disturbing.

Duane

[eyesup]

Jbee, I can agree with most of that. The thing I do disagree with is the whole victimhood culture these days. There ARE victims, I just reject the elevation of it to some sort of cathartic experience. Maybe some will choose that but I simply see life as way to move forward learning as we go and just accepting the good and the bad as equals. Life and nature will simply refuse to stay hemmed in to a zone of safety. It isn’t real.

I honestly don’t get the victim culture. It is puzzling. Maybe I’m the odd one out.

Duane

[jbeegoode]

I've never heard of it being called "victim culture." I think that such an identification is significant. Like the Matrix, people will go among ignorant of the bonds of the status quo. It is important to me to stand up when I realize my victim-hood.

We sat and watched "The Matrix" a coupe of evenings ago. The system is actually rigged in so many ways, but subtly. One can look at it as reality and pragmatic to conform, or drop out, or fight it. In the movie "Gandi" he gets thrown out of the train for sitting in the wrong racial section. He could have chosen several directions and he chose a higher path and action. Look what happened!

This anti-nudity thing in society flourishes when people are asleep. It is a victimization. People simply need to be made aware. Gotta choose your battles though.
Jbee

[GentleBen]

The first permanude postings on Tumbler which resulted in various fiction book series did start with the idea of permanude as punishment, and some of the series did use that as a starting point, but that is not the main purpose for the permanude lifestyle, but rather a twisted add-in put in the laws by anti-nude politicians. Since many of the posters here keep referring to that aspect, it's obvious they haven't read any of the books.

The (fantasy) laws that established the "permanude" lifestyle were part of an entire "lifestyle protection" set of laws that made any of a number of lifestyles protected as approved ways of life. Religion, sexual identity, naturism, permanude, all sorts of ways to live were set as permissible and protected, and there were punishments for attacking, arresting or otherwise interfering with a person who had registered in that lifestyle for living in that manner and set of beliefs. If the lifestyle adhered to included actions or way of living contrary to the prevailing customs and laws, the lifestyle was paramount and allowed with the laws and customs invalid for that lifestyle.

Since those choosing the permanude lifestyle (or were forced into it as a penalty) were always nude and forbidden anything that hid the primary and secondary sexual attributes of a person, and thus were subject to normal physical reactions such as becoming visibly aroused and needing an outlet to the need, the laws around public sexual reactions and behavior were made invalid for the permanude. The opposing Naturist (nudist) lifestyle explicitly forbade public sexual actions, so were subject to the laws. Just being nude wasn't enough.

Anyway, the books by Gloria and several other authors explore the effect of the permanude lifestyle on the characters and the rest of the world. Some are blatant porn, some are more examinations of the regular life of permanude. But if you were ever curious about what it might be like to live always (required) nude, without the lewdness laws applying, they can be fun.