Causing offence?

[yfenni]

I personaly don't care a scrap who sees me naked. However, I am concerned in case I give offence. If I want to be naked as often as possible, should I worry about other people's sensitivities?

[yfenni]

I personaly don't care a scrap who sees me naked. However, I am concerned in case I give offence. If I want to be naked as often as possible, should I worry about other people's sensitivities?

[FireProf]

Just speaking in generalities......Yeah! http://oakhurstonline.com/icon/happy.gif

I certainly understand what you are saying but we don't live in that kind of world or in a society where we nudists are in the majority.

I think we need to respect textiles wishes as we would expect them to respect ours. I'd love to walk into my neighborhood Starbucks each morning naked and get my coffee, shop at our local market, walk down the street and get my mail, wash my car out front, etc., all in the nude but can't so I won't force the nudity on others.

At the same time, I'd like to be able to enjoy my home and backyard without worrying about the neighbors looking over the wall. Visiting our nude beach without worrying about some textile that has 50 times more beach to roam and wants our section too because he/she doesn't approve of what we are doing. Having more clubs and resorts for us to visit without some conservative politician voting against or passing ordinances against nudist venues.

Personally, I'd say yes, you should worry about other people's sensitivities and use good judgment about when and where you are nude.

Good luck. http://oakhurstonline.com/icon/happy.gif

[nacktman]

Aw, go ahead, offend'em ... the one's that would be offended, would be offended even if you were not nude most likely. http://oakhurstonline.com/icon/wink3.gif

Seriously, try and take others into consideration but there are some that you'll never please and most look like this ...

[nakednproud]

i have pretty much zero body shame, but i don't believe in offending other people by my naked ways, especially women. it makes me uncomfortable to know that i'm making somebody else uncomfortable, so i keep my nudism behind the closed drapes of my home, or on secluded hikes, or with other like-minded people at nudist events, or with my buds or brothers who know me well and don't [care]

[EuropeMan]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by yfenni:
I personaly don't care a scrap who sees me naked. However, I am concerned in case I give offence. If I want to be naked as often as possible, should I worry about other people's sensitivities? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

As far as I can see, the concept of "OFFENCE" due to the encounter of naturists and textiles is an exclusivity of the naturists.

It may be useful to analyze the reasons for the textile majority not to enjoy nudism: ("he" may mean "she" as well...)

° quite many people do not want to be nude in view of others - "bodyshame"
for most of them, this shame does not apply to their sex partner, and they will equate nudity to sex.

° generally, one wants to respect the others' bodyshame. Forcing others to be nude is forcing the shame on them, and offence them. And with the equation of nudity with sex, imposing nudity is already a kind of rape

° respecting the others' bodyshame implies letting them the privacy they want when they happen to be necessarily nude, for instance in their bathroom.

° when it happens to accidentally unveil the other's nudity, for instance when opening a bathroom door, misinformed of the room being free, one becomes conscious of some guilt against the person who happened to be nude there. In many cases, the person inside will hastily cover some variable bodyparts , but for the "intruder" it does not really matter if this person feels offended or not by being seen naked, one just reflects one's own embarassment, if the roles were inverted.

° The - respectful - person who feels guilty of this intrusion becomes then annoyed of having seen this nudity.

° With the generalization of the above, one is not used to see other people nude, so that, when confronted to nudists in the open, one has automatically the same reaction of feeling guilty. With a possible associate reaction to counter the guilt by laughing (more frequent with children).

° Nudists can be people who don't care to be seen by others, clothed or not; quite some however will have something like a "collective bodyshame", i.e. will only want to be seen by people who are nude too. So that they may react by hastily cover themselves, and confirm to the "intruder" the fact that he is one... and that he is annoyed by the sight he just had. The nudist may confuse this "being annoyed" with " being offenced". But actually it's rather being annoyed of having offended.



° Now, coming back to one's own bodyshame, the person who does not want to be seen nude will make it a norm that he has to be clothed in front of others. It is a human usual derivation that one tends to enforce one's own norms on the others. So, the others need to be clothed as well - and the ones who don't follow the norm are bad guys.

° Public laws are only a formal writing of the norms being imposed to others.

The fact that nudity may be prohibited by law will add to phenomenon said above, of nudists wanting only to be seen by other nude persons, and would cover hastily when an intruder comes.

° And that same fact will also add to the norm setting: nudism is bad since it is not allowed by the general law...

By grouping and somehow hiding, the naturists will confort the general population that they are an exception, that need to be isolated.



° The final misconception: a nude hiker will promptly dress when he sees somebody coming. Leaving out the case where two nudists are hastily dressing before crossing each other.... The clothed person who is anti-nudity is not more "offended" by crossing closely a nude person, than by knowing that this person is there, walking nude. The offence (against the norm or the law) is in being nude, not in being seen nude.

And covering hastily is again confessing a guilt, rather than standing firm on one's own belief.

° ° ° °

In all of the above, is there a case where a non-naturist feels personally offended (not surprized, nor annoyed...) by others being nude?