Help us fight anti-nudity law in Huntington Beach, CA.

[Corky]

Help us fight anti-nudity law in Huntington Beach, CA. Email or fax the mayor and council members now!! See instructions HERE. Meeting is Monday, July 16 6PM at 200 Main Street, Huntington Beach, CA

[Corky]

Help us fight anti-nudity law in Huntington Beach, CA. Email or fax the mayor and council members now!! See instructions HERE. Meeting is Monday, July 16 6PM at 200 Main Street, Huntington Beach, CA

[nudenwv]

sorry - got to this too late! please inform us as to how it went!

[Bushnud2]

This is wonderful to see these NAC Action Alerts.
In my country, Australia, our governing(?) body Australian Nudist Federation does nothing, except hold a lavish Christmas party for several days.
Well done NAC.

[FireProf]

We sent our email to the Mayor and Council members a couple of days ago. It is our hope that NAC, the naturists at the meeting and the emails help to make this council re-think this ordinance.

[nimrod]

This story has been on the local news yesterday and some today. I do not know if the stations are trying to be delibirately nutral, but it seems that puplic opinion is split down the middle. One man said, "What goes on behind closed doors should stay behind closed doors.", another basically said if you do not like it don't look. A former nieghbor of Ferreira said he was known as "naked" Mike in the nieghborhood, she would even stop to talk to him and found it amusing when a couple of little old ladies walked by and were shocked at Mikes nudity. Another lady who had her back to the camera so her face would not be shown said that Mikes actions were inapropiate and brought up the fact that she has young children. I thought that her actions were a little weird, almost like she had something to hide.

[simonsebs]

Huntington Beach City Council Approves Nudity Ban

Here's an update to the story. It seems when we take one step foward something ends up happening and we have to take two steps back.

[nimrod]

quote:

Originally posted by simonsebs:Here's an update to the story. It seems when we take one step foward something ends up happening and we have to take two steps back.

I would not give up hope yet, there is still the final vote in August, but just the fact that it passed unanimously on the first go does not bode well.

[Naturist Mark]

Interesting development is that the mayor considers the law to prohibit being nude under blankets or towels while changing on the beach - which he considers to be nudity even though completely covered. If his views prevail, I'm afraid every person in Huntington Beach could be arrested for being nude underneath their clothes.

[MrTruth]

Writing to city council members is not good enough. Nudists need to meet in person with the city council members on a one on one basis and in a very polite and respectful manner educate and inform the city council members that nudists are not crackpots. As many city council members need to be persueded in person to not pass legislation that will hurt a large group of citizens. Unless enough people come together and spend time to communicate to the coucil members why this legislation not only punishes innocent people, but will start down the road of draconian laws that control more and more people, nothing will change.

[Agde]

MrTruth makes a good point about normal citizens making personal contact with council members to support default tolerance of casual nudity. Laws are supposed to focus on behavior, not mere clothing choice. If it is a question of someone being offended, rather than being in some way in danger, then ordinances need to outline rights and obligations for both sides, dealing for instance with aspects such as proximity and potential relative harm to whom. Otherwise, people who find green hair, body-piercings, hip-hop jeans worn at the knees, or Red Sox baseball caps worn in New York offensive might also demand an ordinance.

[FireProf]

quote:

Originally posted by MrTruth:
Writing to city council members is not good enough. Nudists need to meet in person with the city council members on a one on one basis and in a very polite and respectful manner educate and inform the city council members that nudists are not crackpots. As many city council members need to be persueded in person to not pass legislation that will hurt a large group of citizens. Unless enough people come together and spend time to communicate to the coucil members why this legislation not only punishes innocent people, but will start down the road of draconian laws that control more and more people, nothing will change.

Sometimes you just do what you can and what you can do is write to those making up the ordinances and laws. Sure it's best to meet face to face with council members but what if you can't? Do you do nothing?

I see you live in NC, was this situation important enough for you as a nudist? Did you make a plane reservation out here to attend the meeting? I wouldn't expect you to, so why are you expecting everyone else to do this when you can't and they may be in the same situation?

NAC and local nudist were there and did speak to this council one on one. NAC asked ALL naturists to help by sending emails no matter where they lived. This ordinance was predetermined and already in the books before the meeting started. It wouldn't matter if we had 1000's of nudist there or you talked to these closed minded individuals for months before. Closed minded people in authority make closed minded decisions.

I agree with you to a point but don't discount the actions of some that couldn't make it to the meeting in person and were willing to do what NAC asked.

[Pete Knight]

quote:

Originally posted by Naturist Mark:
Interesting development is that the mayor considers the law to prohibit being nude under blankets or towels while changing on the beach - which he considers to be nudity even though completely covered. If his views prevail, I'm afraid every person in Huntington Beach could be arrested for being nude underneath their clothes.

So my .75 square metres of beach towel would make me more nude than the .025 square metres of micro bikini that I've seen on a girl, very interesting line of thought!!!! Also bloody stupid!!


Pete Knight

[MrTruth]

quote:

I agree with you to a point but don't discount the actions of some that couldn't make it to the meeting in person and were willing to do what NAC asked.

I am not trying to discout any action or involvement that helps to promote nudism in a positive manner. I am only trying to point that from my experience, it is far too easy for city council members to put aside petition letters and forget about them. Letters also do not give the council member much of an impression of the person who wrote the letter. I think that the best course of action is for nudists to meet in person with as many city council members as they can, and in a polite and respectful manner communicate that nudists are normal people and also educate as to the history and need for appropriate places for nudists to go and practice their lifestyle. Far too often, the only individuals that come to the attention of the city council members are weirdos and crackpots who just happened to be nude while doing other strange things. These crackpots are not at all representative of the vast majority of normal, hard working, law abiding nudists and the only way that city council members will know this is to meet and form an in person impression of such individuals.

Sadly most nudists will not get involved and do nothing when confronted with new restrictive laws or nude beach closures. Anything that helps the situation is valuable. However, in my experience, in person meetings seem to accomplish the most as spending in person quality time with a city council member in an effort to pursued them to support your opinion is the most productive.

As a brief aside, I once ased an AANR club owner what, in his opinion, was the best way to get a beach designated as a cloting option beach so that the tickets, fines, and arrests, of those who went nude at that beach would stop. His suggestion, based upon his 40 plus years of being a nudist and his experiences in the '60's with nudism was this:

"Have 1000 nudists show up and disrobe on that beach one day. When the police come and arrest those 1000 nudists, have 2000 nudists show up the following day. Continue this pattern and then demonstrate that the nudists will not back down or quietly go away. This even will make local as well as national and international news and will force local politicans to come to the table and deal with this issue. If enough nudists push hard enough, the system will change."

As it was in the 1960's with equality and civil rights for blacks, so it can be with nudists. In the 1960's so many protestors and demonstrators were beaten, shot, arrested, fined, and jailed for their participation in peaceful protests, marches, and demonstrations. The system at that time could not even tolerate this and tried it's best to silence the protestors. However, the protestors kept on marching regardless of the arrests. Eventually the system changed as the status quo was forced to change disciminitory laws that were unjust and immoral.

The unfortuante thing about today is that we sadly live in the age of apathy and since the majority of nudists in general don't object, protest, demonstrate, or are active in advancing nudist affairs, it is rather easy for politicians and city council members to vote against them.

[MrTruth]

quote:

Closed minded people in authority make closed minded decisions.

This is very true and sadly politicians in general will not support our positions even if they agree with them on a personal level.

Politicians will do what they need to do in order to get elected. They will not support a position that supports nudism if it will cost them their next election. Nudists do not have enough power, support, or authority on their side. Laws continue to be heavily against them and lawyers and politicians will continue to do what they believe that the general public wants done - and that is to restrict nudism.

This is why it is so critical to promote and educate the textile community with normal nudist representatives that most people can relate to. Unfortunately, in too many cases, some weirdo who happens to associate himself or herself with nudism is chosen by the media as a typical representative of nudism. This is what the general public sees and this reinforces the misperceptions of nudists as a bunch of weirdos. With the way our media works, generally normal or decent people don't make it into the news. Given our limited access to media and opportunities to educate the public, it is so vitally important to use each and every opportunity to the best that we can by sending and promoting the most literate and best prepared nudists that we can so that they can educate, explain, defend, and justify why we need appropriate places to be nude.