Naked at Lunch (28 page)

I asked Felicity why she thought nudist clubs were in decline.

“Well, the thing is, nudist clubs/resorts are not adapting to the times. It’s like we’re using Twitter and e-mail while the nudist world is still writing letters. They’re not changing their marketing strategies, if they’re doing much of any marketing at all. With AANR it’s the same sort of issues. I think there’s a bit of a disconnect between AANR and its members. If people don’t see a reason to become a member, they won’t. AANR clubs/resorts have also been the ones selling a lot of the memberships, and some even require an AANR membership to join. So if the clubs/resorts are losing members, so will AANR.”

“Is the YNA working like the youth wing of the AANR?”

“No. We’re not affiliated with any of the big orgs. We’re our own thing. We have found there’s no lack of interest in naturism among young people . . . The media likes to report on how naturism is dying because there are no young people involved in it blah blah blah. But it’s not true. There will always be interest in naturism. It’s just a matter of reaching young people, having the right image and good marketing.”

I wanted to know more about the genesis of the organization. I mean, in this day and age, when nudists are stigmatized and people have to use pseudonyms, why even start an organization? It seems daringly old school.

“Young Naturists America was founded by myself and Jordan Blum in 2010. It was Jordan’s idea actually, and then he met me and asked me if I wanted to team up so we did. He also grew up going to naturist places with his family, and he had noticed that the movement seemed to be lacking the sort of values it started with. We believe it should be based on acceptance, but that just wasn’t there anymore.”

I have to admit that reading the rules and ideals of the YNA reminded me of the original vibe of early naturists like the German naturist pioneer and health food fanatic Richard Ungewitter—minus the anti-Semitism—and the clean-living Durville brothers from France. The early naturists were nature lovers, environmentalists before there were environmentalists; they were antitobacco, -alcohol, and -industrialization. You won’t find much talk about recycling or climate change at your average American nudist club, but the YNA is making these issues the heart of its mission.

“We hope to keep growing, expanding, and bring naturism into the twenty-first century. There’s a lot we could and want to do, but we’re also limited by funds and just trying to break even right now. We launched an official membership about a year ago, and it’s been growing steadily since then. We currently have maybe four-hundred-plus members.”

I like that the YNA is approaching naturism from an environmental, social justice angle, but I think what’s really resonating with young people might be the idea of body acceptance that it promotes.

“Absolutely it’s beneficial for body image. I find that a lot of women my age won’t try naturism
because
of their body image issues. But naturism is a great antidote to all the messages they get from the media that they’re not good enough, too fat, too wrinkled, too old, etc. As well as the body shame most people grow up with. We find that many people resonate with our body-positive philosophy and message of acceptance. Body image issues have become more and more rampant, so people today really see it as a societal issue that needs to be addressed.”

It must be frustrating to be the leader of a youth movement promoting healthy body image and environmental consciousness and have to use a pseudonym. Isn’t this the kind of thing we hope people will get into?

“It’s a valid concern, especially for certain professions, like teaching. I see stories all the time about teachers who get fired because their old modeling photos surface online. And not even nude modeling, but in bikinis or lingerie! I’ve heard of maybe one or two stories of people being fired specifically for being a nudist. It doesn’t seem to happen too often. Maybe because most people hide it if they think it can get them fired, and also hide it even if it wouldn’t. The fear might be for naught but it’s reasonable to not want to take that risk at all.”

I remembered the German and Austrian hikers I met on the Naked European Walking Tour who were unable to tell their coworkers and employers what they did on their summer vacation for fear of losing their jobs. I asked Felicity if she saw that changing.

“I suppose there will have to be some cases where people get fired for it, and they know that’s why, and they take their employer to court. And then they change the laws to make it impossible to fire someone for that reason. It’s pretty silly, really. We’re all naked in the company of others at some point. But it’s all about image and perception. More people being open about naturism will help a lot too. And educating the public. The more people know about it and understand it, the better! In the age of the naked selfie and sexting and social media, this might also become a nonissue in the future. More and more people will have photos of their boobs coming up online, and maybe at some point no one will think anything of it. So then who cares about the photo of So-and-So on a nude beach.”

Which is the first time I’ve heard a positive spin put on naked selfies and sexting. But who can say? I hope she’s right.

There are other nudist groups that direct their energies to bringing young people into the anti-textile lifestyle. Florida Young Naturists has about two hundred members and is an example of a regional organization that is trying to promote nudism and naturism to the eighteen-to-thirty demographic by hosting a series of events and get-togethers, but unlike the AANR clubs, it’s about active beach parties and yoga classes.

This active ideal is echoed in a group called Vita Nuda—“Join the Nude Revolution!” Vita Nuda is loosely affiliated with AANR’s Youth Ambassadors Program. It eschews a socially conscious message or political agenda and instead takes a hip and relaxed approach to promoting the fun side of nudism, posting an open invitation on its website: “You don’t have to be a nudist to enjoy the nude lifestyle, either. You can come and be a nudist for a weekend, a nudist for a day, or not a nudist at all. You could just be someone who likes to party naked. We won’t judge ;).”

Vita Nuda promotes activities such as “Hooping, Poi, Body Painting, Dancing, Volleyball, Boating, Canoeing, Kayaking, Swimming, Aquaball,
********
Drum Circles, Etc.” I always thought that Poi was a paste made out of boiled taro root and commonly eaten at Hawaiian luaus, but it is, apparently, a Maori performance art involving slinging weights and hoops in geometrical patterns. And what twentysomething doesn’t want to swing his junk around inside a Hula-Hoop while a drum circle pounds a primitive beat?

The Northeast chapter of Vita Nuda, which is easily the largest and most active of its youth-oriented chapters, had been using Lighthouse Beach in the Robert Moses State Park near Babylon, New York, as its go-to nude activity center, but that beach has now been closed to nudists.

Both Vita Nuda and YNA are supportive of AANR-affiliated nudist clubs and both sometimes hold events at these landed clubs. As Felicity Jones said in an interview with NBC News, “For more places to close up is just not good for any of us.”
⁷⁵

But things don’t look so rosy for nudist resorts and the AANR. Young people don’t want to be forced to join an organization or pay dues or day fees, and they definitely don’t want to hang out with their grandparents in the buff; they want to be naked and active and around other young people. And it’s fairly easy to imagine how the retirees in their golf carts would react to a Poi-swinging, Hula-Hooping, boner-sporting drum circle next to their barbecue. They would call the cops.

********
I don’t know what Aquaball is either.

World Naked
Whatever Day

I
had just left a yoga class in Silver Lake and was driving down Glendale Boulevard, when I noticed a large group of naked people riding bicycles toward me. This pinkish
peloton
was a mix of men and women, some wearing shorts or bikini tops, some with swirly body paint covering their skin (a few had the words “No Oil” scrawled across their torsos), but mostly they were nude. It’s strange enough to see people riding bicycles in Los Angeles, but the sight of so many naked riders made the traffic stop. People literally hit their brakes and gawked.

I watched the riders pedal up the hill, smiling and waving, chiming bike bells and hooting. A few of my fellow motorists responded by honking their horns and waving. I flashed a smile and a thumbs-up, although I have to say I didn’t envy the men riding the bikes. Was it safe? Couldn’t you snag your nuts on the seat?

Although a wide range of body types was represented, the cyclists had a uniform look. They were mostly young, in their twenties and early thirties, and, oddly for Los Angeles, predominantly Caucasian.

I don’t know why, but my first thought was that it was someone’s birthday and they had asked their friends to go on a naked bike ride through the city to celebrate. I imagined they’d go home and eat cake and gelato after a lap around the Silver Lake Reservoir. That would be a memorable birthday.

Then I thought that it was some kind of protest, a pro-cycling, antifur, vegan advocacy collective vying for attention. The Lactose-Intolerant Legume League or Vegan Vigilantes against Vivisection.

And then they were gone, heading up the hill, turning right onto Silver Lake Boulevard, and riding out of sight.

It wasn’t until the next day when I was reading the newspaper that I learned that they were part of a worldwide phenomenon known as the World Naked Bike Ride (WNBR).

The WNBR is the brainchild of Canadian Conrad Schmidt, a filmmaker, writer, and social activist member of the Work Less Party of British Columbia. The Work Less Party’s motto is “Work Less, Consume Less, Live More.” It advocates a thirty-two-hour workweek, which you would think would make it the ruling party of most countries. It would have my vote.

The WNBR began as both a protest against oil dependency and a celebration of the human body. The first WNBR day took place in 2004, in twenty-eight cities in ten countries, and as cycling and social activist groups from around the world sparked to Schmidt’s idea, the ride grew. By 2010 the event had rides in seventy-four cities—places as diverse as Amsterdam, Mexico City, Thessaloniki, São Paulo, and Melbourne—in seventeen countries.
⁷⁶

As the organizers say in their mission statement, the groups were “connected by their determination to all be naked on their bikes on WNBR Day, riding in celebration, jubilation to deliver a vision of a cleaner, safer, body-positive world to the masses.” They also added, “It’s time to join hundreds of naked compatriots in a free, non-sexual, fun bike ride!”

There’s that nonsexual thing again. What do they mean by that? Have you ever been on a sexual bike ride?

The WNBR doesn’t really have much to do with nonsexual social nudism—it isn’t really a nudist or naturist event—but anytime you have a group of people getting together without their clothes on, nudists will be drawn to it. As Mark Storey, a participant in the WNBR in Seattle, explained, “What happened was a bunch of nudists got involved, and the young people who got it started were being surrounded by a bunch of older naked guys.”

This made some of the young people—who weren’t necessarily into nudism—uncomfortable and has led to stories of WNBR organizers giving fake locations and start times to nudists so they don’t co-opt the ride.

In 2006 the WNBR organizers clarified their mission statement by announcing that “While the ride does include and appeal to participants from social nudity circles, the ride is not focused on promoting social nudity directly as much as cycling.”

So it’s not about nakedness, it’s about pedaling. Which I understand. As they say in their mission statement, a bicycle is “the unabashed vehicle of the revolution. By cycling naked we declare our confidence in the beauty and individuality of our bodies and the bicycles’s [
sic
]
place as a catalyst for change in the future of sustainability, transport, community and recreation.” There is a logic to the WNBR’s vision of using nudity to bring awareness of the positive attributes of cycling to a wider audience. Cycling promotes self-sufficiency and locavore consumerism, provides health and fitness benefits, creates community, and is good for the environment, and nothing gets the American public’s attention more than a pair of naked breasts.

With the WNBR more focused on cycling and less on nakedness, another group sprung up. As Mark Storey explained, “We wanted to see what we could get started to actually get people to try some things that would require minimal money whatsoever, no jail time whatsoever, and no effort whatsoever.”

Storey and his friends took a poll of other naturists to see what their favorite nude activities were. “Everybody picks swimming. But after that, hands down, it was walking and gardening. Not everybody can walk, but everybody can garden.”

So they created World Naked Gardening Day.

“The first year we did some photo shoots at some public parks, cleaning things up, weeding. We just found a park early in the morning. A bunch of us got naked, cleaned up the park. Somebody took pictures. We got the thing off the ground, and then we kind of waited to see what would happen.”