Nude Hiking?

[highway]

Folks should really consider saying something funny about a post in the Hiking Humor forum. If people keep griping, I'll have to move this to a different forum. If they keep sniping, I'll just close the thread.

So in summary, no gripin' or snipin' folks. Please.

Now back to humor:

If somebody as chunky as I am goes swimming nekkid, is it still "skinny" dippin'?

I see nothing malicious in the above posts but others opinions about the topic, certainly nothing to warrant threats of censure from anyone. It is my opinion that, to do so, would sadly make one nothing more than just some self-imposed "thread Nazi" wielding power inappropriately.

Are you a prude?
Hiking nude
Is not rude!

[Odd Thomas]

Because nudity is associated with sexuality in our species.

Not any more or less than "the opposite sex" is, in our or any other species.

Sexuality, like fear, hate, and greed, is an extremely powerful motivating force for good and ill among people.

So is everything you can and could have named. Candy. Sunlight. Laws. Everything is a motivating force for good and evil. So your point is it's like everything else, kind of morally indifferent, and dual use. If it can motivate good and evil, why does good benefit from it's prohibition?

Powerful forces are best harnessed or at least not able to cause more than an acceptable amount of damage.

Laws are powerful forces too, but laws should never damage or irrationally punish, and most legal scholars use the benchmark of "not a single man should be unfairly punished", a much higher bar than one we impose on our own primal instincts. Primal instincts (and reactions to them) make lousy models for laws.

Think of the aphorism about fire; 'it is a good servant but a terrible master'.

When we stopped fearing it, it brought us out of the stone age.

When you see an an individual or a group of people (on up to national or civilizational scale) who seems to consistently make poor decisions (that lead to particularly poor outcomes), odds are that one of those motivations operates out of whack in them.

What's even more common and spectacularly damaging are the poor decisions made consistently with perfectly good intentions and well-balanced motivations. They paved a road somewhere evil with those. Good intentions motivated by primal instincts.

You follow this up in your next post mentioning class/achievements/expansion...

It's the poverty class that is expanding, not the first world.

The first world is in population decline, and is expanding mostly through the population growth of those in poverty and immigrants from the third world (here and in europe). The first world has fertility problems, and I mean that literally. Darwin is not selecting us, or puritanism for that matter. Darwin is selecting those who don't have this evolutionarily perverted fear of/and the expression of their own genes, and the aversion to the sight of others genes being expressed.

Your comment on puritanism... Isn't it possible that puritanism *evolved as a primal response to a common group threat, as generic and irrational fear of snakes and spiders is thought to be? Most puritanical civilizations had populations that butted heads with the available resources and persevered through social repression, and historically, this repression relaxed as the resources expanded. Puritanism has been a counter to poverty, which historically and to this day accelerates the population growth. If this is the case, puritanism itself should be added to your list containing dual use emotions like fear, greed, etc. and should probably be considered good only when it provides rational benefit, and be considered bad when we're just repressing ourselves with this primal emotion irrationally, just like greed, fear, etc.

I'm not equating puritanism here to religion itself

*Possibly expressed by the Vesicular Monoamine Transporter 2 gene.

That said, I'd rather not have to look at ugly naked people, but I value a rational legal system more than a guarantee I won't have to see a hairy butt. The boobs no longer considered offensive by the law in much of the US (without incident, and largely without notice) makes me think we can have it both ways.

[Captn]

If somebody as chunky as I am goes swimming nekkid, is it still "skinny" dippin'?

Or is it "chunky dunkin'"?

[weary]

....The boobs no longer considered offensive by the law in much of the US (without incident, and largely without notice) makes me think we can have it both ways.

Especially since most world societies throughout history have never considered boobs offensive.

Boobs = offensive has largely been a cultural artifact of muslim, evangelical, and puritan societies.

[Bearpaw]

Since nobody here has a sense of humor, I'm moving this to the General forum. Debate away, but please try to keep things civil.

[Tin Man]

If somebody as chunky as I am goes swimming nekkid, is it still "skinny" dippin'?

Taking a dip sounds like sliding in, so I guess cannonballs would be ruled out... unless you are into pain.

[1/4 moon]

[SIZE=2]
Stupid SOBs…And who the hell is Mother Nature?

She's one heck of an older hiker, We hiked Katahdin in august and I had a heck of a time keepig up with her

[Rain Man]

Since nobody here has a sense of humor, I'm moving this to the General forum. Debate away, but please try to keep things civil.

Hard to have a sense of humor about hate speech and this thread is loaded with it.

RainMan

.

[minnesotasmith]

We're not significantly a puritanical society anymore; consider as evidence the universal access to pornography (including our advertising), acceptance of b*st*rdy, cohabitation, repeated divorce with no grounds, partial acceptance of open homosexuality, etc. Now, we're not coming close to replacing ourselves. Sweden, France, England, Japan, Italy, etc. are all in similiar boats, their native-borns declining at up to 25% a generation.

http://usgovinfo.about.com/cs/census...abirthrate.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...fertility_rate

Now, back in the 1950s and before, when we WERE much more restrictive WRT sexual expression, we DID have a native-born birth rate expectable of a people that intended to exist indefinitely. Look at the predominantly Muslim countries in the world now; puritanical as Hades, yet managing to replace themselves every generation and more. Association may not be causation in a single case, yet after a while, it stops being coincidence...

Anyway, the Sexual Revolution only really benefited childless attractive younger women (while in such status), young men not inclined to have families (again only while in such status), successful older men, and people with truly unusual (by definition perverse) sexual tastes. Everyone else aside from social workers, divorce lawyers, health care workers specializing in VD or abortion, etc. got shafted by it. Examples of the latter include 1) family-oriented men in their late twenties or older who look unsuccessfully for unattached & childless [thus available] women inclined to marry and form families while still young enough to do so, 2) women past their primes (reproductive- and looks-wise), who are left with children with no husband (he left for a younger woman, she kicked him out in an argument over nothing since the law no longer stops that, or he never existed), and 3) all the children growing up without fathers, in larger %s than even in the aftermath of total wars.

How wonderful the latter works out: http://www.childrensjustice.org/fatherlessness2.htm

"Fun" and "convenience" of a sexual nature may be pleasant for nonfamily-concerned/nonfuture-oriented people, but if it comes at the price of ending worthwhile nations, even a civilization, its price was too high to be accepted.

P.S. "Anything goes" sexuality is not "modern", but pre-modern, even pre-Stone Age. It's the sexuality of the barnyard...

[dessertrat]

Why does exhibitionism need an excuse? They want to expose themselves to themselves only, organized in the middle of the woods. Why should any harmless form of expression or communication be limited in any way, legally or morally?

The point is that they are not exposing themselves to themselves only. They cannot help but expose themselves to anyone else who happens by, some of whom don't want to look at them. They know that. The problem is not that they are naked, it's that they are inconsiderate of those who don't want to see it.

[kanga]

The point is that they are not exposing themselves to themselves only. They cannot help but expose themselves to anyone else who happens by, some of whom don't want to look at them. They know that. The problem is not that they are naked, it's that they are inconsiderate of those who don't want to see it.

i see fat nasty people in spandex everyday. i sure don't want to see that, but i do. they could help exposing themselves, but they don't.
naked is how we were made. being uncomfortable with nudity is unnatural, it's something that's trained into us as we grow. nobody's born being uncomfortable with their body or anybody else's.

[Sly]

When did nudity become taboo? Why is the sight of a human body either embarrassing or disturbing? Questions to ponder... but if everyone started walking around naked it would be no big deal. You'd get used to it.

[Nicksaari]

i was staying in a cabin in SNP 15 yards from the trail. i was naked half the time. cooling down after working up a sweat gathering and cutting firewood, i stood out upon the deck with a cold beer in hand, naked as the day i was born. impromptu shower in the spring, nude. walk around naked throughout the day...
the point is: neither some republican ******, nor a liberal will keep me from walking around naked on our trail, or the land that borders it. NO ONE.

call the cops, you miscreants.

[minnesotasmith]

When did nudity become taboo? Why is the sight of a human body either embarrassing or disturbing?

When some proto-humans started avoiding incest and forming organized groups above herd-levels of cohesion such as families and later tribes. The former costs an easy 20 IQ points, so is terribly disadvantageous in a setting with no welfare/disability system. The latter may well have come about due to the selective advantage that greater intelligence brings, but with the costs of longer childhood, more disabling pregnancy/birth/aftermath for women, etc., so there needed to be a support system (normally a husband/father at its core). To stick around and support a mother and her children, a father/husband needed reasonable assurance that the offspring were his, which meant that the mother needed to be faithful to him. Meanwhile, given the relative poverty that existed most of the time, the woman would want to only commit to a man that only slept with her, so that his resources weren't divided with other women. And so on.

[max patch]

the point is: neither some republican ******, nor a liberal will keep me from walking around naked on our trail, or the land that borders it. NO ONE.

Yeah, right. You got the balls to hike the SNP nekkid?

[jhick]

When did nudity become taboo? Why is the sight of a human body either embarrassing or disturbing? Questions to ponder... but if everyone started walking around naked it would be no big deal. You'd get used to it.

1) When religion told us so....
2) see #1.
3) There are cultures that prove your point to be true.

[minnesotasmith]

neither some republican ******, nor a liberal will keep me from walking around naked on our trail, or the land that borders it. NO ONE.

call the cops...

Someone will, eventually. If you won't follow some basic societal norms, there are groups of large men with guns whose job is to be more unpleasant to you than following those norms would be. The delay in acting on this premise just comes down to how slow a learner one is...

[splash1986]

It seems to me that hiking is an activity better done with some clothes on, to protect important assets. Personally, I would hate to wind up in a bunch of thorns naked. Just my personal opinion.

[Odd Thomas]

When some proto-humans started avoiding incest and forming organized groups above herd-levels of cohesion such as families and later tribes.

Incest avoidance evolved in primates long before we wore clothes. In fact, the people most of us see naked regularly when we are young, are our siblings!

The Westermark Effect can be observed happening where there is no nudity taboo. Incest avoidance (in most of us) does not require societal imposed taboos anyway, it's achieved through psychological imprinting- any children growing up in the same living area generally won't be sexually attracted to each other (naked or clothes, sibling or not)

As for infidelity, etc... human testicle size compared to other primates suggests that clothing hasn't helped. Many unclothed primates are more faithful than your clothed ancestors.

If clothing were related to fidelity and families, then (just like in the incest example) it would be the other way around. The best way to tell how faithfull a species is, is to examine their testicle size, not cover them up with clothes.

[Odd Thomas]

The point is that they are not exposing themselves to themselves only. They cannot help but expose themselves to anyone else who happens by, some of whom don't want to look at them. They know that. The problem is not that they are naked, it's that they are inconsiderate of those who don't want to see it.

Why should we have the right to not have to look at things in public places that we don't want to see? That's usually a right we grant to property owners.

What about gays kissing? Advertisements? Breastfeeding? Everyone's offended/doesn't want to look at something.

The inconsideration aspect can be dealt with using existing laws. Being bothered by a naked person who won't leave you alone ideally shouldn't be any different than dealing with a clothed solicitor that won't leave you alone. We already have laws for harassment and even sexual harassment to deal with the inconsiderates, and if they are bothering you they have already broken them.

(assuming that it is reasonable that their behavior should be seen as bothering, which a naked person who wants to make you look at them for more than 10 seconds is, as is a solicitor or union picketer who does the same for more than 10 seconds)