Caution: Contains Nudity And Sex: The Blowfish Blog

I have a new piece up on the Blowfish Blog. It's about nudity, and sex... and how, when people become more comfortable and knowledgeable about sex, the two stop being automatically connected.

It's called Caution: Contains Nudity And Sex, and here's the teaser:

Some years ago, I read a letter to Dear Abby from a concerned mother. She had recently discovered that her children -- her full-grown, adult, married children -- were having hot tub parties with other adults... parties at which these adults sat together in hot tubs without their clothing.

She was appalled. She was deeply concerned about where this was heading. And Dear Abby fanned the flames of this concern into near-panic. She essentially said (I'll have to paraphrase here, since I can't find the original column), "Your children are headed for trouble. This can lead to no good."

Ms. Abby obviously believed, either that these naked hot tub parties would inevitably lead to swinging and infidelity and other disasters, or that they already had done so. It wasn't quite clear which. But the equation in her mind was very clear indeed: Being naked around other naked people either implies an already existing sexual relationship, or will inevitably lead to one.

An equation that not only pissed me off, but completely baffled me.

So. Now I have a confession to make.

I regularly attend parties and gatherings at which there is naked hot tubbing... with people I have never in my life had sex with, and probably never will.

And it's really no big deal.

To read more about the distinction between nudity and sex, read the rest of the piece. Enjoy!

Comments

[Kagehi]

Its interesting that you come to the same conclusion, from the 100% opposite direction, as these people (and others like them):

http://www.naturist-christians.org/

Mind, they **still** have the paranoid fear of sex, but they have managed to get rid of the paranoid fear that nudity "is" sex.

However, its also sad that not only do most right wingers not know about such groups, but their **most common** response to them is usually something like (without saying so directly), "I know Uncle Joe diddles my sister, and started doing so after catching her naked in the bath one day, so these people must be lying about all of it, and really be holding huge orgies all the time!" Well, or some variation that *implies* that every nudist/naturist and even Christian nudist/naturist is lying about all of it. The rampant paranoia you get from people that equate nudity and sex, and refuse to understand that they are not the same thing, is mind numbing.

[Fenix]

So I am really interested in reading the rest of this piece, but your links don't seem to work - I get the nasty 404 error. Has it been moved somewhere else? Can you direct me there?
I love your writing and you have been such an inspiration to me as a budding atheist activist, as well as providing me with massive amounts of ammunition for my arguments, I wanted to thank you for that.