Why are we taught shame about nudity and our bodies?

[Danee]

Humanity is the most unique species on this Earth. It’s because we are the only ones to cover our bodies. And we are taught to cover up in shame. We’re taught shame about nudity and our bodies, unlike any other species. Why? Here goes why.
Humanity began naked. The earliest humans lived naked, and they lived in rather warm climates. Clothing therefore wasn’t necessary and was rather impractical.
However, then humans started migrating north to North America, Europe, and Asia, and it was the Ice Age. Humans realized they had no hair or fur to not need any body covering. However, people were not ashamed of nudity or their bodies yet. It continued that way throughout ancient history. The human body was seen as innocent in ancient Greece and Italy, and the predecessor to today’s Olympic Games had the competitions done in the nude. Public nudity was then commonplace. Many societies lived naked until some centuries ago.

Indigenous peoples in the Western Hemisphere were abundant until the Western European conquest of the 16th to 19th centuries. Such peoples lived naked without shame, and those peoples remaining live that way even today. The indigenous peoples had indigenous religions practiced and did not require clothing. The European conquest changed everything, and the conquest extended to other parts of the world as well.




Religions have taught about being modestly dressed and shame about casual, non-sexual nudity.


The 18th and 19th centuries had clothing fashions cover the entire body.
As more clothing became required, even when impractical to have it worn, nudity became limited to less circumstances.
As nudity became limited to less circumstances, more parents taught their children that nudism is wrong.

The early modern Olympic Games would also have the athletes compete naked. It was around the time when swimwear got invented, too.

More technology got invented, and civilization advanced that way, yet came more isolation of the natural world.
Things got invented to justify being afraid of the nude and not go nude. Unnecessary and redundant clothing like bras and swimwear got invented. Air conditioners in summers where it’s at least very warm. Casual clothing. And there came laws created to criminalize public nudity, even the most innocent of it.





The 20th century saw rapid technological advancements but also more isolation of the natural world.
The media has blurred nudity. This teaches shame of the body even when nude.
Many negative influences have caused an aversion and frowning upon of even the most innocent exposure of naked bodies.
In the modern era, globalization and materialism are factors to why we have been taught to be ashamed of being naked.

Our parents have taught us about body shame. Why? Because our grandparents did it to our parents, too, and it passed down from earlier generations, too. It has been so brainwashed that it gets to the point that nudity is nothing more than a rarity.
However, even among nudist families and communities, other negative influences teach such people to be ashamed of nudity and human bodies. Children there get influenced by the media and peer pressure and they may, too, start to be ashamed of nakedness.
Many children raised as nudists become self-conscious of nudity and their bodies when hitting puberty and/or between the ages of 13 and 29 or so. It could be because of the changing genitals and being more aroused by sex due to the changing bodies. But did this happen some 2000 or 3000 years ago when many societies lived naked? The ones raised as nudists may become self-conscious when hitting youth due to the world filled with clothes.

Even among nudists not ashamed of nudity, they may keep nudism secret. It has to do with their friends and family rejecting nudism, but then many nudists go to nudist clubs and resorts without telling their friends and family. They love being naked but worry too much about what their friends and family will think of them as nudists. True, due to the stigmas and taboos imposed on nudism over the centuries, people say things like, “Gross”, “Are you crazy?”, and “I don’t want to see that”. But then again, keeping nudism secret means it can’t be accepted by mainstream society. In this day and age, we should have nudism promoted.
There is not much announcement on nudism. No wonder few people frequent nude beaches and resorts, and few people know nudism exists.
In some ways nudism has regressed. Historically people have only swum nude. Swimsuits are only a little more than a century old and don’t help with swimming at all. The YMCA, Boy Scouts, and boys in K-12 schools would swim nude in the United States and it ended sometime between the 1960s and 1980s. It ended for one absurd reason in the YMCA just because of women beginning to be admitted to swim with the men together in the 1970s. The sexual revolution of the 1960s caused more bans of swimming naked. The AIDS discovery of 1981 caused nudity to become more sexualized and even more restricted. Globalization of the United States’ stuff around the world has caused more frowning upon of nudism overseas as well. The last three decades were especially terrible times for nudism in the United States.





 Skinny dipping seems to be mainly a male thing. The Boy Scouts, YMCA members, and boys in U.S. K-12 schools would swim naked until a few decades ago. Strangely and sexist enough, that wasn’t the case for the Girl Scouts, YWCA members, and girls in K-12 U.S. schools. The females in the places and organizations have had to deal with using swimsuits. It seems like more men participate in skinny dipping events than women too. It has to do also with how women’s bodies have been seen as sex objects in the last two centuries.
Nudism brings security over the natural processes of the stages of life. Due to clothes compulsiveness, we have had anti-aging creams developed due to fear of getting old. Why? Because we don’t get to see how the stages of life go.
We’ve been taught that the naked body is boring and it’s therefore best to cover it up. That is just gratuitous and crazy.
The way we came into this world is how we should live and go out. How can being naked be considered uncivilized and there are people saying they want to die with casual clothes on?
True, religions have taught us about modestly dressing ourselves, but such biases don’t affect us anymore. They are outdated biases that have no place anymore in modern society.
Children are taught to not see naked bodies starting at a young age. While as a baby it may be okay to take pictures of them naked and adults don’t find it a big deal, even that moment doesn’t last a long time. Children aren’t taught to not look at cruelties like war, violence, and killings on TV and movies.
If things hadn’t changed to require clothing at all times in the first place, by now we would have less problems in society. If everyone grew up nudist, we’d have less violence in this world.
We are told to stay dressed even at the beach, to swim, the sauna, and at home.
At least now the Internet makes it easier than ever to view wholesome nude images. During the 1980s and 1990s, it was painfully difficult to view wholesome nude images of the human body.
Clothes compulsion has led some people to be never-nudes.
We’re told to confine being nude to private times and places. There is nothing wrong with keeping being nude intimate, but being nude can be from the most intimate moment to the most public moment without a problem.
Because non-sexual nudity is too often hidden from view, no view leads to ignorance and eventually aversion. We need to break this.
Many nudists don’t tell their friends and family about them going to nudist venues, but the only way to make progress is to let others know about something to advance the thing.
Nudism is indeed very important to humanity. Health is very important, and being nude promotes health. Social equality matters, promoted by nudism. We then learn to stop self-loathing. Nudism solves many of society’s problems. Being horrified of nudity is being horrified over nothing. Clothes aren’t our friend.
It has been proven that clothing is made with harmful stuff that is slowly killing us.
We need to really publicize nudism and promote nudism positively.
Clothing is only for protection from inclement and cold weather and risky activities, but not for vanity or modesty.
We have a huge textile industry that wants our money for making clothes. They want our money even when clothing is redundant.
We need genuine nudist leaders to help end the clothes compulsiveness.
To normalize nudity, we will need to change stuff. Only we can change the aversion of nudism. We need to petition to stop the crazy censorship of nakedness. We need to end the advertising of too much sex and perfect bodies. We need to end negative body image advertising. We need to petition to end a lot of atrocities like war and violence to be seen on the media, movies, and the world’s most popular websites and instead allow non-sexual nudity in them. We need to petition to have being nude be allowed anywhere in the world. We need nudism in our everyday lives. It’s for our own good.
The purpose is not to force nudity on anyone, but to make nudism accepted by mainstream society and then more people can try it.
We know how the male and female bodies look like. Most of us have seen whole naked bodies before, in one way or another.
We were born naked, yet how can being naked be considered rude, obscene, and be even criminalized in public? Society is just too twisted.
 Why do we have so many prudes in society? Nudity is allowed for entertainment and voyeurism but not for comfort.
People can handle nude art but why not normal naked bodies?
Remaining closeted on nudism can’t promote the nudist lifestyle fast enough.
There are nudist celebrities. Celebrities have a huge influence on the general public. Celebrities pose nude yet the nudist celebrities don’t come out of the closet to advance the nudist movement.
It is already no longer enough for some nudists worldwide to remain closeted. It’s clearly time to go public with nudism and make nudism mainstream.
We should normalize nudity in paintings, homes, workplaces, videos, photographs, websites, television, movies, and more art.
Where is a naked country?
Why have strict policies on dress codes when we have negative consequences for clothing ourselves at all times?
The future should be of having public nudity legalized and have many more nudists.
When clothing is not needed, it’s a symbol of adornment at best.
There are predictions that the future may have fewer if any clothing. We can keep our fingers crossed and/or pray that this comes true.
We aren’t born with shame of nudity or our bodies, like how we’re not born with ageism, sexism, racism, or xenophobia, for example.
How can we easily relate to one another without nudism in our lives?
I would definitely be naked all the time if I could choose and circumstances permitted nudity all the time.
Humanity is the only species taught to be ashamed of their bodies.
Any body part can cause sexual excitement. Only the genitals are the true sex organs we have, and even those are no more sexual than any other body parts. We don’t think of sex all the time, nor can we have sex all the time. The thing is too much sexualization of nudity in society.
If noses, knees, and hands aren’t censored, why are genitals, buttocks, and women’s breasts censored?
We can start advocating for a normalization of nudity and the normalization can begin to materialize in the near future. Why even complain of no nudity normalization? We can start change now!
 Well said. Another sign of hiding bodies in shame even when nude is how so many nudists are closeted.
People have created myths of nudism. It’s one of the most misunderstood lifestyles by society.
Should we ban clothes worldwide? That would definitely make the world a better place.
We can make the future a lot more nudist and then many people frown upon clothing and not nudity.
We need to get together and make a nude-friendly world.
Nudism is indeed for everyone. It doesn’t matter who one is, nudism is for all, and does not discriminate. Let’s positively promote nudism and we have even more nudists each time until the whole world population is nudist again.
Let’s hope for eventually having a perfectly nude world to live in.
Once people try nudism and go nude often, they’ll never want to go back to clothes again, at least most likely.
Social nudity and nude recreation should be more widely available for everyone, since nudism is for everyone and nudism adds a lot of fun to our lives.
Clothes are crushing us and are often like a prison.
 Well said. A true quote. Clothing is just very restricting. Nudism sets us free.
We need to question why we’ve been brainwashed into naked body shame. It brings so many negative side effects.
Let’s have this information be widespread and to positively promote nudism



From: https://rfgjga1992.wordpress.com/2016/01/12/why-are-we-taught-shame-about-nudity-and-our-bodies/