Der Spiegel (Germany) reports on an initiative to teach immigrants how to behave regarding women.

“No matter what swimsuit a woman is wearing, she is to be respected”

 

This ‘advice’ appears to have been issued in the wake of further sexual assaults by Afghan immigrants in Germany, a phenomenon stretching back to Cologne on New Year’s Eve, and further back again than that.

Co-ordinated attacks in Cologne were so concerning that they’ve even got as far as having (and rightly so) their own wiki page.

It’s a disgrace that immigrant males appear incapable of behaving in a manner we would expect most European males to understand and comply with, without in any way seeking to dismiss European on European sexual assaults that would be commonplace in many cities across the continent most weekends. It is likely that there will probably be more of these, European on European, this weekend..next weekend…and it’s a scandal and a disgrace that it is allowed to be seen as part of a ‘normal’ weekend. Sexual assaults on women are never acceptable, by anyone. The slight difference is that every male growing up in Europe will have been taught that assault, rape, or any sexual activity against a woman who may be too drunk to account for her own actions is wrong. The physical incapacity to say ‘no’, our rules say, is not an excuse.

Males coming from beyond Europe may have a different set of values and a different attitude. But it’s not an excuse. Wherever we grow up in the world there should be an implicit understanding in males to respect women, and a different sense of female style and fashion -in respect of women not being covered from head to toe, for example- does not make them ‘sluts’, does not make them ‘easy’, does not make them something to be regarded as something available for sex. I doubt there is a society around the globe that views women in this light. Some societies have a different attitude to women, finding them subjugated to a patriarchal society, but none teach that she is merely an object to be used for the release of sexual tension. So how do so many immigrant men turn up at the borders of Europe with, apparently, such an attitude branded into their tiny little minds?

I don’t wish to dwell too much on immigrant males, though. While the actions of some is disgraceful, and should lead to their expulsion from the continent of Europe, the fact remains that the numbers committing such actions is ‘low’. Low is still too much. The number shouldn’t be ‘low’, it should be zero. Right-wing media will almost certainly jump on this as a reason as to why all immigrants should be excluded from the continent and are working to their own xenophobic agenda.

I got to thinking, recently, about how we might consider the words of immigrant males regarding western, European women, views you can read about here, here and here. Disturbing reading.

But I then began to expand this awful attitude in the context of naturism, and European males’ view on the European female who might go nude.

Tumblr has a huge number of photo sites, and when researching for material and photos for SL Naturist, I’m regularly pointed in the direction of a tumblr site. Before people start to criticise the immigrant male’s attitudes towards more freely dressed European women, they might also need to examine the western world’s attitudes towards naturist women.

Words like ‘slut’ and ‘whore’ are freely tossed around. ‘I saw this big titted bitch with a completely shaved pussy on a beach in France’ might run a caption. For one, invading her privacy with your camera is an assault of itself (regardless of whether the law says so or not), and using words like ‘bitch’, while focussing on her breasts or genital area…can you really tell yourself that when it comes to the moral high ground, that you’re not down there in the gutter with ‘immigrant males’? It seems to me your attitude is no different. No different at all.

Women are not ‘bitches’, ‘sluts’ or ‘whores’ when engaged in simple naturism. They are not ‘bitches’, ‘sluts’ or ‘whores’ in almost any photographically depicted circumstance.

And then it comes to confusion as to what naturism is. How many photos of a woman performing oral sex on a man (or woman for that matter) are on your tumblr site? The tumblr site that, you know, has ‘naturism’ or ‘nudism’ in its title. By including photos of people engaged in oral sex, or penetrative sex, aren”t you displaying the same levels of ignorance that you might be applying to immigrant males? ‘Oh, these dirty Muslims all need to be thrown out if they’re attacking women’. The ignorance displayed in including photos of a sexual nature, it seems to me, is not that different. Certainly, you aren’t physically attacking women, but your mindset is right down there in the gutter with the Afghan male who is equally ignorant and stupid.

There is nothing wrong about depicting the female nude form. It is something that has been a mainstay of art ever since man was drawing on cave walls. And there is something about the female form that means it is continually aesthetically pleasing, certainly to males, but often not any less so to females. And there is something aesthetically pleasing about the male, nude form to many women, something else that artists have striven to recreate in paintings and sculptures. I’ve got no problem with the depiction of the nude. I’ve a problem with the manner in which it is sometimes talked about or captioned.

Naturism is not about sex. Sex is not part of naturism. It would be nice to see ‘naturist tumblr account holders’ grasp these simple facts and not reveal themselves as little more than social media’s equivalent to the mindset of the ‘immigrant male’.

Trine