An absolutely bizarre moment occurred last week when a woman claimed, at a meeting held by US politician Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, that to save the planet the solution was to eat babies. :-O

It turns out the exchange was some sort of stunt, but the power of social media was evident when the video went viral, and a meme was born.

To demonstrate how things move quickly in Second Life, there is already a T shirt bearing the #eatthebabies hashtag.

Not remotely ‘naturist’, I know, but the real life exchange demonstrates what an increasingly bizarre world we inhabit. It seems to me that it just gets stranger and stranger and it’s hard to know what’s real and what’s not anymore.

I dunno, where naturism was once seen as some weird, fringe lifestyle, it feels like it’s becoming increasingly normalised as a result of the weirdness surrounding us all.

Ella

This morning was the 7th annual North-East skinny dip, an event that more or less concludes the naturist ‘season’ in this country (the UK).

It raises cash for MIND, an mental health charity, and I’ve heard that it was marshalled in a different manner to keep ‘casual photographers’ away, with only official photographers and participants cameras/phones allowed to record the event. Whether this was flagged up in advance, I don’t know, but my source -a veteran of this event- says that the male to female ration was much more balanced this year.

People like to have the likes of this on their ‘bucket list’ (skinny-dipping is on many people’s bucket list) and also like to raise money for charity. Combine the two and you have a winner! But people don’t like to necessarily have their naked self splashed all over the internet or in print, and it’s clear that many people would avoid the event for that reason. Good marshalling, to preserve people’s anonymity makes sense for events such as this (and also the Sydney Skinny, another event that also is firm on photographic rules).

(photos shown from last year’s official photos)

Ella

This photo is, apparently, from Atlantic City in 1939, so we’re celebrating the 80th anniversary of the photo. Topless male swimming had become the norm around 1934, and I’m guessing that Atlantic City was just a little behind the curve, normalising it in ’39, hence the photo.

It’s almost certainly staged in front of a real sign, playing on the fact that the woman is pointing out the info given while the beach lifeguard looks bemused.

In many parts of the world, 80 years on, women are still fighting for equality in this matter.

Ella

Susan has been out and about, taking photos of various SL naturist locations (and more general views). Above, she’s at the Punta Negra naturist sim, and we’ll have a report on that soon.

In the meantime, here’s a small gallery of other, similarly inclined photographers.

Ella

The entire summer was, as I previously reported, a wipeout. 

Poor weather, children needing attending, only one naturist holiday this year, back in June, and relatively little report-worthy naturism in real life to even report on! My most clothes orientated summer for 20 years!

Factor in ‘the builders’ (and the builders over-running on completion) and months have just slipped away with SLN taking a firm back seat.

Back now! And those who contribute to SLN are (almost) all back from their holidays, and we’re all feeling refreshed by having an enforced break!

When I couldn’t write, though, I was able to think about how to develop the blog. I’ve abandoned the Flickr account for SLN, as it was something of a bolt-on anyway, and I’ve spent most of the month, so far, just getting back inworld and seeing the changes to SL’s naturist community, and simply socialising before I go back to the usual routine of having to split a wider SL time into two sections…being inworld….or writing for SLN.

Spare a thought, too, for bits of naturist Spain buffeted and battered by the flooding hitting the region. In the photograph above we can see San Javier, the village outside Murcia which contains the regional airport, one we’ve often flown into, and then driven to our various naturist holidays in a couple of locations on the Mediterranean coast.

In previous bad flooding, we got out with hours to spare! We could see the lightning storms envelop Madrid as we flew homeward. By the next morning some of the bridges we’d crossed on our journey to the airport  had been washed away.

Back to more regular posting from this week!

Ella

I have to apologise for the lack of posts throughout August. Quite simply, a growing family have needs throughout the summer holidays, and between day trips here and there, amusing them on wet days and so on, and then a minor illness to contend with (nothing serious) SLN had to take a back seat.

With school returning, things should return to normal, as far as posting is concerned. Thanks for your patience, everyone

Ella

There’s a fantastic article in today’s Guardian about the joys of wild swimming. 

It’s a topic the blog has covered on numerous occasions (search the archives) and something we do often in Second Life (nude swimming in non nude sims) as well as in real life.

Susan, watched over only by sheep and herons, goes wild swimming in Second Life

Susan

Yesterday was Brighton’s Pride Parade, and I was taken by a report in which there appears to have been a huge amount of litter and rubbish left behind, including thousands of laughing gas canisters and balloons.

Brighton’s residents have complained about the huge amount of litter left behind.

Last year, over 100 tons of litter was collected after the parade.

Granted, any large gathering of people, regardless of the issue, will generate slovenly behaviour, but really…people need to understand that respect is a two way street.

If you march for the demand to be respected, then it’s incumbent upon you to offer the same amount of respect to the environment. And this is naturist relevant because there is a large naturist community within the LGBT community, and naturists should be holding themselves to a higher standard of respect than others. WE demand respect as naturists, and do a bit to ensure that WE clean up the beach after ourselves. You know, ‘leave only footprints, take only memories’.

The same SHOULD apply to the LGBT community. You want respect? Start providing it. As a community, you shame yourselves in this regard! And if anyone thinks I’m having a go at a community, I am! Particularly when you keep demanding respect. As I’ve said, it’s a two way street. 😦

Naturists aren’t blameless, of course, plenty are equally slovenly. But really, Brighton Pride folk! If you’re preaching ‘respect’, start displaying it! The Pride Parade in my home town is always great. The war zone of litter left behind shames you all, though! (Yes, I’m angry…I live here!)

Pookes

Staff member and coffee shop manager Julie has pointed us at a shop called ViveNine, which is giving a lace ‘cardigan’ as a group gift. I was so taken with it that I hopped over there to pick it up myself! A lovely little (semi) cover up for whenever you come out of the sea or pool on holiday! Pookes

I saw this photo online and I love it!

Mixed gender, shame-free wild swimming that shouts ‘we’re too hot! Let’s get our clothes off in a non sexual way and cool off!’

Europe is in the middle of another record-breaking heatwave, and this sort of photo pretty much represents what all of us, naturist or not, should be doing to cool down.

I bet the location of the photo wasn’t officially designated naturist. It doesn’t matter. It’s people doing something entirely natural without shame, or society constructed body shame.

The entire world, within reason, should be like that.

The same body shame exists within Second Life, to the point that many skin/cothes designers are nipple-phobic. As for genitalia! :-O

To me, if I find a mountain stream on a hot day, skinny dipping is entirely natural, anywhere in the world. And the same, increasingly, applies within Second Life. If I find a photogenic location where I can take photos, I’ll readily strip off for them! And the rest of the girls on the staff feel the same. Increasingly, for us, there are NO (or very few) non-naturist locations in SL anymore. Obviously, as in real life, we aren’t going to go nude in a busy shopping mall or shopping fair. But any photogenic woodland, forest, desert or even urban area, if we like the location, we’ll photograph at it.

This conservative mindset in SL and its designers exists because SL (and Linden Labs) are US based, and there is so much uptightness about nudity within US social mores, whereas Europe is much more liberal.

If I was to buy a new SL skin I’d quite like to see what the nipples look like on it, and it’s a source of frustration to find skin stores with censored nipples within the store. The same applies to male genitalia. I imagine the men playing SL quite like the idea of knowing what they’re getting! The full picture! And many SL related blogs similarly self-censor. Please stop! It’s a nipple. The world won’t spin off its axis if you publish a photo of an essentially cartoon avatar with nipples on display.

The world doesn’t spin off its axis if others encounter that nude couple in the stream I started this post with. Everyone survives without scars!

Ella