• ameancow@lemmy.world
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      21 hours ago

      It’s entirely a modern, “developed” world phenomenon where everything in the world is sexualized to the point that you can’t use the bathroom or shower around other people without feeling weird. That weird feeling is real, and you can’t just hand-wave it away, but it’s socially constructed. I think we should all remember that. There are currently and have been many times and places where people just don’t care nearly as much about each other’s bodies or being seen by others.

      When you really think about it, it’s absolutely crazy. We have been wearing clothing for less than the last 100,000 years or so. A blink of an eye evolutionarily. And that was just cold environments. Before that, we had a 4.1-billion year unbroken chain of successful life that as far as we know, never wore clothes or felt shame going to the bathroom.

      • weker01@sh.itjust.works
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        5 hours ago

        Nudist spaces (for example sauna) are relatively common in some parts of Europe. I don’t think it’s necessarily a western thing.

        • ameancow@lemmy.world
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          4 hours ago

          I started to type “western” and then used the word “developed” nation instead, and even then I realize that’s not entirely accurate. Places like Japan and New Zealand have public baths, often with little or no real separation between genders. There’s a famous pic out there of a yakuza woman bathing with her male compatriots. They have a stronger stigma about tattoos than boobs.

          Conservatives would absolutely explosively shit themselves if they visited a bathing area in New Zealand, or for that matter any of the many, many nudist communities in the US. You know, those places where we hear about horrible sex crimes that happen every day?

          Wait, I’m being told that’s actually churches where the horrible sex crimes happen. Churches where people wear clothes.

          I fucking swear, the same people who scream about bathroom “safety” are the same people who think all men are rapists if they so much as see a woman’s ankle and blame victims of assault for what they were wearing.

      • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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        21 hours ago

        Yeah, it’s certainly irrational, but as you said, it’s very real. I don’t want people of the opposite sex looking at me naked (or even the same sex, but that’s less bad), and I’m sure they feel the same about me.

        • weker01@sh.itjust.works
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          5 hours ago

          To me that sounds quite sad. Non sexual nudity is a unique experience it’s unfortunate that many will never be able to enjoy it or disassociate it from sexuality.

          In Germany there are big and accepted nudist spaces. It was also quite the cool experience meeting strangers in a public sauna in Finland. It was such a peaceful environment, as everyone was literally exposing themselves and showing a certain vulnerability that we do not encounter otherwise.

          • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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            3 hours ago

            Yeah, I’ve been to a public bath in E. Asia and, while it was uncomfortable for me (very different from my culture), it was fine. But I bet most people from my region wouldn’t even consider going.

    • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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      1 day ago

      Yeah if that is your hill you should be arguing for shower stalls anyway. Like you said nothing stopping anyone from perving in there as it is. Gender has nothing to do with it.