Hacker News Reader

Comment by laurent_du | Hacker News Reader

Let's be real, everyone feels nudity is inherently sexual, except on HN and probably on reddit where men love to claim that it's not. I don't know if it's virtue-signalling, sexual frustration, or something else. It does sound weird and creepy to me - grown up men who claim that naked women are not arousing, the same men who rally en masse every time pornography censorship is discussed, to complain about freedom of expression, when they are really just afraid they will lose the ability to stare at naked women having sex.

Another, more charitable, explanation, would be that a lot of people around here are asexual. It's possible - but to this extent? I am skeptical.

View on HN

Plenty of "normal" people outside of HN visit saunas, nudist parks, and nude beaches. It's perfectly alright not to be comfortable with doing so yourself, but other people feel differently.

Then again, there are societies that will shame (and do worse things to) women for showing their hair or skin to strangers.

If you're (un)lucky, your innocent holiday pictures may make the front page of Wikifeet, but that doesn't mean you're a creep for posting your holiday pictures online. There's a spectrum here and claiming to know the absolute truth and branding everyone else as perverts is silly.

Personally, I find the puritan idea that any nudity is sexual to be quite childish and immature.

"let's be real" isn't a strong argument tbh; your argument doesn't apply to a lot of cultures. Ever been to a sauna? Nudist areas? Ever seen South-American, African, Indonesian tribes?

Whether nudity is considered sexual is cultural, not "inherently", and you claiming that "everyone" feels like it is is highlighting your own blinkered world view. You don't speak for "everyone".

It seems a lot of Americans (main users of this site) wear clothes in saunas, or in the shower after going swimming

Nude beaches are pretty old as a concept? Always a niche community but there's definitely been hippies talking about non sexual nudism for decades and etc

It must have been non sexual at some point in our historical development, before clothes. So I can't really agree that it's inherently so - just that we've culturally made it a sexual thing for basically all of history. That might be close though to functionally be inherent to human society depending on your viewpoint though.

There are plenty of people who grew up in naked households. Ranging from just being nude at home to being intermittently undressed around others.

Do you think those people found nudity sexual?

How about doctors and nurses that see naked people all the time? Is simple nudity sexual for them?

How about athletes that shower in open showers together. Are they experiencing a sexual experience when they’re showering after practice?

There’s so many counter examples to this that saying nudity is sexual is just silly.

> I don't know if it's virtue-signalling, sexual frustration, or something else.

I think de-sensitization [*] may play a big role here; I'm convinced that the more porn you look at, the higher your threshold goes. I've not consumed any porn for years now (as I write in my other comment), and I find the lady in the picture extremely sexual. Yes, she's not suggesting / soliciting / provoking; she is just standing there. I agree. Yet she's no less sexual for that fact.

[*] edited comment for fixing my wrong use of the term

I think I would agree that she's sexy / attractive depending on terms, but I don't think that makes it a suggestive or sexual photo strictly I guess. I can be turned on by a partner fully clothed and showing a little shoulder, if I'm in the right mood! But that wouldn't make it a sexy outfit, I'm biased by my emotions about her.

I think this is why there's a lot of pedantry and "know it when I see it" to the discussion

> everyone feels nudity is inherently sexual

I propose you watch 5 minutes of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naked_Jungle with nude Keith Chegwin, and you will be disabused of that notion.

Your argument will be reduced to "everyone feels some kinds of nudity, preferably not featuring Keith Chegwin, are inherently sexual"

No, even you do not think nudity is sexual.

I imagine you've been to a locker room before - was that sexual? Of course not. But you're not gay, you might say.

So then it's not nudity - it's your own inclination to sex. If you see the world sexually, you'll sexualize nudity.

All of this is in your head and projection, especially the part about others being creepy. You think sex and nudity is creepy and people are arguing for easier access to being extra creepy. That’s on you, but your judgments on others is not a healthy truth.

Tell me you've never been outside the US without saying you've never been outside the US.

Taking just one example, in Finland it is extremely common for people to visit saunas, and from what I've heard, you'd be laughed at if you tried to wear clothes (or even a towel) in the sauna.

One Finn posting online I saw a while back remarked that a lot of the problems Americans have would be resolved if we all saw our grandmas naked regularly.

I have never been in the US, and have been living in Finland for more than 15 years. Hilarious how wrong you are.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com