We are in Euronat, a large naturist center. A very big one even…. Hundreds of acres, tens of kilometers of paved roads, a huge beach and thousands of people in the summer. In this area, nudity is highly valued. People who choose such a center usually know why they are there and accept the rules.
There is one exception, however, which is significant... Children and young people... I will ignore the specific problem of young people and consider only children.
Although many of them, convinced by their environment of the benefits of naturism, willingly submit to the rule of nudity, it must be recognized that a minority is more or less resistant. Clearly, nudity is not attractive to these children.
But why are these kids swimming in their bathing suits?
The adults are amazed. They notice that instead of taking the opportunity handed to them on a tray: skinny dipping, some children on the naturist beach keep on those swimming trunks that swell in the water and make them look ridiculous. For most adults who experience this behavior, it is simply incomprehensible because it is so obvious to them that swimming without a bathing suit is a pleasure.
An attempt at an explanation:
Society, ie the child's family environment, almost never sees nudity as a positive behavior. But on the contrary. Nudity is often seen as a wacky idea, an eccentricity sometimes mixed with perversity. Under no circumstances does it seem normal in our time to live naked, and outside of naturist centers nudity is clearly suppressed. Because parents are obviously not the only ones influencing their child. The friends, the media, the adults who surround them have a real and sometimes decisive influence on it.
Simply put, in our French society, being naked is considered “bad” and being clothed is considered “good”. The child needs these certainties to give him security and help him build his judgment.
But what happens when it enters a naturist site?
Then it no longer works, or rather, it works the other way around. Now the nudity that was banned, vilified and sometimes ridiculed is suddenly acceptable, decent and even recommended!
When you talk to kids who keep their bathing suits on at the beach, it's easy to get the feeling that they keep them on for swimming too, simply because in their minds it's not "good" to take them off. Maybe around them on the naturist beach the others are naked, maybe some adults even ask them to undress, but it's still not good......
These children did not have the opportunity to meet people who revealed to them the reasons for their own undressing, to feel the body in its entirety, the pleasure of being naked, the joy of feeling the wind that blows you with every pore of your skin caresses, the sun that warms you all around, the elemental contact with the earth and the sea, quite simply the fact of being comfortable in your body, in total harmony with nature, but also the refusal to conform to irrational conventions subdue that force you to wear useless bathing suits, the respect that you show to each other, more or less old, more or less physically privileged and therefore above all…. no judgment in the eyes of others… None of this is seen by these children who are against nudity.
Furthermore, when we observe the children in Euronat playing table tennis or badminton in the multipurpose room, we see that almost all of them are clothed. This is not compulsory, especially if the temperature is above 30°C. In this case, it is not just a minority of children who oppose nudity, but almost all of them. Real naturist kids feel left out or get dressed again!
However, some animators prescribe nudity, for example, in “archery”, and this is not a problem for anyone.
It's time everyone followed the same rule because we are in a naturist center.
So let's be clear then:
If asking a child to undress on a day-to-day basis is reprehensible because it means making them do something “bad”, it is important to know that in a naturist center it is not so, because that is what it means to get it to do something "good".
Yes , in naturist centers, the practice of nudity by adults in contact with children must be encouraged. Yes , it is entirely possible and even desirable to praise children who manage to change stubborn habits by shedding their clothes…. It's not always easy. Even for parents or animators, it is not enough to demand nudity by authority, it is necessary to create an interest of their own in the minds of children. By setting your own example, of course, but the example alone is not enough. It is necessary to make it clear to all children that nudity practiced in a naturist center is honest, unrestricted and definitely a “good”., regardless of the negative messages coming from outside, regardless of the irritating mockery of school friends, regardless of the raunchy jokes spread by some media…. Because it is precisely this 180° turn in their conception of nudity, this reversal of the values they thought were firmly defined, that is the obstacle that prevents them from accepting a pleasure that seems obvious to us convinced adults.
And let us be convinced:
To think that we respect children when we refuse to approach them to inform them, to share our beliefs with them, to help them eliminate prejudices that harm their physical and moral development is an intellectual misunderstanding. It is a waste of valuable opportunities to leave children unaware of the values that every naturist should defend and propagate for lack of personal conviction or determination.
May the management of Euronat give appropriate instructions to the animators, may certain animators be advised so that they can act with delicacy in order to change the whole atmosphere of this great naturist center.
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