Wow! What a title for this blog post. It is enough to have people quickly pass on reading it just because of the title. But let’s face it – depression is getting more and more common in our present situation. I could likely write a book about the political situations in the world where polarisation is getting to be the norm. The anger that is spewing out from all sides of whatever political conflict that you can think of [and even within the confines of one side] is scary at best.
Reason has no voice. One is either a comrade or an enemy. Lines are being drawn in the sand, and those lines are morphing into positions that have little to do with the reality of the local situation. And all sides are continually adding to the list of grievances for which they feel offended and insulted. Standing at the sidelines, one wonders how it can ever be possible to reconcile the polar opposites at war with each other.
So, where does naturism fit into this? Well, I’ve been wondering about that myself. Are we as naturists only the targets caught in the middle, helpless victims? Or, in our own way, are we also finding ourselves at war with our own polar opposites? This is a very difficult topic. My best guess is that we are simply outsiders, outliers if you will. Naturally, I am talking about naturism, not naturists when I make that statement.
In real world terms, naturists are a mixed bag of individuals who have lives outside of naturism. They are conservatives, liberals, Christians, agnostics, atheists, asexual, sexual – as humans outside of being naturists, we belong to one group or another. In Canada we are adamantly Liberals, Conservatives, Green Party, for or against oil and pipelines, racists or those who espouse inclusiveness, or Socialists [NDP]. As such we are caught in the divisive and destructive dialogues as much as the textile world.
Naturism is becoming part of the battleground as vested interests try to remove rights for naturists – social media and regular media highlight the anger of many who take more than umbrage that we would dare go swimming with our children while nude. And within the nude community we have similar polarisation when it comes to sexuality – the enemy within.
We need to go within and nourish ourselves as individuals. We need to slip out of the public eye and take the target off our backs. We need to build community with each other, a community that is tolerant of differences. Trying to control others to conform to our way of thinking is to engage in the divisive warfare. And to be honest, that begins at home. Does it matter that we are different if we share the value of clothing free life? Can we not grasp that point of similarity and learn to be tolerant to each other? Engage in dialogue that builds connection rather than foster divisiveness.