Friday, February 17, 2012

All Nudist, All Wrong

A blogger well known for his often sarcastic and mean-spirited posts has taken on the American Association for Nude Recreation and their just-announced Amazing Canvas Nudist Face and Body Painting Event to take place during Nude Recreation Week in July, 2012.

The problem is not so much that Mr. All Nudist is critical of the event, everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, but he has distorted and misrepresented the nature and purpose of the event, referring to it as "painting naked girls" and imagining "a naked middle-aged man painting a child's naked body".

This is reprehensible language, especially from one purporting to be a nudist. All he needed to do to do was pick up the phone and call AANR instead of jumping to conclusions and making false assumptions.

A couple of the photos he uses in the article are *not* representative of the AANR event, and were not provided by the organization. In addition, All Nudist previously touted the fun of body painting here, and even provided links to where paints can be purchased. The blogger was also present at a Badger Naturists Halloween party with "a bunch of folks that know how to have a good time", where body painting was one of the activities, and All Nudist posted a couple of photos here. The entire gallery is here.

Hypocrisy? You decide.

In case one wonders where such vitriol comes from, there is precedent on the All Nudist website for uncalled for, mean-spirited attacks. In 2009, a producer for Andrew Zimmern's "Bizarre World" contacted All Nudist inquiring about an organic gardening nudist group in Wisconsin, or other nudist groups and activities in the state. Now, anyone who has seen Andrew Zimmern's shows is aware that this is a gregarious man, always enthusiastic and positive about the foods and cultures he exposes to his viewers.

So how did Mr. All Nudist respond? It's hard to believe, but this is what he said:
You have apparently done absolutely no research whatsoever on the subject or you wouldn’t be asking these questions.  Not only are all of them answered on All Nudist , one of the top legitimate nudist/naturists sites on the Web, but are readily available with the minimum of effort on the internet.  As are Wisconsin nudist/naturist clubs, groups, forums, message boards, camps and year-round events.  Do you even know what AANR and TNS are? 
 Our guess is that you are someone who has taken some journalism or media classes and is doing a Summer internship, probably unpaid.  Close?...Be glad to help you after you do your  homework, consulting fee $75.00/hr, one hour minimum.  Or…maybe a promo on the show…Otherwise, read the damn website and learn more than you need to know.
Of course, the producer was mortified:
Your email was completely unexpected and uncalled-for. I have worked on ‘Bizarre Foods’ for more than two years, speaking with people in all corners of the world, and I have never encountered anyone with such a negative reaction to a few simple questions. There are plenty of friendly people in Wisconsin who are happy to work with us; we will get a great show without including naturism.
And now Mr. All Nudist is concerned that a body-positive AANR event will be bad PR for nudism, when his irresponsible and downright mean comments cost us all some damn good publicity.

And is Mr. All Nudist himself bad publicity for nudism? With blog posts on erections, swingers, nudists obsessed with sex. and other provocative subjects, one can draw distorted conclusions. And saying that young people "tend to be both exhibitionist and insecure" isn't helpful for appealing to a younger demographic.

I offer this so that if you do take the time to read Mr. All Nudist's incendiary and reckless writing, that you take it with a grain of salt. He refers to himself as a "cynical old bastard", and that is one point on which we recommend you take him at his word.

Please note that I am on the AANR Public Relations Committee, and these opinions are my own. Details of the body painting event are still being worked out, with full details to be announced soon.