Virginia Man Not Guilty of Indecent Exposure

It took less than 20 minutes for a Fairfax County jury to find Erick Williamson not guilty of indecent exposure for an incident last fall where a passer-by claimed that the man willfully appeared nude in a doorway and a window of his home.

The concept of obscenity is at the heart of the case, which went to the seven-person jury shortly before 3 p.m. Did Williamson intentionally display himself, both to Dean and to another woman who drove past the house and saw Williamson at 6:40 a.m. that same morning? Or was he simply moving about the house, admittedly unclothed, packing, eating breakfast and getting ready to move, as he testified.

A couple of the more disturbing aspects of the case, such as the witness being a spouse of a police officer, and the cops who entered the man's home without a warrant, remained unresolved.

Whether or not this man considers himself to be a nudist or naturist is irrelevant, but the issue strikes at the heart of every body freedom advocate who enjoys nudity at home. The police witch hunt against this man, which included sending letters to schools looking for witnesses who might have seen the man nude at other times, is an abuse of power which goes beyond protecting the community, and is designed merely to cover their own asses. The police exceeded their authority in the initial reaction to the incident and then tried to turn it into some sort of danger to women and children in the community merely to justify their heavy-handed actions.

Perhaps most shameful is AANR's stance on this incident, which basically condemned the man before a trial.

Carlyn Hawkins, a spokeswoman for the American Association for Nude Recreation, declined to comment on the specifics of the case. However, she said, "I'm nude when I'm in my home, but I also keep my drapes closed."

Hawkins said the association advocated naked responsibility.

"We don't want to offend anybody," she said. "We want to be accepted and we don't want any nudist to create any problems."

Even Executive Director Erich Schuttauf chimed in:

Did Mr. Coffee simply stumble around the kitchen preparing brew, or did he stand spread eagle in open doorways and a large plate glass picture window at 8:40 in the morning-and were mother and son taking only a small shortcut between two very public sidewalks from which one could have just as easily seen a purposeful display as has also been alleged?

AANR's continued policies of nudity being best when "not offending" condemns all nudists and naturists to practicing their clothes-free lifestyle behind drawn curtains, locked gates and tall fences.

There was no evidence that the Virginia "Naked Coffee Guy" did anything lewd or indecent, but there is evidence of overreaction and hysteria over simple nudity, and authorities treating a man's penis the same as a terrorist bomb on an airplane.

Thankfully a jury made the wise and sensible decision to find this man not guilty. The question today is will AANR apologize to all of its members for failing to support the most basic right of being nude in one's own home?

The Holiday Newds 10/13/08

• Over half of Austrian male youths rely on pornography for their sex education. Australia basically has the same problem.
• "It's almost macabre that people are paying £4,000 a week to strip buck naked and enter a white tiled room with concentration camp bright lighting."
• More fallout from teenagers sending nude photos of themselves with their cell phones. A Virginia assistant principal was arrested on a felony charge for obtaining a photo of a female student as part of a school investigation. An editorial in the Newark Advocate states that the arrest of a 15 year-old Ohio student for sending a nude photo of herself by cell phone is overreaching and unreasonable. And a 13 year-old Texas boy was placed in juvenile detention on child pornography charges and has been suspended from school for receiving a nude photo of a female classmate. “He doesn’t know what a felony means. He doesn’t understand what pornography means,” said one parent.
• Australian police are installing a network of closed-circuit cameras around the Gold Coast to be used during the motor car race next week. Police claim that the cameras do not violate privacy laws and are designed to catch people engaging in criminal activity, and are not for focusing on women who traditionally bare their breasts from high-rise balconies.

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Virginia is for Lovers, But Not Nudists

The owners of Playa Sonrisa clothing optional resort in Mexico thought that a remote area on Assateague Island in Virginia was a nude beach. They were wrong, so Donn and Cindy Murphy were fined $250 each by a ranger for "indecency and disorderly conduct as defined by local law", even though nobody but the ranger saw them, and nobody complained. They have written an open letter to the state and citizens of Virginia, FCN, TNS and AANR.

Murphy called the crime "victimless" and the regulation "misguided." He said his purpose in writing about the incident now is "to be proactive in effecting a change in legislation and park management policy in order to eliminate similar unnecessary negative impacts on other naturists in the future."

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

Those Pesky Breasts

A visitor to a Norfolk art gallery complained about the bare female breasts on a drawing, so the owner improvised by placing paper plate pasties over the offending images.

“I just feel like a woman’s private parts are hers,” said Jane Bruno, 42, of Suffolk, who added she would rather not see exposed breasts in public.

“Because it is art, it doesn’t offend me that way,” said Jaz Brown, 26, a Virginia Beach construction worker on a break. “Art is trying to capture the person. I think it’s beautiful.”

“What about little kids, though?” said his co-worker, Daniel Pitino, 35, of Virginia Beach. “Not sure. Not sure.”

Not sure? Really? Someone tell Daniel that the female breast is biologically designed for children. And while you are at it, tell him that kids can deal with the truth. If a child has a question about the female breast, it's perfectly OK to tell him or her that the breast is what feeds babies, that it is a symbol of life and nourishment, and when it is depicted in art it is a thing of beauty, something to be admired and appreciated, not shunned and feared.

Just grow up a little, people, this is just pure ignorance.

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

The Weekend Newds 5/2/08

• The CEO of a $300 million company prefers to spend his life in the nude. [smh.com.au]
• The Australian Nudist Federation is supporting the use of security cameras on a nude beach in order to discourage offensive behavior. [Geelong Advertiser]
• Arizona State University in Tempe is joining the string of colleges supporting "undie runs" whereby students strip down to their underwear for a jog around campus, and then donate their clothes to charity. [College Times]
• The Sun uses World Naked Gardening Day as yet another excuse to publish photos of topless women. [The Sun]. Seriously, May 3 is the official World Naked Gardening Day. [WNGD]
• ABC News headline exclaims that teen breast enhancement is "no big deal'. [abcnews.go.com]. And don't forget about Laser Vaginal Rejuvenation to make your Brazilian look more attractive. [smh.com.au]. Or boob jobs to help strippers survive a bad economy. [Los Angeles Times]
• A New Jersey law outlaws the "change of clothes in any public area or public street unless within a permanent enclosed structure". [jaunted.com]
• A Florida biology teacher claims that she was fired from her high school because she moonlighted as a bikini-wearing babe on a fishing charter boat. [h8torade.com]
• African police are cracking down on "indecent conduct" at the annual Pink Loerie Mardi Gras parade in Knysna.

  Event co-ordinator Juan Lerm said Pink Police marshalls would clamp down on nudity. An 80-year-old man who has exposed his rear each year - last year he was archbishop of the moon - is to be asked to cover up. [iol.co.za]

• The bare-breasted woman on Virginia's state flag is called "Virtue", but the commonwealth has a long history of regulating consensual sex. [readthehook.com]
• Five musicians in a UK orchestra will bare all on How to Look Good Naked.

  "We've all got a great deal of respect for one another, and don't have anything you wouldn't see on a beach in Brighton on a sunny day.
  
  "The programme is very much about developing confidence, and the nudity is just a metaphor of being comfortable with who you are." [The Courier]

• Naked girls and giant puppets are part of a new stage production of Carmina Burana. [guardian.co.uk]
• A Cleveland reporter sheds his fears and his clothes to become a nude model for a life drawing class. [The Plain Dealer]
• The naked sushi craze has hit Florida. [tampabays10.com]
• People were shocked! shocked! to see Britney Spears wearing a towel in an exercise room. [sfgate.com]
• A new Florida law will punish anyone who takes a nude photo of a minor, even with parental authorization. Offenders face a five year jail term or a $5000 fine. [wjhg.com]
• Thirteen lacrosse players have been disciplined for writing a prom invitation for one of their teammates on their bare bottoms.

  "Inappropriate is inappropriate," school athletic director Dottie Davis told The Ann Arbor News. "It disrespects women, and that's the clear message we need to have the students understand — what may be fun to them isn't necessarily fun to everyone else." [ap.google.com]

• A group of University of Maryland students were taking a nude bicycle ride when the police arrived in answer to a complaint. Although they managed to throw on their pants, the 4 males and 1 female remained topless, but only the female received an indecent exposure citation.

  Maryland code doesn't specify exactly what constitutes indecent exposure, though attorney and government and politics professor Amir Sadeghy said a topless woman likely would fall under the definition.Singling Caitlin out from the shirtless bunch probably would not be classified as gender discrimination, said Sadeghy, who is also the director of the university Mock Trial team. [diamondbackonline.com]

• A Massachusetts town has OK'd strippers to take the stage at a local club, but they cannot be nude. [The Morning Call]
• Charges of indecent exposure have been dropped against a 77 year-old Australian man, prompting the president of Free Beaches Australia to call for at least one official nude beach in Queensland. [thedaily.com.au]
• If you can't get up the courage to go skinny-dipping this summer, you can always go skinny-sipping with Nude Beach Beer. [The Business Journal]

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

The Daily Newds 4/16/08

• The nudist flights in Germany are back on. [macedoniaonline.eu]
• Shane, a Utah artist, has a team of body painters due to the demand.

  "(Customers) are not bashful by any means," he said. "Most of the parties I've been to, guys and girls, most of wearing some sort of a bottom and most people just do topless." [The Utah Statesman]

• Sexualizing the entire female body seems to be the goal of Dita Von Teese, who has now posed for a book on foot fetishes. [monstersandcritics.com]
• Nearly half of Germans responded that they were embarrassed about the nude male genitals and buttocks of a new public sculpture. [topnews.in]
• Easy Target Department: A 49 year-old woman has been arrested because she is accused of selling her body for sex out of her own home. [NBC5.com]
• The once taboo male penis is popping up on the big screen everywhere these days. [mtvasia.com]
• A Florida strip club owner is fighting for his right to have live nude dancing.

  In the suit -- filed in the U.S. District Court in Orlando by Playtime of Brevard Inc., which does business as Playmates -- naked dancing on stage is described as "non-obscene . . . Plaintiff maintains that the nude human body is a thing of beauty which, when combined with music and rhythmic motion in the form of dance, conveys an important message of eroticism . . . Nudity is incorporated as a necessary and integral component of these dance performances. The nudity is not presented merely for its own sake." [floridatoday.com]

• Streakers are wanted for a charitable nearly-nude run at Florida Atlantic University. [palmbeachpost.com]
• PBS blurred out scenes with nude male buttocks in a new version of "A Room With a View'. [madison.com]
• Oregon citizens are rallying against a proposed strip club with plenty of fear and loathing, but no hard facts.

  A bar with nude dancing would be bad for business, bad for Carlton's reputation and, especially, bad for local children and adults, speakers said. It could mean an increase in drunken driving and other crimes, they said. It could threaten the safety of young people and make it uncomfortable and unwise for them to play in their own hometown. [newsregister.com]

• A student challenges a poll which found that 61% of all Northwestern students had partied naked. [northbynorthwestern.com]
• Prince William has been photographed with his pants down, at a party where he and his brother challenged some women to see how many CDs they could hang on their nipples.

  Harry, 23, cheered loudly as one girl managed an impressive eight CDs. [news.com.au]

• The art museum director who chose the nude self-portrait of a 17 year-old girl as the winner of a Virginia newspaper's art show has been fired for "supporting child pornography". Aaron De Groft is outraged.

  “They said, ‘She can’t be the winner; it doesn’t fit with the squeaky clean image of the Virginian-Pilot and SunTrust [their sponsor],’” he said. “And I said, ‘Are you kidding me?’ Every day on the front page of your newspaper you print a blown-up picture of dead people from the war in Iraq.” [flathatnews.com]

• Rickets is making a comeback in children because breastfeeding mothers are simply not getting enough Vitamin D from the sun.

  ...vitamin D is called the "sunshine vitamin" for good reason -- the easiest way your body gets what you need is from the sun's UV rays. But our sun-shunning
  behavior the past few decades, fueled by fears of skin cancer and the sun's aging effects on skin, set us up for vitamin D deficiency across the population. [cleveland.com]

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

The Daily Newds 4/10/08

• The number of women under age 18 receiving breast implants has jumped 500% over the last decade. "There are girls and women who are devastated by the fact that they don't have breasts and their friends do," (plastic surgeon Dr.) Greenberg said. "They don't play gymnastics and they don't go on dates or they can't wear certain clothing, and I hear these things every day."[roanoke.com]
• A writer reveals her disgust for the human body in declaring "Naked Gardening Day" a bad idea. [oregonlive.com]
• 60 college students stripped down for an "Undie Run" and donated their clothes to charity. [easternprogress.com]
• A new Ohio bill would target a "pack of perverts" who take any surreptitious photos of naked children. [stowsentry.com]
• A prominent UK photographer with ties to Sir Paul McCartney has been put on the sex offenders registry for taking naked photos of an under-16 girl. [thisisgloustershire.co.uk]
• "Puppetry of the Penis" is "genital origami". [winnipegsun.com]
• A "nude-in" demonstration is being planned for the Democratic National Convention in Denver. [rockymountainnews.com]
• During the filming of "How to Look Good Naked" in the UK, participant Jenny Stockton stripped nude in front of hundreds of mall shoppers. [kentonline.co.uk]
• First Lady of France Carla Bruni Sarkozy, who has a history of posing for nude photographs, enjoys a 90% approval rate. [nypost.com]
• The first 2008 people who sign up to pose nude for Spencer Tunick in Austria will receive free rail travel to the May 11 event. [Yahoo! News]
• Whatever happened to "parking"? Neighbors called police on a couple having sex in a van and blocked their escape with their own vehicles. [spinalcolumnonline.com]
• The turnout for San Francisco's nude torch run was underwhelming. [sfweekly.com]
• A woman in her 30's has no problem with being nude and simulating sex on screen, but is terrified of on stage nudity. [backstage.com]
• "The Summer of Naked Swim Parties" is a new novel about a family of "free spirits" in the 70s. [oregonlive.com]
• The Beltane Fire Festival is becoming more "family friendly" but they are keeping the red-painted naked dancers as part of the events. [Edinburgh Evening News]
• Neighbors are complaining about all the "sexy noises" coming from Christina Aguilera's naked swims. [My Park Magazine]
• The two young artists disqualified from winning the student art competition in Virginia are getting a lot of support and attention. Judges chose them as the winners, but the sponsoring newspaper disqualified the awards because the artworks depicted nudity. [dailypress.com, hamptonroads.com, inrich.com]
• Conservatives in South Carolina are seeking to enact a stripper law similar to the one passed recently in Ohio. [charlestoncitypaper.com]
• Daniel Radcliffe is bringing his penis to Broadway. [efluxmedia.com]
• A 19 year-old Australian man has been fined $500 for streaking in front of thousands at a rugby match. [Port Macquarie]
• A Vietnamese photographer finds that there is a movement of young girls seeking to have nude photos taken of themselves. [Vietnam Net]

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked

The Daily Newds 4/4/08

• Women in Denmark will be allowed to swim topfree in public pools, a triumph for proponents of equal rights. [The Copenhagen Post]
• In the continuing war on nipples, the apparently offending male body parts were airbrushed from a Florida WrestleMania billboard. [2snaps.tv]
• Liz Book was allowed to bare here breasts without being arrested in Florida on March 8 for The International Topfree Stand (TITS). [Diary of a Topfree Revolutionary]
• Spencer Tunick is planning his next outdoor nude installation in Vienna on May 11, in case you happen to be in the area. [tunickvienna.at]
• Nakedjen finally got naked in Utah. [nakedjen]
• My friends at The Nude Life blog are also celebrating the return of the nude season. [The Nude Life]
• PayPal is no pal to nudists. [soonews.ca]
• Residents in Arcadia, Florida, have a "live and let live" attitude towards a new proposed nudist resort. [sun-herald.com]
• The city marina in Fort Pierce, Florida, has banned a charter fishing service that offers topless and bikini-clad female mates. [UPI]
• A Virginia newspaper rejected the decisions of two judges in a local high school art exhibition.

  “We honestly don’t believe those two pieces are appropriate to be held up as the winners of a high school art show, because they do depict the nude,” Pam Smith-Rodden, director of marketing for The Pilot. [hamptonroads.com]

• Comedian Sandra Bernhard reminisces about her 1992 Playboy pictorial.

  "It was like a highlight of my career in a certain way, and I think it was kind of a pre-porn-friendly kind of mentality that we have now ... . (Now) everybody feels like they can pose nude on the Internet. I don't know - I just feel like it was something special and it was done with a specific kind of point of view, and no, I wouldn't do it again, just because I don't think it would work now." [pridesource.com]

• "This is Who I Am: Our Beauty in All Shapes and Sizes" is a new book of photographs and short essays exploring how real women relate to their real bodies. [The Seattle Times]
• Some people have withdrawn their children from swimming lessons at a public pool which also rents sessions to gay naturists. [Daily Express]
• A new bylaw threatens a nude beach in New Zealand. [tvnz.co.nz]
• Authorities in Utah are plotting to ruin the lives of dozens of teenagers who sent nude photos of themselves with cellphones, thus making felons out of flirts. [The Salt Lake Tribune]
• A naked book reading in Germany was being heralded as yet another example of a "growing renaissance of naturism ideals" [ananova], but it turned out to be just an April Fool's Joke. [earthtimes.org]
• The "titty tax" is DOA in Texas. [austinchronicle.com]

Tags: nudism, naturism, nudist, nudists, naturist, naturists, nudity, nudes, bare, au naturel, nude, naked