Personal thoughts on some recent hue & cry. (If you haven't heard about it, doesn't really matter.)

[amanuensis1]

Why do nudists advocate nudism?

It's not, I hope, because that way they get to LOOK AT NEKKID PEOPLE ZOMG. It's because they think the cultural taboos on nudity are silly. Who decided what body parts we must cover up? Why are bare buttocks obscene, and bare feet are just feet? Why do some cultures think it's immodest to expose one's hair? Are certain parts sexual only because we've fetishized them to be so? Do we like it better because we have?

If these parts were not taboo, would it be taboo to touch them? To exist in a polite society we have a standard that people are generally not touched without their consent. But we seek that consent often. We extend our hands for others to take them and shake them. We open our arms and lean in for a hug. During meaningful conversation, we seek to deepen communication by reaching to touch one's arm, one's shoulder. We are a society that does touch and considers it acceptable to do so as long as the other person sees it coming, does not withdraw or speak against it, and as long as the touch is on a body part not considered taboo.

So what if we took the taboo off body parts?

If I were out in public with you and you were someone I knew and trusted and you ran your fingers through my hair, I would be in touch-related ecstasy. I would sigh, "Ooh, do that some more," and if you continued, no one would run over and arrest us. They might think we're odd, but because you are not touching a body part considered naughty or dirty, we could have a field day. Fondle my breast or buttock or genitals in public, however, even if they're covered with clothing, and there will be cries of, "Stop that! There are children here! You can't do that in public! Etc.!" Why is that obscene, but the other is not?

If I proposed that we do a social experiment where we treated the public touching of sexual body parts with the same politeness we do non-sexual body parts, would people think that was interesting? Refreshing, liberating? They might. Could there be disapproval? What about people who did not want to participate? Would they fear I might label them as "hopelessly stuck in society's arbitrary rules," and be unhappy at such negative labelling? Might people think I just wanted to get my hands on their naughty bits?

They might. I would be hesitant to propose such an experiment.

Comments

[nicked-metal.livejournal.com]

Re public domain vs open source: The model has been published and can be changed by those who adopt it, hasn't it? Therefore the 'boobs project' is 'open source'. (Whether the 'boobs project' has been named incredibly badly is another thing.) As for the boobs themselves, they were never open source, open access, or public domain. What the project did was to say "It's OK to ask", thereby significantly relaxing the usual social constraints on access, but not intentionally removing them.

I was the one assuming that the guy in the bar only wanted one thing - I had thought that the comparison was based on equivalent desires but different actions. I now begin to think that we're in violent agreement, our problem is our ability to communicate effectively, not so much a significant disagreement.

Which is to say that I didn't assume that the woman would be smart enough to see through the guy's intentions, although I'm happy to concede that most women can see through most guys.

I think that intent is an important guiding principle in this matter, and I suspect that you agree. I don't want to have sex with someone who isn't interested in me as an entire person, and I fully support any woman who doesn't want to be treated like a piece of meat. For me (and many others), the emotional content of a relationship is extremely important, and I'm not interested in physical intimacy with someone that I'm not emotionally intimate with.

However, I think that 'fooling around' is a legitimate and enjoyable thing that people can learn from. I didn't fool around as a kid, and I was married at 18. Having followed the rules until the separation, I'm now in a situation where physical relationships scare the hell out of me. A safe place where I could start to get more comfortable with physical relations without either party mistaking it for something else really appeals to me.

I think that the project was an attempt to create a safe space such as the one that I describe there.

(And now I see that I'm a stranger who barged in and acted on a misunderstanding, which is the kind of behaviour I've been criticising lately....)

[jamoche]

OK. I think you may have thought that I was saying that the guy in the bar was exactly the same as the guy who wanted a button that would let him avoid that pesky social interaction, when my assumption was that the guy in the bar was sincere in wanting to get to know the woman first.

But I was also acknowledging that the OP could be right that bar guy and button guy had exactly the same motives, but insincere bar guy is still - if only slightly - a better person for at least being aware that social interaction is something that people value. He's making an effort to behave like a member of the human race; he does not deserve a reward for the effort itself, but it does mean he has a chance to actually discover that the object of his attention isn't an object at all but a person. But button guy will never do that; he's skipped the process that would make that possible.

[nicked-metal.livejournal.com]

I agree with you that recognising the value that people place on social interaction is a virtue.

If we remember that the buttons give permission to ask (and not permission to touch), then what ferrett rather foolishly portrayed as an all-in gropefest becomes an exercise in communication.

I guess, there are times when my thought processes really are very profound, and there are other times when my thoughts and feelings are really very shallow. And I think that it's good to encourage people to be honest about the depth or shallowness of their thoughts and feelings. I agree with an implication of what you're saying - that touching people in a deep and meaningful way is better than doing it in a shallow and meaningless way. But I don't think that it has to be deep and meaningful in order to be good, and I think that a bit of shallowness now and then is good for us.

So, yes, not investing in communication and 'getting to know you' places a limit on a relationship between people. But I think a limited relationship (provided everybody gives genuine consent) can be a good thing.

Personally, I would be very reluctant to take part, I think my values about relationships are actually very similar to yours. But I don't think that the best way to evaluate this concept is on the basis of whether it suits me, I think the best way to evaluate it is on the basis of whether it suits the participants.