Boris Bajic
Guest
There is a whole bizarre thing going on with nudity and youth these days. It doesn't do to be constantly comparing today with one's own childhood, but I have few other comparisons.
When I was at primary (mixed) and secondary (single-sex) schools, we usually got changed for swimming, PE and so on in a big gaggle (sexes separated in primary school). Some kids were self conscious and sort of hit behind towel or shirt tails, but there was generally a mood of casual unawareness. I recall self-consciousness only in a few (myself included) during early puberty when apparently weird stuff was happening.
Similarly, at home it was normal to chat with a parent who was in the bath or getting dressed. Nudity was just sort of life but without clothes.
I've noticed in all my children that despite (I hope not because of!) our casual attitude to wandering around the home unclothed, there is a degree of prudery in the young that we would not have recognised.
My kids are all fairly sporty, but they and their peers do not all pile into the shower together after a match or training session. They change with towels held up, like damsels on the beach. When a friend comes over and they change for some activity or another, they do so one by one - with the other waiting outside the room. Somehow we have raised a generation of prudes.
Yet these prudes (boys in particular) are quite happy to watch the most extraordinary and explicit pornography and somehow take delight in the nudity of others. I do not speak only of my own children... it is pretty universal, but your kids might be better at deleting history. I find the dichotemy between personally slightly prudish ways and a sort of objectivising delight in fairly brutal and crude pornographic imagery quite odd and quite interesting.
To me, pop videos are nothing. I imagine they are made to attract the 14-18 market or those whose emotional or social development is sufficiently delayed to put them in that catchment group. A little nudity to yoof music sems tame in comparison with what all these kids can reach in five clicks on the Internet.
When I was at primary (mixed) and secondary (single-sex) schools, we usually got changed for swimming, PE and so on in a big gaggle (sexes separated in primary school). Some kids were self conscious and sort of hit behind towel or shirt tails, but there was generally a mood of casual unawareness. I recall self-consciousness only in a few (myself included) during early puberty when apparently weird stuff was happening.
Similarly, at home it was normal to chat with a parent who was in the bath or getting dressed. Nudity was just sort of life but without clothes.
I've noticed in all my children that despite (I hope not because of!) our casual attitude to wandering around the home unclothed, there is a degree of prudery in the young that we would not have recognised.
My kids are all fairly sporty, but they and their peers do not all pile into the shower together after a match or training session. They change with towels held up, like damsels on the beach. When a friend comes over and they change for some activity or another, they do so one by one - with the other waiting outside the room. Somehow we have raised a generation of prudes.
Yet these prudes (boys in particular) are quite happy to watch the most extraordinary and explicit pornography and somehow take delight in the nudity of others. I do not speak only of my own children... it is pretty universal, but your kids might be better at deleting history. I find the dichotemy between personally slightly prudish ways and a sort of objectivising delight in fairly brutal and crude pornographic imagery quite odd and quite interesting.
To me, pop videos are nothing. I imagine they are made to attract the 14-18 market or those whose emotional or social development is sufficiently delayed to put them in that catchment group. A little nudity to yoof music sems tame in comparison with what all these kids can reach in five clicks on the Internet.
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