Nude Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness

Speaking on a purely hypothetical level, let's say I'm at a public park, and the weather is pleasant, and I decide I would be more comfortable if I stripped naked. I'm not harassing anybody, I'm just minding my own business, the way I'm most comfortable. My question is this: is there any Constitutional basis that would justify the restriction of my freedom to do so? Would my choice to disrobe fundamentally threaten the life, liberty, or pursuit of happiness of another? Let's consider these one at a time. Would taking my clothes off threaten anybody's life? No. Would it restrict anybody's liberty? Not unless you define liberty very broadly to include the "liberty" to recreate in parks "free from" the sight of nudity. But if you look closely, this isn't really liberty at all, it's a restriction of liberty. Finally, could stripping nude in a public park negatively affect somebody else's happiness? Certainly. But does it limit their ability to pursue happiness? No. If they're unhappy, they can pick their feet up and go somewhere else.

[description: a man strips nude in a public park]

Now let's turn the tables. If you take away my option to enjoy nude recreation in public parks, are you threatening my life? Of course not. But are you restricting my liberty? Absolutely! I should be the one to control how I dress myself. Obviously, you're limiting my happiness, but are you limiting my ability to pursue happiness? Not in the broadest sense, where even a prisoner digging a hole with a spoon could be considered to be working towards the promise (no matter how unlikely) of a happier state of living - like hope, one can pursue anything with the right mindset, no matter how dire conditions are. The truth is, I can always search for another place to be nude. But if this kind of restriction on my liberty is applied across the board, then that leaves me little recourse. Except to petition the government, I suppose. But at what point does continuously tossing obstacles in my path add up to actively obstructing my pursuit of happiness?

What happens when we weigh these two sides against each other? It's clear that nobody's life is being threatened either by nude recreation or its restriction thereof. On the liberty issue, I don't think there exists a credible argument to refute the fact that preventing people from recreating nude significantly restricts individual liberty, in a way that permitting them to do so does not. Which brings us to the pursuit of happiness, in all its vague and indeterminate glory. I think in either case, avenues exist for a person to pursue happiness. But the way I see it, restricting a person's liberty to recreate nude hampers his pursuit of happiness in a more direct and substantial way than permitting that person to recreate nude would hamper the pursuit of happiness of somebody else who wants to control what other people wear at the park. It comes right back to liberty - if your happiness depends on restricting other people's liberties, then that's a less valid concern than that of the person whose happiness simply depends on having liberty.

[description: a man strips nude in a public park]

Obviously, the world disagrees with me on this point. I think a rational analysis of the facts supports my conclusion that a person should be allowed to recreate nude in a public park if they so choose. The reality is simply that not enough people would care to. To most people, nudism is a foreign concept, and one that's frankly quite scary. The reason, then, that it is restricted to the extent that it is, is simply a matter of habit and popular opinion, and not social justice. But then, that's the way the world works. Justice isn't a naturally occurring phenomenon. It's a human concept. We strive towards it, sometimes. But only when it's comfortable and convenient for a majority of the population.

Q: Why do you call yourself an exhibitionist?

A: On a personal level, a large part of my sex-positive platform hinges on an insistence on re-envisioning what constitutes exhibitionism. So you might ask, if my experience of exhibitionism doesn't match the stereotype, then why do I call myself an exhibitionist? Well, other than the fact that this is a great opportunity to highlight and combat the way we tend to stereotype and "other" people we don't understand - especially when sex is involved - as with everyone else, sexual identity tends to be something you discover, more so than something you deliberately construct.

I didn't set out to champion the cause of exhibitionism when I entered the world of nude photography. Truth be told, I spent a lot of my life self-conscious about my body, and a lot of time in those early days as a nude model being mortified of sharing my images, out of a fear of negative judgment. I did it because I had a passion for the art form, and an admiration for the human body. If I'd had the opportunity, I would have shot images of beautiful naked women. But due to a social handicap, I was forced to limit myself to self-portraiture.

I've told this story before, but my whole journey as an artist grew out of looking back on sexting pics I shot (of myself) for my girlfriend in high school. I liked the pics, I enjoyed the process of taking them, and I had the distinct impression that it was unfair that only one person in the world (besides myself) should ever get a chance to see them. That's why I started sharing them, and that's how I got started taking more. What happened from there is that I developed an appreciative audience. I continued to enjoy the process, and there were people out there who liked the results. Over the years, I gained confidence and experience, and I groomed myself to be an even more eye-catching model, until nude self-portraiture became a fundamental part of my life and identity.

Because I was lucky enough to be "reared" as an artist in a permissive environment, and because my self-portraiture has always been an independent activity, there were never any artificial boundaries erected between nudity and eroticism, and nothing stopped me from exploring both through my photography - except my own embarrassment at first, which was gradually eroded as, again, I acquired an appreciative, even enthusiastic, audience for such works. If at any point I was uncomfortable with sexually explicit media, I would have stopped producing it. Instead, I found it to be an enjoyable activity. And I also found sharing it with an appreciative audience to be empowering, but not just that - it was also exciting.

I'm pretty sure getting excited by expressing your sexuality (especially visually) in front of random strangers on the internet counts as exhibitionism. Not everybody gets off on that. It just so happens that I do.* As do so many others. It's liberating, living in a sexually repressive culture, to be able to express yourself sexually and be appreciated (not shamed) for it. Moreover, as somebody with a social handicap and no strong interest to have intimate relationships with lots of people, this is a way that I can be sexually adventurous with very little (indeed, practically nonexistent) danger to myself or others. It has nothing to do with "accosting" people on the street, and everything to do with indulging in consensual kink with other voyeurs, as well as exploring, conceptually - through art - the excitement that can come from being naked or encountering nudity (whether or not that involves any sexual behavior whatsoever) in places and situations that it's not normally expected in a gymnophobic culture.

*I didn't immediately put two and two together, but in retrospect, one of my earliest and strongest memories of my own sexual awakening involves frolicking nude in front of a camera.

And I think there are a lot of people out there like me, if the popularity of websites like OnlyFans are any indication. I want to support them and defend them, and be a voice for them. And for myself. And show the world that we are not a dirty stereotype that can be brushed aside, reduced to a DSM diagnosis, and treated as mere "perverts" rather than human beings with an ethical conscience, deserving of dignity and respect and the same rights and liberties everybody else gets.

[description: a nude figure holds a garden gate open while another nude figure stands in front of it]
The Illusion of Danger

This photo illustrates one of my points about exhibitionism and sexual fetishism in general. It is a clone shot depicting one nude figure opening the gate for another nude figure, who is standing - as revealed by the viewpoint in the second part of the diptych - in view of the street. As an exhibitionist, the idea of standing in front of that open gate excites me. I don't know why it excites me. I didn't choose for it to excite me. That's just how it makes me feel. And that's why I constructed that illusion in this photomanipulation.

I never actually stood naked in front of that open gate. The gate was closed when I stood in front of it, and when I held it open, I was always behind it, out of view of the street. But when I stitch the two images together, it looks like I'm standing there naked in view of the street. That's part of the "artifice" in art. And I'm explaining the trick because it demonstrates my point - namely, that you can find something sexually thrilling and still understand the logistical and ethical issues it raises, and maintain self-control even in the face of those feelings.

Being an exhibitionist isn't illegal or unethical or immoral, and neither does having those feelings predetermine a stereotypical pattern of antisocial behavior. You might even find perfectly acceptable outlets for those desires - like when I share images like this one with consenting (even enthusiastic!) voyeurs online.

The Voyeur's Exhibition

[description: a nude figure stands on furniture to peek out the window while another looks on]

This clone shot was conceived and completed all in the space of about an hour (with a pause in the middle for breakfast). I woke up to the noise of heavy machinery across the street, and stepped up on the furniture to take a peek out the window (covered on bottom for privacy, but open at top for natural light). As an artist who is my own muse, I often wonder how I look from a third person perspective, and I thought that this would be an interesting pose to photograph - so I did. There was some empty space in the frame, so I decided to throw in a clone.

It still amazes me how much of a taboo society puts on human genitalia. This is a beautiful portrait of the human body. You may or may not find it arousing (it's certainly fine if you do), but it's tasteful - not vulgar, or sexually explicit in any way. Why do certain parts of our bodies have this stigma, that they have to stay covered up all the time and hidden from general audiences? This isn't pornography. Yet we treat it as if it were.

Anyway, I think it's interesting that this is another in a long line of portraits from throughout my career that blurs the distinction between voyeurism and exhibitionism. I'm the one peeking out the window, curious to see what's going on outside, while staying hidden from view. Yet, I'm also the one who's naked - the thing voyeurs are typically on the lookout for. The fact that this whole situation (which really happened, I didn't make it up just for the shot) is being photographed and then shared with others makes it a wholly exhibitionist depiction of a voyeuristic situation - we're not seeing what the voyeur is seeing, we're seeing the voyeur.

I guess that's what happens when you're a nudist, but you're also an artist, and you understand the appeal of both voyeurism and exhibitionism. The really fun thing to imagine, though, is that this sort of thing might be going on when you're out on the street. That face in the window, almost wholly obscured by a curtain? That could be a naked person in there! And what's more, we always imagine (well, the prudes do) that it's some nosey old lady doing the snooping. But what if that naked person in there was actually attractive? It sounds like a fantasy, and the odds might be against it, but take it from a nude model who was in that very position just today - I'm telling you, it happens.

And as an artist, I make it my purpose to go the next step further, and show you. You're welcome.