LIFE WITHOUT SHAME
So . . . I had a rough night last night. I didn't go to bed until 4:30 am and I am usually in by 2:00. Since learning about Stéphane Deschênes ban from Patreon over accusations of "Child Sex Abuse Material," I have become increasingly worried about the legal repercussions of my lifestyle. While naturism/nudism has been legally... Continue Reading →
According to Child Protective Services, everyone in my family is guilty of possessing and sharing CSAM (child sexual abuse material). This includes my mother, father, sister, brother, aunts, nephews, cousins, godmother, and the priest at my local Greek Orthodox Church in Tarpon Springs, Florida. The photos in question are from my 1978 baptism. In all... Continue Reading →
In the opening shot of Michael Cacoyannis's 1977 film Iphigenia, we are exposed to the "thousand ships launched by Helen," preparing to set sail for Troy, and hundreds of Greek actors camped naked on the beach. When we first meet the actor playing Achilles, he also isn't wearing a thing. This is in stark contrast to Nolan's... Continue Reading →
Nudism is losing ground in the battle for acceptance. Every day, it seems, we are under attack by social media. Our way of life is perpetually misrepresented, when all depictions of nudity, however innocent, are lumped in with p@rn. Earnest YouTubers promoting the lifestyle are quietly erased. My account was recently flagged with a violation,... Continue Reading →
It isn't easy being a nudist these days---with the algorithm associating all nudity, innocent or otherwise, with porn---and living the lifestyle can be daunting when it comes to friends and family. Few of us are lucky enough to live in a clothing-optional home, and many people I see on Reddit lament having to hide their... Continue Reading →
Hey naked guys and gals, I'm back from my trip to La Jenny Naturiste Village, and I have to say, Belinda Carlisle was right . . . Heaven is a Place on Earth --- that place, of course, being located on the French Atlantic coast. You can probably guess that this review will be overwhelmingly... Continue Reading →
If there was any doubt just how beautiful the human body is, look no further than the Isis Fashion Awards. When these videos first popped up on my YouTube feed, I was quite pleasantly surprised. Not only does YouTube allow this level of exposure on its platform — something for which, hypocritically, I was nearly... Continue Reading →
Notice: I originally wrote this piece in 2017, when Felicity Jones was still active on social media, and my friend Steve from Allnudist.com still graced us with his insight (RIP). When my nudist content migrated over from my literary blog, I neglected to post this because I was never quite happy with it. Over the... Continue Reading →
Nudity in Art and Literature is a new series illuminating often-missed, non-sexual expressions of the unclad body found in books, movies, games, and other mediums from the most recent times to the ancient past. Let's be honest here: we've got enough articles about the virtues of nude living to last us a lifetime. More resort/nude beach... Continue Reading →
If you're not into the gaming scene, you may not have heard about Baldur's Gate 3, a D&D-based role-playing adventure for PC and PS5 that won the Game of the Year Award and allows you to play completely naked. That's right. While many nude mods have been made over the years to remove a game... Continue Reading →
Ten years ago, in 2014, I debated someone who insisted, based on his experience, that nudism was either dead or dying (listen to the podcast below). Admittedly, over the past several years, we have seen a worrying decline in organized nudism. Club memberships are down, and many resorts have had to shut their doors, turn... Continue Reading →
When it comes to naturism and naturist families, we need to discuss the elephant in the room; we need to talk about naturist children. Who is really sexualizing children? Is it the textile community forcing toddlers into bikini tops, cults demanding their women cover up for modesty's sake, or natural parents who believe a child's... Continue Reading →
While walking my dog, in mid-conversation with a co-worker, or waiting for a stoplight to turn green, I can pull up the most depraved sex acts on my phone (within legal bounds, of course), a scene to make the Roman Emperor Caligula blush. Whatever your fetish, there are infinite options for your viewing pleasure. Looking... Continue Reading →
Yes, it finally happened. After dodging the proverbial bullet for three decades, it finally hit me: the most embarrassing thing that can happen to a nudist. I've hated clothes since I was a kid. Shoes, socks, underwear (shudder): stick to me like leeches. By age twelve, I was stripping down to my bare skin the... Continue Reading →
For a moment, I thought I had a brilliant idea. Since nudist and naturist appear to have been co-opted by p@rn, I figured we needed a new name. First and foremost, what we do is NOT about sex! That's the whole point of the lifestyle and an important distinction for me and the tiny percentage... Continue Reading →
For those not in the know, Stéphane Deschênes takes my vote for naturist president (if such a thing existed). Soft-spoken, erudite, and with a French Canadian accent pronouncing episode more like ebisode, Stéphane is the first person who comes to my mind to represent the clothes-free lifestyle. For Stéphane, ethical naturism, as he calls it,... Continue Reading →
It's a bit funny when you think about it, that no matter how rich or famous or powerful you are, underneath our clothes, we all look the same. Kamala Harris, arguably the most powerful woman in the world, would not look out of place standing naked in the jungle amongst the Zoë. The same goes... Continue Reading →
Fans of Aenya come from all walks of life. Honestly, the scope never ceases to amaze me. Amazon tells me I've got readers in the U.S., Europe, and Australia. But I never imagined being contacted by someone from a Middle Eastern country, and not just any country, but IRAN of all places, which is currently... Continue Reading →
Can a totally nude heroine become a lightning rod for feminism? Or does sex appeal and the gratification of the male gaze distract from messages of equality? I can already hear the detractors, the angry feminists, and, let's just call them "SJWs", calling me out. Their argument, I imagine, will go something like this: Thelana... Continue Reading →
Mykonos is basically sex island, my Greek friend tells me. Once you get off the boat, a random girl will grab you and take you to bed. Sure, I say, rolling my eyes. I didn't believe his promises for a minute, but I'd heard plenty of crazy stories about Mykonos. Yes, it was a place... Continue Reading →
As an 80s kid who loved going to the theater, there were certain things we could never imagine seeing on the big screen. While Star Wars opened up the possibilities for Sci-Fi in film, paving the road for Terminator and Aliens, fantasy epics like Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings were beyond anything... Continue Reading →
Millions of people were infected with herpes after a recent law lifting the ban on public nudity. The national death toll currently stands at 500,000 and counting. And yet, despite this horrible loss of life, nudists have been refusing to put on clothes, demanding that they have the right to frequent public places, like restaurants... Continue Reading →
So, I am driving down this narrow, rocky road---a road so rocky you can barely call it a road---along the edge of a cliff in my rented Audi with my wife and two kids. Now, I am not a religious person, and I no longer believe in God, but I sure was doing a whole... Continue Reading →
I've recently come under fire for comparing aspects of nudism to the LGBTQ+ community, which you can read about in two of my posts, Heroes of Naturism and Nudity, Censorship, and Discrimination. More than a few Redditors accused me of being insulting, and several "fuck yous" were lobbed my way. Now, social media has never... Continue Reading →
Misconceptions about nudism and nudists are ubiquitous these days, which makes it more difficult for nudists to express themselves and to let their friends and family know who they are. They provide the naysayers of the world a strawman target and the ammunition to ridicule a minority they know nothing about. In debunking these misconceptions,... Continue Reading →
Just as racism and homophobia exist to varying degrees around the world, so does bigotry against nudists. It might seem offensive to equate the two, but in countries like Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan, women who refuse to cover their faces can be jailed, beaten, and raped. Becoming a nudist is a choice, and yet that choice... Continue Reading →
I was born with a cleft lip. If you’ve never seen pictures, let me just say it can get pretty ugly. Basically, it looked like a mugger took a knife to my mouth as I exited the womb. The doctors did their best to sew me up, but the scar remained. As a result of... Continue Reading →
Long before dreaming of nude beaches, when my afternoons were like a naked prisoner at home, I picked up the phone book and flipped to my favorite word in the English language. Well, my second favorite word, the first being naked. But since naked can mean just about anything, I searched under “nudist” and came... Continue Reading →
One good thing about being locked in my house, besides being naked all day, was having to find ways to entertain myself. There was no Facebook or PS3 or Cartoon Network in the 80s, only He-Man and GI*Joe and Transformers, and when those were over, I turned to my own imagination, to writing fiction. My... Continue Reading →
I would like to give a special thanks to Felicity Jones of Young Naturists America for originally posting this story on her blog! People talk about Obsessive Compulsive Disorder these days as if it were a joke. “Oh, I am so OCD!” you might say, when choosing what to wear or putting away the dishes.... Continue Reading →
This story originally appeared here: Young Naturists America, thanks to co-founders Felicity Jones and Jordan Blum, two of the most awesome people on the Internet! Please go visit their site! My father was born into poverty, having to sometimes go without shoes to school, and steal money for books. He immigrated to the United States... Continue Reading →
We need stories to humanize us, to help share our perspectives, because if it's one thing I know as a lifelong lover of words, there is no greater force for change than story. And this is mine, my memoir, in which I grow out of years of repression and low self-esteem into adulthood, confident and... Continue Reading →
Someday in the near future, no later than 2040, you will go to the beach and see more than a few people not wearing a bathing suit, or anything else for that matter. People will be able to get their mail in the buff, sunbathe their bare butts in their own backyard or skinny dip in their... Continue Reading →
Imagine you are a gay man or woman happily married to someone of the same sex. To celebrate your love, you post a vacation photo of you and your significant other kissing on the beach. None of your friends or family members object to the image because they have known you and your spouse for... Continue Reading →
Do you ever feel like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day? You know, when he wakes up every morning to that same song, "I've got you, babe . . .", because his entire life is a repeat of the same day? Last Thursday, I was in that Groundhog Day rut, and wanted to do something crazy, to carpe... Continue Reading →
What does it mean to be naked? Western civilization seems to understand the concept, and most people will agree that, regardless of personal belief, public nudity is not the status quo. But there is constant disagreement as to what constitutes nakedness, how to define a public place, and when or where and under what circumstances... Continue Reading →
The worst loneliness is not to be comfortable with yourself—Mark Twain Yes, I am a nudist! Or naturist, as I prefer to call myself. I've been beating around the bush regarding this issue, hinted at it here and there, in articles and in my fiction, and to many of my astute readers this may come as... Continue Reading →
Can nudism save the world ...? Not really. No. Thanks for stopping by. OK, wait. There's more! But you probably guessed that, right? Nudism/Naturism won't save the world, but it can make the world a better place. Now, I am not going to go into the usual spiel about body acceptance and freedom. Too much... Continue Reading →
My religious background is almost comic. I was baptized (at a very late age) into the Greek Orthodox faith. Usually, this happens a year after birth, but my parents procrastinated a very long time, and I ended up looking like a naked hippie dangling from the priest's arms, with my long, blond(e), luxurious hair---some people... Continue Reading →
The heroic nude dates back thousands of years, to my distant ancestors, the Ancient Greeks. Communal nudity was common in Greece, where people farmed, exercised, swam, and sparred in nothing but bare skin. The prefix gymn means naked, denoting activities originally practiced in the buff, including gymnastics and "going to the gym." Millennia ago, Olympic athletes... Continue Reading →
After a lifetime of promoting nudism, have I finally thrown in the towel? Or, in this case, was it thrown on the towel? Sorry, textiles, today is not the day. However, as a lover of philosophy, I feel it necessary to follow the example of Socrates and examine what I feel most passionate about in... Continue Reading →
Confession time: I would live naked 24/7, if I could, and I suspect I am not alone in this regard. I hate clothes. They block the sunshine, the air, and most of your body from the sense of touch. They are grating, hot, and sometimes they itch, not to mention expensive and a lot of work to maintain. How much time is wasted washing, drying and... Continue Reading →
ALL THELANA BOOKS ARE NOW 25% OFF! This includes the beautifully illustrated survival story, The Feral Girl, The Feral Girl Hardback Edition, and the epic fantasy adventure that started it all, Ages of Aenya. BUT HURRY! SUPPLIES ARE LIMITED. 17.00 12.75 18.50 13.88 25.00 18.75 She's the original naturist heroine, created by an actual naturist,... Continue Reading →
So I just spent the better part of two days removing a line. We're talking about a tiny, black, curving line a few centimeters tall. This row of pixels is so offensive, apparently, Jeff Bezos has taken it upon himself to protect us from it, whether we want him to or not. This is the... Continue Reading →
OK. This is a rant. My apologies.Today I received word that The Feral Girl: Illustrated Edition will be removed from Amazon's platform. Why? Here's what they told me:During our review, we found the cover image for the following book(s) is in violation of our Content Guidelines: The Feral Girl: The Aenya Saga: Book One of... Continue Reading →
To call Ages of Aenya a book about nudism is like calling The Lord of the Rings a book about not wearing shoes. Yes, I have called Ages of Aenya, the first book in the Aenya Saga, a naturist fantasy adventure, and I have even read it in the nude. But this should matter no... Continue Reading →
The Ilmar (plural) or Ilmarin (singular, descriptive) go by many names: savages, barbarians, wildlings. Given their total lack of clothing and their propensity for living in forests, hills, and river valleys, they are viewed by most other races as a lesser developed human subspecies closer to animals than a civilized people. This view is perpetuated... Continue Reading →
