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Public Nudity Legal In Munich


cdowis

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Leave it to the Germans to allow naked people to roam freely…but only in certain places.

So goes the general reaction in Europe these days to the news that the city of Munich has given enthusiastic approval to allowing naked people to stroll freely and to sunbathe in public spaces.

 

This doesn’t mean that just anybody who feels like taking his or her clothes off can strip down everywhere. The city, according to the Atlantic Cities, has designated six official “Urban Naked Zones” in parks offering privacy, but also only minutes away from the busy city center.

“While these areas’ locations in parkland gives them a degree of seclusion, none of them are fenced off or hidden away,” the site reports. “One spot is barely 10 minutes from Munich’s main square, located along a stream to which tourists flock.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ceciliarodriguez/2014/04/14/nudity-goes-legal-in-munich/

 

I was a missionary there decades ago, so I wonder how this will affect missionary work in the city.

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My family recently lived in Germany.  Seeing naked Germans is par for the course if you stumble across certain lakes or if you unknowingly walk into the sauna at the schwimmbäd when looking for the locker room.  My kids' reaction was always something along the lines of "aaaagh!  My eyes!!!!!!"  They're none the worse for wear.   No harm done.

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The City . . . has designated six official “Urban Naked Zones” in parks offering privacy, but also only minutes away from the busy city center . . . [Ellipses and emphasis added by Kenngo1969].

 

Let me get this straight: We're talking about nudidity (as M*A*S*H's Radar O'Reilly once called it) in public places, on the one hand, yet people are concerned about privacy, on the other hand??? :huh:  Here's my solution: save the "getting naked" for home!  <_<

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I was in Munich a couple of years ago.  There is a big park that is right in the metro area.  People were sumbathing.  Most were naked.  No one seemed to care. For Germans, the naked body is not such a sexual thing as it is in the United States.  

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I was in Munich a couple of years ago.  There is a big park that is right in the metro area.  People were sumbathing.  Most were naked.  No one seemed to care. For Germans, the naked body is not such a sexual thing as it is in the United States.

Having seen some of the pics of beaches where the Germans go in Europe, and the volks on them, I entirely agree with it not being a sexual thing.

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How would it affect missionary work?  I'm an anthropologist and display of the naked body doesn't bother me (unless it is in a sexual context--them I'm a prude.)  I do remember being a missionary in Korea though back in the day.  These are very modest people and yet they had public baths and allowed public urination, breast feeding, etc.  It took some adjustment, but we have to adjust our American thinking when we are abroad.  Missionaries can adapt.  If they can't, they can be relocated.

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During certain festivals such as Mardi Gras, I understand that the missionaries are required to avoid certain areas.  I guess they could "adapt" to Mardi Gras, if the mission president would allow them to do so.

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Having seen some of the pics of beaches where the Germans go in Europe, and the volks on them, I entirely agree with it not being a sexual thing.

There seems to be a weird thing where people you might actually want to see naked never are and the people you don't want to see are willing to strip down. In the US we have a lesser degree of the problem called "deluded fat men thinking speedos make them look sexy".

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Early Christian Father, Clement of Alexandria, in The Instructor Book 3, where he also says Christians are slated to become Gods, addresses this type of thing in a treatise on godly behaviour:

 

Chapter V.--Behaviour in the Baths. And of what sort are their baths? Houses skilfully constructed, compact, portable, transparent, covered with fine linen. And gold-plated chairs, and silver ones, too, and ten thousand vessels of gold and silver, some for drinking, some for eating, some for bathing, are carried about with them. Besides these, there are even braziers of coals; for they have arrived at such a pitch of self-indulgence, that they sup and get drunk while bathing. And articles of silver with which they make a show, they ostentatiously set out in the baths, and thus display perchance their wealth out of excessive pride, but chiefly the capricious ignorance, through which they brand effeminate men, who have been vanquished by women; proving at least that they themselves cannot meet and cannot sweat without a multitude of vessels, although poor women who have no display equally enjoy their baths. The dirt of wealth, then, has an abundant covering of censure. With this, as with a bait, they hook the miserable creatures that gape at the glitter of gold. For dazzling thus those fond of display, they artfully try to win the admiration of their lovers, who after a little insult them naked. They will scarce strip before their own husbands affecting a plausible pretence of modesty; but any others who wish, may see them at home shut up naked in their baths. For there they are not ashamed to strip before spectators, as if exposing their persons for sale. But Hesiod advises

 

"Not to wash the skin in the women's bath." [1627]

 

The baths are opened promiscuously to men and women; and there they strip for licentious indulgence (for from looking, men get to loving), as if their modesty had been washed away in the bath. [1628] Those who have not become utterly destitute of modesty shut out strangers; but bathe with their own servants, and strip naked before their slaves, and are rubbed by them; giving to the crouching menial liberty to lust, by permitting fearless handling. For those who are introduced before their naked mistresses while in the bath, study to strip themselves in order to audacity in lust, casting off fear in consequence of the wicked custom. The ancient athletes, [1629] ashamed to exhibit a man naked, preserved their modesty by going through the contest in drawers; but these women, divesting themselves of their modesty along with their tunic, wish to appear beautiful, but contrary to their wish are simply proved to be wicked. [1630] For through the body itself the wantonness of lust shines clearly; as in the case of dropsical people, the water covered by the skin. Disease in both is known from the look. Men, therefore, affording to women a noble example of truth, ought to be ashamed at their stripping before them, and guard against these dangerous sights; "for he who has looked curiously," it is said, "hath sinned already." [1631] At home, therefore, they ought to regard with modesty parents and domestics; in the ways, those they meet; in the baths, women; in solitude, themselves; and everywhere the Word, who is everywhere, "and without Him was not anything." [1632] For so only shall one remain without falling, if he regard God as ever present with him.

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[1627] Hesiod, Works and Days, ii. 371.   [1628] [Such were women before the Gospel came. See note to Hermas,   cap. xi. [17]note 1, p. 47, this volume, and [18]Elucidation (p. 57) of   the same.]   [1629] [The barbarians were more decent than the Greeks, being nearer   to the state of nature, which is a better guide than pagan   civilization. But see the interesting note of Rawlinson (Herod., vol.   i. p. 125, ed. New York), who quotes Thucydides (i. 6) to prove the   recent invasion of immodest exposure even among athletes. Our author   has this same quotation in mind, for he almost translates it here.]   [1630] [Attic girls raced in the games quite naked. Spartan girls wore   only the linen chiton, even in the company of men; and this was   esteemed nudity, not unjustly. David's "uncovering himself" (2 Sam. vi.   20) was nudity of the same sort. Married women assumed to peplus.]   [1631] Matt. v. 28.   [1632] John i. 3.

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http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf02.txt

 

:rofl:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Anybody who who would roam nude is either out of touch arrogant or stupid.  It always pays to leave something to the imagination.  It generally produces a much more enticing picture.

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Anybody who who would roam nude is either out of touch arrogant or stupid.  It always pays to leave something to the imagination.  It generally produces a much more enticing picture.

I certainly understand that opinion from your cultural point of view, but Germans really don't share that view of nudity.  I remember standing on the bridge in Munich just blocks from the busiest part of the city, overlooking this park where nude Germans were sunbathing on a sunny but definitely not hot day.  While I was watching, a group of school children I would say about 8 years old paraded through the park all in their school uniforms single file lead by an adult leader at both ends.  I obviously have no idea where they were headed.  Perhaps to the international exhibit that was not too far away.  but the fact that this group of young children were lead through the nude sunbathers tells me that in the German culture, nudity is not something that is viewed as abnormal.  No one that was sunbathing said a word or tried to cover up.  No one standing on the bridge said anything or thought that was weird at all.  

 

Can you imagine what would happen if two school teachers lead a group of American children through a nude beach?  That incident really told me a lot about the difference between German culture and our own.

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I was in Munich a couple of years ago.  There is a big park that is right in the metro area.  People were sumbathing.  Most were naked.  No one seemed to care. For Germans, the naked body is not such a sexual thing as it is in the United States.

They see it the same way (sexual) or there would be no more Germans. The issue is that they have a more casual outlook about sexual issues. I lived there for four years. Most rest stops along the autobahn have no bathrooms, that makes for interesting situations. In the men's bathrooms at Airports there are female attendants. Porn is available in the Airport, Porn is shown on regular TV, past 10:00 or 11:00. As far as Munich goes, as a result of the attacks on Jewish Olympians, it was off limits to U.S. military personal unless you had special orders. When I attended the NCO School in Bad Tolzs, Germany, I was instructed to drive around and not through Munich.

It is a beautiful county and a lot of good people...but terrorist groups (German ones) continued to have groups that tried and added others in attacking Jews Where ever they could. Such groups continued until 1990-1995. When on guard duty in late 70's and early 80's (when I was there) our weapons were locked and loaded. Hill I was there, I was stationed on the East German border,most I never got to see East Germany, except through binoculars or gun sites...so going back and seeing "All" of Germany is on my bucket list.

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