Why are so many Young Men so shy about Nudity?

[+ HornyRetiree]

Was at a nude/clothing optional beach today. Every age, body shape and flaccid size imaginable!

 

Four young men (early 20s?) came down. They wrapped a towel around themselves while pants still on (not even down to underwear) and then went through amazing contortions to get pants & underwear off and bathing suit on UNDER the towel. Ridiculously amazing.

 

What goes? Why? I have heard friends mention similar at the Gym.

 

Anyone know why this is?

[bnm73]

I don't know that it's necessarily a youth thing. I'm in my mid-40s, have been to a couple of nude beaches in my day....and have always felt nervous and reluctant to strip down completely naked. I've ended up doing so, but it has always taken me a little while after being naked before I didn't feel "exposed," as it were.

 

That said, a normal person would have had their bathing suit on under their pants in that situation. In that context, I would wonder if they were trying to draw attention to themselves (with their contortions, etc.) for whatever reason.

[+ HornyRetiree]

I don't know that it's necessarily a youth thing. I'm in my mid-40s, have been to a couple of nude beaches in my day....and have always felt nervous and reluctant to strip down completely naked.

 

Interesting when I see that you say you escorted when younger!

[bnm73]

Interesting when I see that you say you escorted when younger!

 

Being naked for SOMEONE has always been different to me than being naked for EVERYONE. I could escort in a heartbeat....but I could NEVER have been a stripper.

[+ Avalon]

When I worked for the mortuary we had to change from our ordinary clothes into suits for the funerals. I wanted to go to the restroom to do so but was told I had to in the office with the others. There were usually four or five. There was no nudity; we just had to strip down to our underwear.

[+ tassojunior]

Was at a nude/clothing optional beach today. Every age, body shape and flaccid size imaginable!

 

Four young men (early 20s?) came down. They wrapped a towel around themselves while pants still on (not even down to underwear) and then went through amazing contortions to get pants & underwear off and bathing suit on UNDER the towel. Ridiculously amazing.

 

What goes? Why? I have heard friends mention similar at the Gym.

 

Anyone know why this is?

 

Sounds like gay panic. Was it a heavily gay beach?

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

I couldn't agree more.

 

Millennials are (for the most part) the most sexless, boring generation... Uncomfortable with their bodies and unable to comprehend those who aren't.

[+ HornyRetiree]

Sounds like gay panic. Was it a heavily gay beach?

 

Mixed, Gay & Straight with both genders -

[+ tassojunior]

Mixed, Gay & Straight with both genders -

 

They perceived it as gay. Or had been told it was.

[+ Avalon]

When I was in high school in all our classes except for P.E. we were separated by our grade standing - Freshmen, Sophomore, Junior, Senior.

 

But for P.E. we were all mixed in together. All ages of physical development. And the showers were communal. Just didn't seem right to me.

 

I had a dear female friend - a TexMex - who grew up in lower Rio Grande Valley on the American side. She told me that she dropped out of high school because she didn't want to take a shower at school. This was back in the 40s.

[+ sniper]

I think people 40something and older had the experience as a youth of HAVING to get naked in front of other people and so just got over it sooner. But as people hav

They perceived it as gay. Or had been told it was.

 

But then why did they go to that beach in the first place?

[+ sniper]

I will also hypothesize their getting shy about nudity may partly be about people getting bolder about hitting on them. I see young guys wear their underwear to the steamroom at my gym basically to broadcast "no" to the guys who are cruising there.

[Epigonos]

When I first started teaching high school in 1966 the guys in P.E. thought nothing about showering together in gang showers. By the time I retired in 2002 the kids weren't about to shower together then simply loaded up on deodorant and went to their next class.

[bongripper]

The hippies are dying off. One of the positive things they did for out ultra Puritan country is relax our “standards” about nudity. Also in this age (happens on this site unfortunately too) people feel no compunction about posting people’s pictures without asking permission (were providers by the way so some of y’all think we’re open season.) And after they are posted they are available to anyone on earth. There is quite a bit to lose because people don’t practice basic respect of privacy.

[LookingAround]

Sorry can’t accept the premise here. The young guys from Grindr who come over drop their clothes like they’re radioactive.

 

Who says young guys are afraid of nudity.

[+ Charlie]

Young males nowadays are much more aware that they are sex objects to other men than they were in the days when homosexuality was the lust that dare not speak its name. When I was a young man, if another man stared at my naked body, I could yell "Faggot!" and punch him in the eye without being accused of a hate crime. Now young men are probably reacting the same way that most young women do when they are in the company of men whom they do not want to attract sexually, by trying to avoid evoking any prurient interest.

Edited August 6, 2018 by Charlie

[bnm73]

... by trying to avoid evoking any prurient interest.

 

Then why go to co-ed nude beach and make such a display of putting on a bathing suit? Or why go to a nude beach at all? I can appreciate your sentiment, but I'm not sure that it would necessarily apply in this context?

[+ tassojunior]

Then why go to co-ed nude beach and make such a display of putting on a bathing suit? Or why go to a nude beach at all? I can appreciate your sentiment, but I'm not sure that it would necessarily apply in this context?

Maybe they wanted to cruise naked chicks without gay men cruising them.

[liubit]

Being naked for SOMEONE has always been different to me than being naked for EVERYONE. I could escort in a heartbeat....but I could NEVER have been a stripper.

Like he says.

[Smurof]

I wouldn't attribute shyness to youth. I'll forever regret having a hang-up about my extremely hairy ass when I was a freshman in college. The figure art model gig paid $100 an hour! Today, so many people are fighting over these types of jobs that the colleges can pick great looking bodies, and pay next to no money compared to the 80s. Today, the last thing I am is a looker (well, okay, maybe a "was it really that small" pondering) but I LOVE to be naked as much as I can, be it getting waxed, massaged, or at a nudist resort, and don't care what other people think. Perhaps today's youth care too much.

[maninsoma]

The hippies are dying off. One of the positive things they did for out ultra Puritan country is relax our “standards” about nudity. Also in this age (happens on this site unfortunately too) people feel no compunction about posting people’s pictures without asking permission (were providers by the way so some of y’all think we’re open season.) And after they are posted they are available to anyone on earth. There is quite a bit to lose because people don’t practice basic respect of privacy.

 

Even though you are so far the lone voice in this thread to cite this reason, it's the first thing I thought of as well. In previous generations it would be obvious if someone was taking a photo. Today someone can appear to be simply using one's phone and take surreptitious photos of strangers. Those photos can then be shared online quite easily without the subject's knowledge or permission. Perhaps these young men were simply trying to prevent having naked photos of themselves presented for the world to see.

[+ JEC]

In addition to my day job I teach spin at my local Y. I am always fascinated by locker room dynamics. Our locker room has a row of open showers against one wall, and a row of enclosed shower stalls on the other. It’s generally younger guys who gravitate to the shower stalls. At the same time, many of the morning “regulars” (straight) know I am gay and do not hesitate to change or shower next to me.

 

I do think this is largely a generational thing - many of the younger guys will even keep a towel wrapped around the them while changing their underwear (sadly LOL)

[+ FrankR]

Ugh, get naked? I can’t even. Like, seriously, is that a thing? I am getting through the summer grind, showing off the mad kit I spent my swag money on and you want me to get naked!?!? Hashtag WHATEVER!

 

(The ‘kids’ nowadays really sound like that!)

Edited August 6, 2018 by FrankR

[+ poolboy48220]

I'm with @bongripper and @maninsoma . Too easy to have your naked picture taken & made public without your knowing it these days.

[caramelsub]

I agree with the notion someone had mentioned about young men are now seen as sex objects. I’m a millennial and never had to strip down in gym class naked at all, just to underwear. Wasn’t required to shower after gym either. If you’re old and fat there is nothing to be seen, versus a young chiseled guy, with a great body who knows he will attract attention.