Being shy about nakedness - a British thing?

[lottieandmias]

I've noticed that loads of women at the gym seem to walk around naked without batting an eyelid. I'm way to shy to ever do that. Am I hung up or not? I don't mind them doing it if they want to but I never could.

You don't see any nakedness in my pool changing rooms. They're mixed ,with private showers and changing rooms. I prefer it that way.

I hate being naked at all apart from the obvious times with DH! I hate all my bits hanging free. I have massive boobs and they're nowhere near as pert as they could be. I don't know if it's a British thing, I can't imagine enjoying it if I was any other nationality either . It's not that I don't want other people to see me naked, necessarily, it's more that I just hate the feel of it!
Doesn't massively bother me if other people are naked in changing rooms though, I just don't look.

Kaekae unless you are a gynae I doubt you get to see many 'huge hairy vaginas' although I doibt even they have come across a hairy vagina.

If I looked like Elle then I'd flaunt it, I don't so I'd cover up. Not sure it's a British thing.

so what are changing rooms for then if not changing?

In Japan everyone hops into the onsen (hot communal baths) naked and no-one bats an eyelid. I found it really liberating. Maybe it's because I'm Welsh, not English .

I'm not worried about be naked in front of other women, as other posters have said, it's too much faff to fiddle around changing under towels. What is odd is that the anti-naked posters always talk about women 'strutting' and drying their hair/chatting with no clothes on.
I've been to several gyms over the years and I've never, ever seen this behaviour, just other women minding their own business. Maybe being naked sometimes, but not in an exhibitionist way.

I find the British attitude to nudity v wearing. Endemic body-dysmorphic attitudes- fine. Hyper sexualisation of everything- fine. Getting casually dressed and undressed in front of other people at gym etc - not fine. Nudist beaches - childish titters. Naked saunas- hysterical laughter and comments about sexual perversion.

I much prefer the continent in this respect.

Yeah it's def a british prude thing. I've lived in France and Germany and no one bats an eyelid.

There's nothing wrong with being a 'prude' though. If that's how you feel. getting naked in front of strangers isn't mandatory.

Tiggy

There is a definite hang up about nudity here, but then I grew up in Finland where my local pool had signs reminding you that swimming suits were not to be worn in the showers (open plan, no cubicles) or the sauna (people often got told off by other pool users).
But then things like saunas are such a huge part of the culture and of family life in many European countries that attitudes to nudity are bound to be different.

The gym I go to has signs up requesting people to cover up. Changing is OK but wandering around naked not so much so. Presumably they have had complaints. The showers are private cubicles anyway but the general changing area is open plan.

I remember my agonies of embarrassment at changing rooms and communal showers in German campsites long ago. Ironically I was around 20 and looked as good naked as I ever would. Still had to do the Irish under-towel changing rigmarole though

I realise it makes me a complete prude, but I do wish that women at my old gym had been a little less free and easy with the nudity. It was attached to the office I was working in at the time, and I really could have done without seeing quite so much of my director. Just.... boundaries, you know?

Not keen on the idea of a mass of fanjos, frankly. But I live three mins walk from my gym so I just go home to shower.

I'm no prude but have been diagnosed with body dysmorphia - my BMI is 18 but I feel enormously fat and no one has seen me naked in a long time as a result.

Yep it's a British thing. I too have experienced foreign swimming pool showers where you have to take your costume off to shower, for the sake of hygiene. I have also wandered through the first floor of some (again foreign) stranger's house completely naked in the middle of the night to go to the toilet. Was liberating.

Well I'm 34. It's true people should be allowed to do this if they want to. But the thought of stripping off myself is enough to bring me out in a cold sweat.

Yes the gym is in the UK.

I wouldn't do it now but when I played women's hockey everyone went in the the buff in the changing rooms.

I find British attitudes to nudity so bizarre. I can't help but think that there's a link between on the one hand perfectly normal changing room nudity seen as absolutely weird and bizarre (all this "strutting" and "flaunting", otherwise known as "getting yourself ready after the gym") and on the other hand a total normalisation of drunken exhibitionism and casual sex.

I think if Brits were more accepting of their and everyone else's bodies and had a more normal relationship with bodies, they wouldn't feel the need to show themselves up when drunk. Perhaps we also wouldn't titter over a pair of boobs on page three.

I realise this is a generalisation, but I personally find it broadly true.

Page 3 is another issue though, don't you think? It's high time it was banned for the way it objectifies women.

As for the drinking, that does seem to be a UK thing as well. But is casual sex not common in most countries?

I totally agree fourteen