Men’s locker room are for men to be in any state they choose. Naked part nude or naked like a jay bird. In the steam sauna I always wear flip flops and had one towel to sit on. I am nude because I am sweating and once I shower and hit the locker room I still sweat I enjoy just letting my body temperature lower naturally as I relax all nude no towel.
I do not want any clothing on my privates since I am in a men’s locker room and they need to dry off just like the rest of me, maybe more. I do not bother anyone, I reply when talked to, and I do watch TV sometimes. Once I am cool and no sweat I dress and go home or to work.
If you have a problem with men nude in a men’s locker room it is your problem not mine. What I am doing has been done in our culture in the USA for well over 150 years. You want me to change my behavior to suite new sensibilities, Those sensibilities are the new generations problem, not everyone else that are acting normal in men;s locker rooms.
I don’t have a problem with nudity in the locker room in general. What I am pointing out is that it goes against the current social convention. And if you go against social convention, people around you think you’re strange. It doesn’t matter if you change my mind about this. I don’t go to your gym and I won’t be able to influence the other members at your gym who think you’re strange.
What is normal? There’s not an absolute. It’s the social convention of a time and place. Is it normal to go nude in public parks? In Germany, yes. In France, no. I don’t have a problem with nudity. At a beach, sauna, or gym, I will go nude or not depending on what is the convention. My preference is to be nude because it feels better, but I’ll respect the social convention. It’s not so onerous to be dressed that I feel entitled to be nude.
Actually, this thread helps understand why the locker-room-nudists do other things which are not socially accepted, like dry their balls with the public hair dryer, press their genitals against the sink when they shave, sit on a bench and rub anti-fungal cream on their balls, etc. They feel their personal preference trumps the social convention. They want to be nude, so they’re nude even though no one else is. They want to blow dry their balls, so they do it in public with the shared hair dryer. If nudity in the locker room was more the norm, then they wouldn’t stand out so much. They would just be one of many and it wouldn’t seem like all the nude guys do this. But when everyone is covered, only those who shun the conventions are nude and it’s not surprising they also shun other social conventions. This isn’t to say that all the gym nudists do this. Rather, it’s that the people who do this are quite often also gym nudists.
When was this social convention? I guess I missed it. You do not seem to understand this so called new social convention is not making me look strange it is the people who seems to follow this new PC mantra based on the misunderstanding that being nude in a men’s locker room at any time or place is odd or strange to other men.
I do not care if people think I am strange. At age 60 frankly I do not care what most people think of me naked in a locker room. This professed new social convention that wants to change the normal interaction of men and women is what is strange. It seem based on your comments, trying to change what has been the norm to something unnatural. In the USA men have been taking showers nude, shaving nude and I guess using blow dryers to dry their junk. I have done that at home but it does not bother me when other men do it in the locker room. It really seldom bothers me what most men do in the locker room. If a guy has jock itch and is applying cream I prefer he sit on a towel. But if not so be it, that is why I always use a towel to sit on and I wear flip flops.
I do try to be respectful of other men in the locker room. I always sit on a towel or when I shave nude I use a towel to lean on at the sink. Yes I do sometimes shave my face while naked in the men’s locker room. Till you mentioned it I never gave it a second thought. Contrary to the new social convention, I will still do so when I need too.
Wanting to be nude in a men’s locker room for a man in the USA is the most proper place I can think of being naked. It has been and still is socially accepted by most men when in a public gym locker room. In fact it was expected when you entered a locker room that you would see men naked. I do not care if other men older or younger do not want people to see them nude. That is perfectly fine with me. I respect modesty but please do not try to enforce your sensibilities on me just because you feel it is now strange based your interpretation of this new social convention.
Now If a guy is doing it because he thinks it offends the social convention that is a problem. Modesty is perfectly okay if that is the way you feel you wish to be. It is a problem when it is done with the misunderstanding that being nude offends other men in the room. Most of the guys do not care. But if you want to get dressed under a towel or just go home and shower that is fine. Your level of modesty is your choice, just do not try to impose your modesty and new social convention on me when in a men’s locker room. It seems clear based on the men’s age that younger guys are being taught to feel it is strange to be nude around other men. I say this since based on my locker room visits it is the younger men who wish to be the most modest. They no longer take showers with other males in school and see nudity as always sexual, when it is not. Many of these younger men have never seen other men nude except when thinking it was sexual. That is not a healthy attitude imho.
I think that is why you see so many older guys doing what ever they need to do in a men’s locker room nude, they do not care about this new social convention. They are comfortable being nude around other men and contrary to your assertion it is not strange to be nude when you shave. When I look around the locker room I see men nude but not in any sexual way. Do I look at men, sure that is normal to mentally compare yourself to others. I have done it since I was a boy, why now as a man should I change? Males seeing other males nude was/is a natural way to see how your body compared to others. The dynamic now seems to be if you see a guy naked it is sexual, that never was/is the case for the majority of males.
I am not trying to change your thoughts, I am trying to express it is perfectly healthy and normal for men to be around other men nude in a men’s locker room. It is not strange or abnormal to walk naked in a men’s locker room contrary to your assertion of this new social convention or social correctness. This nudist behavior is quite natural and has been for generations.
It sounds like you don’t like the idea of other men blow drying their balls with a shared hair drier. But a hair dryer doesn’t touch anything but your hand. I’m puzzled why you care whether it is used to dry hair on a clothed person, or a naked guy’s balls, or someone’s damp socks.
Jesus, is your entire life ruled by your silly social conventions and concerns about “normality”? Believe it or not, if people around you think you’re strange, it’s not the end of the world.
Coincidentally, after reading this thread I was about to go to a gym/locker room for the first time after being away from such communal showers for about 20 years, and I was a bit nervous about looking like a cro-magnon left behind in these apparently sterilized times.
Fortunately, it seems that nothing has changed in this respect and people appear not to have any qualms about walking around nude.
I have to say though, something that has changed is the presence of smartphones and their cameras. Don’t they make you uncomfortable? Particularly if the people using them are foreign.
Mr Wolf the gyms I go to all have a no phone policy. It is a concern for privacy and makes good sense. The younger guys real self enforce the rule if someone pulls out a phone. I myself do not care if someone wants a picture of a slightly pudgy 60 year old man they must really be hard up for naked pictures of guys. I would not worry about the problem it seems well enforce d. Enjoy your workout and shower.
This cartoon sums this up nicely (don’t worry - it’s SFW unless your work is REALLY prudish).
Personally, while I’m shy enough I have to use stalls to pee I manage to make it from locker to shower and back in the nude without dying of embarrassment. Admittedly the fact that I leave my glasses in my locker means that all the other nude people are blurry enough to be effectively pixelated, which tends to prevent any issues with accidentally glimpsing something one wishes one hadn’t seen.
My gym has those signs too (although there may be only one in the whole locker room) and it is routinely ignored mostly by the younger guys. Even had one or two guys taking vanity pictures of their physiques in the mirror, with other guys in the background. It doesn’t bother me (because I am a fat old guy) but if some younger and/or fitter guy wanted to say something to one of these morons, I wouldn’t mind backing him up. It’s just so clueless.
Before this goes any further, it is particularly uncomfortable if they are foreign simply because one does not understand what they are saying.
Add to that a jocose tone to the conversation, an unusual angle between the gadget and the owner and one begins to wish to hide one’s naked self inside the locker.
Also approaches to nudity tend to be culturally uniform. These guys were asians and the japanese, on the sexual level, are stereotypically a bit …hummm… deviants?
That is the point that this was not issue before!! But seem now some guys are uncomfortable and probably because of sexuality and LGBT all out in open now where in past no one talked about.
So guys feel uncomfortable being nude or almost nude.