At the Video Game Store: Demonic Rule but NO Simple Nudity

Get ready for a Platypus diatribe that’s a cliché,’ but oh-so-true, argument about what’s wrong with society.

Tonight one of the Bare Platypuses took his puggles to the local video game store.   While waiting for the kids to trade in some games (Lego Star Wars and Lego Indiana Jones if you’re wondering), your Platypus browsed the miles of aisles of flashy box covers.  A couple titles caught his eye.

The first is, from what a bit of internet research tells us, a game that’s been out since 2007 called Overlord. 

[Cue Dana Carvey of Saturday Night Live’s “Church Chat” lady voice…] Let us quote exactly from the back jacket of the game, shall we?

Think Evil. Breed Evil. Control All!

Get in the action and become the Overlord, the all-powerful dark lord with a horde of minions to command and a land to conquer.

Control a horde of minions.

Slavish and loyal they’ll smash, destroy, kill, and steal anything for you. Your word is law.

Become the Overlord.

Do you want fear, respect, gold and power?  Become the most powerful being in the world by any means necessary.

Conquer a twisted fantasy world.

Show the Seven Heroes, demonic Halflings, and Rabid Unicorns who’s boss.

You can read the jacket to Overlord by clicking Disturbing Game 

That game was rated “T” for Teens – The same rating enjoyed by the other game we’ll review: The Sims.  The Sims is a lot like playing with a virtual dollhouse.  Players control the homes, jobs, accessories, and---admittedly---relationships of their characters.  When the simulated cartoon avatars use the shower or hot tub, their “naughty bits” and bums are pixilated lest we see ordinary figures bathing and swimming in cartoon nakedness.

If you search online but "off the grid" there are patches that users can download from third-party providers. These replace the pixilation with faux buttocks and pubic mounds. But you won’t find any ordinary nudity in the retail version of the game. And you won’t find any nudist camps in the Sims Vacation expansion pack either---a special module for the game that lets players control icons in destinations like campgrounds and the beach.  Apparently EA Games is too concerned about its brand to openly offer The Sims with a nudist option.  Or they fear having their game slapped with an “M” Mature rating.

Now the Platypus doesn’t believe in censorship or banning games.  So we’ll just ask a question.  If you were a parent, which would you rather have your teenager play?  A game that’s advertised with the line “Do you want fear, respect, gold and power?  Become the most powerful being in the world by any means necessary."  Or a game that would allow Ken and Barbie Sim and little Skipper Sim to frolic in the buff at a virtual nudist club while playing volleyball and shuffleboard?

Don’t hold your breath waiting for option two.  If you do download the computer “hacker’s nudity patch” for your Sims, better scan it for viruses first.

Would You Put a Swimsuit on a Platypus? (With Pic)

Somewhere between fact, folklore, and urban legend we heard this: Walt Disney’s cartoon character Donald Duck was once banned in Finland because he didn’t wear pants.

That seems a bit much coming from a country where mixed genders, young and old, sit buck naked in the sauna.  But, hey, if we have to choose between a country with naked saunas or Donald Duck, pass the pickled herring and get us jobs in the Nokia factory.

Anyway, can we all agree that putting pants on a cartoon duck, or a real duck, just doesn’t make any sense?  Can we agree that a bathing suit on a swimming Platypus would be Goofy too? ( Uh oh. We just mentioned Donald Duck and Goofy in the same post.  Maybe Disney trademark police will flag this. )

Is it such a stretch, then, to ask why anyone thinks Lycra or Nylon trunks are an improvement over our bare skin when we go swimming?  Maybe even Walt Disney didn’t think so.  He started the movie Pollyanna with a bare bum shot of a kid holding a rope who then swings out and drops into the ole’ swimming hole.

So maybe there’s hope.  Walt Disney wouldn’t clothe a duck or a skinny dipper.  Now if we can just release him from that cryogenic chamber he’s frozen in and thaw him out, Walt can help us!  Oh yeah. We’re back to urban legend again…



04/24/12 Update:  Here is the story behind the (erroneous) rumor that Finland banned Donald over his lack of trousers.  Turns out the city of Helsinki simply stopped buying the Duck's comics for its library system as a budgetary measure.   According to Snopes.com .

Star Wars Fans: Think Amydala Skinny-Dipped?

Star Wars.  Episode 2. Queen Amydala returns to her home planet of Naboo.  She’s accompanied by a much older Anakin Skywalker, who serves as her security escort. They hide out from an assassination plot by staying at the Queen’s palatial country estate.

Dreamily looking out over open waters from her balcony, Amydala talks about swimming out to an island just offshore every day as a young girl.  And she mentions lying out in the sun on the sand with her friends.

Our Platypus question:  Do you think Amydala skinny-dipped in those days she so fondly recalls during that scene?

We say “yes.”  It’s the most logical explanation for why she had so much fun and why it was so special for her. Of course, we can’t prove it.

Unless George Lucas starts reading the Bare Platypus blog.

Ramblings on the Naked Rambler

Anyone familiar with the Civil Rights movement knows about that famous day in December, 1955 when Rosa Parks stepped onto a bus in Montgomery, Alabama.  Later told to give up her seat to a white passenger, Parks refused and was promptly arrested. That, in turn, touched off the Montgomery Bus Boycott---one of the more significant chapters in the story of black efforts to achieve equality in the United States.

But what if no one had noticed Rosa's act of Civil Disobedience, or worse, didn’t care?  What if she was arrested and forced to pay a fine or serve jail time and nothing changed in Alabama?  What if she boarded yet another Montgomery bus a month later and the same refusal—arrest---jail--release cycle repeated itself?  Then repeated again.  What if each time angrier and angrier judges ratcheted up the penalties until Rosa Parks was facing three years’ imprisonment or more by the time she captured public attention?  And still nothing changed.

Bare Platypus asks these questions as we turn to the subject of Mr. Steven Gough, also known as the Naked Rambler in the United Kingdom where he resides.  Perhaps we should state, more precisely, where he does jail time for repeatedly violating indecency laws by walking the roads of the UK countryside bare bum naked.  Each time Mr. Gough is released from the hoosegow he gets only mere feet down the road before he drops trou and begins walking nude again.  Each time the magistrates before whom he appears get a bit angrier and angrier and punish him with longer sentences.  Each time his plea is the same:  There’s nothing wrong with the human body.

You can read a Wikipedia entry about him by clicking http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Gough

When Bare Platypus first learned about the Naked Rambler years ago we may have judged him too harshly.  We then thought he was a publicity hound, or worse, an exhibitionist who got enjoyment from shocking people.  But as we read more, and as Mr. Gough is arrested again and again, we’re not so sure. … In fact, Mr. Gough starts looking a bit heroic to us.

For one thing, many of the Naked Rambler’s ramblings have taken place on rural country roads where there aren’t all that many people present.  For another, he does not appear to have targeted any person(s) (e.g. kids waiting at school bus stops) with his nudity.  He is also willing to serve lengthy stints behind bars out of deeply held convictions.  Finally, he served his country as a Royal Marine and, presumably, has a priority claim on freedom given that he was prepared to defend it with his life.   (There are some things we’re not so sure about, including the fact he has children who don’t have dad at home through all of this.)

For now Steven Gough’s chief problem seems to be that there aren’t many others prepared to “get on the bus” with his nude walking venture, or to express outrage over his perpetual imprisonment for something as simple as living bare.  But perhaps history will remember the Naked Rambler as a champion for bodily rights.

As NURBA recently wrote on Twitter, “History LOVES envelope pushers.”

Naked History: Sanitized for Your Protection

In George Orwell’s classic novel 1984 the “futuristic” book opens with the main character working in a branch of government whose job is to delete all references to any persons no longer favored by said government.  He carefully arranges to airbrush these disfavored people from pictures in newspaper archives and cuts out their names too.

In reality, the most controversial aspects of history often don’t make it into the textbooks in the first place.  And it seems you can’t get much more “controversial” than the naked human body. 

Take the ancient Olympic Games, for example.  Spend more than a cursory amount of time researching the Games and you will learn that they were played in the nude for hundreds of years.  Many Greek athletes trained in the nude also.  Yet if you picked up most children’s books about the Games in a school library, you would likely find those ancient Greeks running around in toga-like apparel.  We can’t have little Johnny or Suzie seeing illustrations of naked people---even if it’s the truth. Books with naked people might not sell well.

In literature the censorship goes even further at times, deleting mere words about nakedness.  Not many years ago the New York Board of Regents’ exam given to high school students included a reading comprehension passage from Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi.  In typical Twain fashion, the original passage described the experience of a boy traveling down the river on a raft, including the statement that he and his traveling companion were usually naked, “whenever the flies” would let them be.  But in the Regents’ passage all references to the word “naked” were removed… without so much as a …. Or [edited] marking!

In his best-selling book Lies My Teacher Told Me   Professor James Loewen notes that history is often censored and he argues that this censorship makes it more boring for students to study, as well as removing powerful life lessons.  Loewen’s book doesn’t dwell on the subject of nudity, but does note that nudity is usually a big no-no in any study. 

He presents the famous Vietnam War photograph of a young girl running down the street naked after her body and clothing had been burned when her village was napalmed.  Interesting that this powerful image helped stir feelings against the war and helped change the direction of US policy, yet would have virtually no chance of making it into a high school curriculum because of the girl’s nudity.

Sanitized for our protection, of course.

04/30/13 Update: The nation of Qatar preferred to return two statutes with male nudity back to Greece (from which they were on loan), rather than display them without coverings and risk offending female visitors to an archaeological exhibit about the ancient Olympic games.  Read details HERE 

4/30/12 Update:  Another example -"The Dirty Cowboy," a picture book about a cowboy who takes a bath and then can't get his dog to give back his clothes because it doesn't recognize his scent, was removed from a Pennsylvania school library by an 8-0 vote.  Officials said the cowboy's nudity would "groom" kids to accept pornography: http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2012/04/30/Dirty-Cowboy-book-pulled-from-schools/UPI-11071335806194/

Trayvon Martin Case – Bare Platypus Shares Personal Insight

Since late February news media have dispatched story upon story and commentary upon commentary about the tragic death of Trayvon Martin following an altercation between the 17 year old black youth and an armed neighborhood watch citizen named George Zimmerman.  The case has sparked discussions about race, justice, various interpretations of Florida’s “stand your ground” law, self-defense, the actions of police personnel, investigation procedures, and what happened that night.
 
Bare Platypus has NOTHING to say to those issues, either way, because… you know what?  We weren’t there. 

But Bare Platypus HAS been to Sanford, Florida in Seminole County. Home to the neighborhood so thoroughly “watched” by Mr. Zimmerman where the incident took place.  Our experience shows that Seminole County residents have a history of sticking their nose where it doesn’t belong…with predictable results.

Over ten years ago the Platypus team drove to Sanford on a rainy night for a hearing about an anti-nudity proposal.  The county commission’s meeting chambers were filled with residents prodding the commission to put the measure on the ballot for referendum in the next election.  That didn’t bother your Platypus team at the time because we were simply looking to have some wording revisions made to the proposal.

What had started as a measure to deal with gaudy strip clubs of the flashing neon-sign variety, had morphed into one of the most all-encompassing exercises of prying into persons’ private lives that we had ever seen---or have seen since.  As written, Seminole County’s proposal prohibited nudity:

• Whether it could be seen by the public or not seen by the pulic;
• Whether on public or private property;
• Whether among members of a for-profit or not-for-profit venture;
• Whether on grounds open to the public at large, or in a private club where entry was strictly limited to a membership requirement; and
• Applied regardless of the size of any group of naked persons.

In other words, the County proposal not only banned the existence of private nudist clubs behind a thoroughly-built fence, but also prohibited any social group (no matter how small) from being naked too.  Have the softball team over to celebrate your game win in the amateur league?  Better not skinny dip!  Find a secluded swimming hole? Better not skinny dip either – or face fines big enough to curb big-league adult entertainment over a single incident.

When we politely explained these scenarios, do you know what the residents in Seminole County / Sanford took the podium to say?  “We want to be able to know what is going on in someone else’s back yard behind their fence... and put a stop to it if it’s something we don’t think is proper.  Even if that’s just some skinny-dipping.”

The county anti-nudity measure went on to pass, without any amendment, by an overwhelming margin.

Call us sore losers. But Bare Platypus could have predicted you would have trouble from a neighborhood watch association formed from the ranks of people who think that it’s their business when somebody else skinny-dips in the privacy of their own back yard.  

Instagram: Instant Caution for Nudists? (with pic)

Before we start today’s blog post, Bare Platypus has a quick question for ya.  Somewhere within your parents’ family photo albums is there a picture of you naked as a tyke splashing in the tub or bare on a bearskin rug?  Hold that answer.

Now let’s talk about Instagram.  Bare Platypus must be slow on the technology beat because we had not heard of this San Francisco-based company until today.  When Facebook announced that it is paying One Billion Dollars in stock and cash to acquire this small collective of about a dozen employees who offer a unique internet / android app.  Instagram lets people take pictures they have snapped with camera phones and edit them before storing them in Instagram’s “cloud vault” of photography.  Instagram’s piece de resistance is an app that turns camera phone pics into something resembling a 1970’s era Polaroid snapshot .

Let’s return to that picture of you in the tub or on the rug.  The only people who know about that photo are likely to be you, your parents, and the prom date you had who your folks took it upon themselves to show.  It probably remains in the plastic sleeve of some photo album stored on some shelf.  But what if the whole world could see your bare tush? 

That, of course, is precisely what happens with “cloud computing” sites that store photos.  Instagram is the latest in a long line that includes FLICKR, Photobucket, and the albums users create on Facebook.

Bare Platypus doesn’t see anything inherently wrong with this, but there IS a hidden issue for nudists.  What happens when pictures that we take, edit, and store on such sites--- believing them to be perfectly natural---are tried in the court of public opinion under standards that are constantly changing?

Back to you and your picture in the family album.  At the peak of concerns about “child pornography” that image your folks took of you (heaven forbid they took more than one) could have landed them in jail… or at least a trip to the police station to answer some questions.  Indeed, that’s what started to happen when parents took film in for photo developing at the height of the hysteria.  Lifetime Networks even made a television movie about one mom who had her children taken away.

Platypi don’t subscribe to Lifetime so we didn’t see it. But we HAVE fielded calls from concerned parents (some nudists, some not) who learned the hard way that a picture or two they thought was cute and innocent didn’t look that way in the eyes of a different beholder.  When the “beholder” was a clerk at the 1 hour photo store it was an occasional issue.  Now thousands, nay tens of thousands, may be the beholder.  Any one of them could be offended, concerned, report it, or request that your photo be deleted. (We have also assisted one family with some extreme difficulty they encountered over photos posted on Flickr for which they were ultimately cleared of any charges.  But not before being burdened with a job loss and considerable legal expense.  Their experience is just one of the reasons you will not find any nudity on Bare Platypus except for the illustrations of our Platypi.)

Don’t think that will happen?  Maybe not.  But consider this:  Some time ago the very same Facebook that just bought Instagram for $1 billion made the controversial decision to block, remove, even terminate the accounts of some breastfeeding mothers who wanted to preserve and celebrate a time in their infants’ lives.

4/23/12 Update:  As so happens, Instagram does, in fact, promptly delete photos and entire accounts if fellow users flag an account for posts with nudity.  Read Instagram Removed My Account .  No word on whether they also report users to authorities.