Naked ambition, nudity and the New York Times make strange bedfellows. I have written before about the aspirational aspects of the New York Times’s home page. Sure, there’s a healthy serving of news, op-eds, trends, entertainment. Increasingly however, there are subtle and not-so-subtle items that nudge the reader in the right (on) direction. All sorts of wellness articles (today, it’s walking, foods to keep you hydrated, risks of eating grilled foods, is aloe a sham? and more). There are enticingly exotic recipes, nimbu pani anyone? And best buy recommendations. Today it’s headphones, carry-on luggage and, as part of a wellness article, recommendations on sunscreen (we don’t say sunblock anymore).

I’m not sure whether the NYT is playing follow the reader (and his/her aspirations) or is actively pulling its readership into hipper, healthier shape. Either way it’s a solid business model: why not squeeze a few extra years out of each devoted reader?

Having set the scene we come to a June 17^th article, a true headscratcher. The title says it all, “How to Feel Better Naked”.

Really? Is this a state we should aspire to?

The writer draws us into the topic by leading with a then 37-year-old woman who was dragged by her husband to a nudist resort. No way was she taking anything off. But… you guessed it, conformism prevailed, she stripped, loved it and now, decades later, she is a director of the American Association of Nude Recreation. By the way, the AANR is headquartered in the Florida town of Kissimmee. You can’t make this up.

The thrust of the article is how we need to feel more comfortable in our own skin. One expert’s solution is “simply to be naked more often”. Household chores, another AANR director says, can be more fun naked. But beware of developing an unnatural attachment to your vacuum cleaner. And don’t even think about picking up a feather duster. Not to mention advanced challenges like window cleaning (see below), pan frying and how to inquire further before answering the door to a disembodied voice saying it's the blind man.

Apart from the opening scene, the article contains nothing specific about public nudity. There’s the poignant story of the plus-size woman who braved wearing a bikini. “It shocked me how amazing it felt to have sun on my skin; to feel wind on my flesh.” Yes, but she wasn’t naked.

There’s a lot about non-standard bodies, generally female and plus-size. One of the cited books is Fattily Ever After. Which leads us to another segment of society agitating for equal treatment, this time aesthetically. I did a quick dive (bellyflop?) into a world of body image activists, social media influencers (who “celebrate self-love in all shapes, sizes, skin colors, body types, genders, and beyond”) and other proselytizers. I find some of the macho-aggressive posturing a shade sad. “21 Kick-ass quotes about body image.” Or, “8 Bad-ass Body Positive Women to Inspire you.” The attitude seems to be, I’m hefty so deal with it.

The NYT article has come a long way from one woman’s understandable reluctance to bare all publicly. No matter how nonchalant one is strutting his or her stuff in the buff most public nudity can get you arrested. As can some household nudity. Take this man who was convicted of indecent exposure for forgetting that the picture in picture window runs both ways. He is appealing. Not that the two shocked women who reported him would agree.

There’s an old joke: I want to die peacefully in my sleep like Grandpa and not screaming in terror like everyone else in his car. Here’s an update: I want to feel comfortable in my skin like Uncle Woody and not cringing in embarrassment like everyone else at the party. Nudity is a two-way street: the flip side of liberation is consideration of others.

The overarching question is whether feeling natural au naturel is part of the NYT’s Readership Improvement Plan. Yes, RIP. Is public flopping and jiggling part of being an uber hip, determinedly healthy, hyper-informed and completely self-actuated urban player?

One of the article’s main themes is how liberating it feels to be naked. It doesn’t ask why? The words “natural, nature, and au naturel” come to mind, perhaps as echoes of the simple natural life our primitive ancestors lived. A main point in Yuval Noah Harari’s excellent book Sapiens, is that mankind traded freedom for dependency when we took to farming. Once tethered to a parcel of land, we were forced to pray for rain, fight diseases, and defend against invasion. Nomads don’t pray for rain, they move on. The arc of world history runs from Harleys to Minivans.

And from Minivans? With the world seemingly coming off its rails, instead of harking back to those ancient times perhaps this focus on nudity anticipates a future in which we all find ourselves cast in a real life version of Naked and Afraid.

Postscript. I looked up the above reality TV program to confirm the details. I knew the basics, a man and a woman are cast naked into the wild and challenged to survive. But per Wikipedia, it’s not a man and woman exactly, it’s “1 human being who identifies as male (man); 1 human being who identifies as female (woman).” Contortions, apparently written by a team of lawyers, thanks to non-binary activism (another segment agitating for equal treatment).

Post-postscript. In the few days that I’ve been fine-tuning this blog the above cited Wikipedia article has been changed. The lead paragraph now drops the awkward “human being” verbiage and settles for “two survivalists.” Sexual orientation unstated. What a simple, if inelegant, solution. With that kind of thinking we could settle the entire “who goes into which bathroom?” controversy with one door that says: People.