A collection of 101 abstracts of cases dealing with recreational nudity and how they were handled in the legal system.
Many people equate their nude recreation experience with being in the biblical paradise known as the Garden of Eden. There is a freedom that comes with being nude with your family and friends on some ocean beach that many believe is as close as one can get to that mythical place on Earth.
Not everyone accepts simple nudity as innocuous and innocent. Laws have even made it illegal!
The expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden by Masaccio (1401-28) seems like an appropriate image for those people prosecuted for being nude. This compilation reads like an anthology of short stories developed about the general theme of being nude in a recreational setting.
Some of the stories seem a bit implausible. Others are down right funny. Some are titillating. While others are nothing short of bazar.
The thing that makes this book all the more interesting is that the tales are all true. Each "story" is an abstract of an actual case that has been heard in court.
Taken collectively the stories reveal how nudity in a recreational setting has evolved over the years from 1934 to 1995.
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
From the Inside Flap
Masaccio's fresco, The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden seems an effective illustration of the materials summarized within this text.
With the expulsion of Adam and Eve also came the first prohibitions against nudity, at least mythologically. A prohibition that early on crept into the judicial system occasionally still appearing in some contemporary judicial opinions ruling against public nudity.
Perhaps it is not surprising that the advocates o nudity in a recreational context often equate its manifestation with the paradise of the Garden of Eden.
In this volume Gordon Gill summarized 101 reported U.S. court decisions involving recreational nudity.
Author Gordon Gill first perceived a need for such a book after observing a succession of judicial decisions dealing with its legality, not all of them consistent. A bit of research revealed some early decisions - beginning in the 1930s when the American nudist movement was becoming firmly established - wherein prosecutors successfully obtained criminal judgements against persons engaging in innocuous nudity in private swimming pools, etc. Subsequently, the laws of a number of states changed so that engaging in recreational nudity on private property now is generally deemed acceptable.
As is evident from an analysis of recent cases herein, courts are rendering mixed decisions in the legality of casual nudity in public beach and park areas. The Supreme Court of Florida has held that in the absence of accompanying lascivious conduct, outdoor public nudity did not fall within the provisions of an indecent exposure statute. Similarly, the New York Court of Appeals has held that prosecutors could not apply a criminal statute governing lewd behavior to bare-breasted women enjoying public facilities in a city park. Meanwhile, other state and federal courts have proscribed casual nudity.
See all Editorial Reviews
