Verification of the right to engage in naked outdoor activities.

This petition is aimed at securing the explicit written confirmation of the
right to be naked in the outdoor environment, at a suitable distance from
population centres, and to engage in healthy and harmless sports and
activities, without interference, obstruction, discrimination or harrassment.

        http://gopetition.com/online/6863.html

Although technically legal in most countries in Europe, people engaging in
naked outdoor activities are often taken to task by the police and/or the
justice (?) system itself. Let me say that again: simply being naked in a
public place is not apriori illegal, but it is treated as such by many. There
are many cases where people will even be prosecuted under a law with the
suitably vague title of 'behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace',
which might cover any number of circumstances. Another typical catch-all
alternative is 'indecent exposure', which is equally guaranteed to have
different meanings depending on context.

Nudism is a belief system, built around the basic tenet that people of all
ages, races and creed, have a right to be naked and to engage in peaceful
activity with no regard to their shape, size, colour or wealth. Additionally,
nudism believes that clothes are not a necessary prerequisite of the human
condition, but an add-on. This is in direct contrast to the media passion for
using the naked form for commercial gain and the repeated implied suggestion,
to the majority of the population, that there is something to be ashamed of in
their own body by the inevitably one-sided comparison, and which therefore
should be covered up in socio-economic labeling textiles.

The saying: "Clothes maketh the man" is a truism which it is possible to
challenge. This petition is saying it should not be necessary to cover your
body with cloth to be approved of by society, and that society should explictly
allow different belief systems to coexist in the same (open air) sphere and not
be permanently stuck in a bucket of textile prejudice.

Modern nudism is about people engaging in naked activities, around the world,
as both a personal statement of freedom and as a stand against the pervasive
and dubious use of the naked body in (all forms of) the media.

These people are, or are learning to be, proud of their naked bodies and are
celebrating this natural freedom by being naked in nature. Modern nudism is
bringing the naked out of the closet, out from behind closed, secretive places
and special camps, to the great outdoors.

Being naked is not illegal, although many people continue to think it is. This
petition is aimed at securing the explicit written confirmation of the right to
be naked in the outdoor environment, and to engage in healthy and harmless,
sports and activities, without interference, obstruction, discrimination or
harassment. This petition is urging all people to canvas their representatives
on behalf of their right to be naked outdoors, and for those representatives to
act on this petition and to amend the legal system appropriately, both in their
own countries and at the European Union level.

Article II-70 of the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, (Freedom of
thought, conscience and religion), due to have been ratified in 2005 may have
confirmed this. Again, this would have been an interpretation, and not an
absolute recognition of the situation, which is why it is still deemed
important that this existing right should be explicitly enshrined in the
European Treaty.