Victoria Coren asks So what's the dress code?. She's taking the mickey, of course. As the British Naturism spokes said "In February, it simply isn't warm enough."
I'm a bit ambivalent to nudity. I don't find other people's nudity in the slightest bit erotic and I really would not want it in the workplace. I'm not just thinking of an office. Imagine going into a catering establishment...no, no, stop it now.
Damn, I've fallen into the traps I were trying to avoid, 'there's something rather disgusting about the human body' and 'I have an absolute right to determine how other people appear'
Naturism isn't about going off to live in a colony any more, but about the healthiness of fresh air on skin, respect among like-minded people, a lack of discrimination between different types of human body, and the environmental benefit of not having so many bathing suits to wash...'we were born naked, and there is nothing shameful about the body. Why spend hundreds of pounds at Calvin Klein to cover it up? 'These sound like excellent modern values to me. Eco-responsibility, mutual respect, additive-free health: you'd think the movement had been invented yesterday.
It's never going to catch on in Britain, really, not least because of the weather. But one thing I have noticed from years of lying inert on beaches during package holidays is that, in general, the people who seem to have the most inhibitions about stripping off are those that appear to be the most hung-up about their appearances. I wonder if, in being so apparently obsessed about how they appear to random strangers they fail to enjoy their bodies for their own sakes.
I wear low-cut tops to the office. I generally wear low-cut tops. This is because I am unsuited to polo neck jumpers because of my body shape and because of that weird 'don't touch my neck' thing (Actually, it's not so weird, I have a colleague similarly afflicted and the last time I was at the hairdressers the shampoo girl knew precisely what I was saying).
I have absolutely no desire to use my 'feminine wiles' on anybody in the workplace. And anyway, in the world of skilled professionals, it doesn't work. No doubt most people have entertained the occasional abstract fantasy, but the driving force is results, delivery, meeting objectives, efficiency. Why appoint someone who flashes a bit of cleavage when your own career prospects and bonus depend upon your ability to appoint someone to do the work?
