Extreme exposure

[Anonymous]

The Spectrum video had the dancers in some very stretched out poses, showing their flexibility and ability to make “shapes”. They’re attractive and impressive. I wonder what it would feel like to be that exposed. I wondered with the dares we were doing ages ago if they would progress to something extremely revealing, but I think unless you’re built like a male model, it’s not a good look for most men! (Although maybe that adds to the humiliation that some people, including me sometimes, enjoy.) I saw an interview with a male model who, when he saw what people had drawn, was surprised how revealing his pose had been. He’d just followed the directions he was given. He decided he wasn’t bothered – what’s done is done – but he had been intending to just sit there, not be examined in medical detail in body-places nobody normally looks at.

Once you’ve overcome the challenge of letting people see you naked, are there postures you wouldn’t want to adopt? If you were directing an experienced and consenting model, would you enjoy experimenting with increasingly revealing poses? And of course the very old chestnut – where is the boundary (if there is one) between art and pornography?

Ed likes this

[Arthur]

I think that once you are naked naked is naked and certain poses aren’t going to make you feel more naked, but on the other hand I get where people are coming from on this. I was actually writing a scene in my novel last night where two groups play volleyball game, where one of them is naked and the other one is dressed, and the naked team felt intimidated because everybody could see their naked bodies in very physical motion jiggling around and everything like that. I think that when you are naked you can basically see everything moving around, when you are wearing clothing your motions don’t make as much of a difference, but when you are naked you can see every bit of the body moving and flopping around, dicks, balls, breasts etc.

and Gary like this

[Anonymous]

Yes, I hadn’t thought about the movement being significant, and it is. If you’re filmed, say, climbing up a ladder with the camera looking at your front through the ladder, there’s lots of interesting muscle movement and other body parts as well. It’s very exposing, but – on film – the exposure would be brief and not the main point of the exercise.

A different example would be a stripgame forfeit where you end up spreadeagled, particularly if you start by sitting on the edge of a bed. There your fairly brief exposure is part of the forfeit but also part of enjoying the game.

Now though imagine a photo taken in either of those situations so that everyone can see you for as long as they like, extremely exposed without any context. That’s quite scary. I suppose it’s a bit like one of those film scenes where a model attends the opening of an exhibition which includes nude photos of her. How does she react to seeing herself on the wall of a gallery where people can stare at her for ages?

I like the volleyball example. It exposes your body, including holding your arms in the air for a lot of the game, and lots of diving for the ball etc., so it’s challenging but a key part of the whole experience. There’s a lot more going on than just a set of opportunities to see peoples orifices!

Arthur likes this

[Arthur]

“Now though imagine a photo taken in either of those situations so that everyone can see you for as long as they like, extremely exposed without any context. That’s quite scary. I suppose it’s a bit like one of those film scenes where a model attends the opening of an exhibition which includes nude photos of her. How does she react to seeing herself on the wall of a gallery where people can stare at her for ages?”

It’s actually funny you should mention that because right after the volleyball chapter they get jobs as nude models and that makes it even more embarrassing for them because people are painting their bodies and drawing their bodies and taking photos of their bodies, so that they will always have a visual record of it even when the person is not there. Even if a person is briefly outside naked you are only seeing them for a moment, but as they say a picture paints 1000 words and lasts forever, so once you have a picture or a video of a person naked like that you can’t really get rid of it once it’s out there and now people can scrutinize every inch of your body.

The thing that made my situation more exciting and my novel was that they had a contrast study where a naked man and a naked woman have to stand next to each other, back-to-back, side-by-side, and then face to face, and it’s excruciating for the guy because he is incredibly shy but the woman is a completely uninhibited exhibitionist so she is loving every moment of it while he is just dying of embarrassment, and I think that it provides a perfect contrast overall.

One thing that I always thought about was if you have like a twin brother or sister or something like that, and they started doing nude modeling or pornography would you feel self-conscious about that, since their body naked looks exactly like yours and you could easily be mistaken for them. It’s a question I have always wondered but I have never come across anybody in a situation where they had a twin who was doing nude modeling or pornography or something where they are exposing their naked body while the other was more prude.

I was thinking of putting that in a story involving cloning where this one woman feels extremely self-conscious over the fact that there are lots of people out there who have an identical body as hers, and who are going around showing it off, where as she would rather not be seen.

Ed likes this

[Anonymous]

“a naked man and a naked woman have to stand next to each other, back-to-back, side-by-side, and then face to face” – that reminds me of the doorway performance/installation that crops up from time to time. I hadn’t thought about the relationship between the performers. I always assumed they were both members of a theatre group but now I’m thinking about the relationship a bit more.

• What if her boyfriend has never seen her naked? She hasn’t told him about the performance but now one of his friends is standing there with her, both naked and face-to-face?
• What if they’ve always fancied each other but never said anything? Maybe they still can’t say anything, especially if the theatre group has an ethical thing about what happens in a performance stays in the performance?

“a twin brother or sister or something like that, and they started doing nude modeling or pornography” – there was an episode of Friends about that. Phoebie’s identical twin sister had made a porn movie and the episode looked at how Phoebie’s friends reacted to the movie. I did once see a platonic female friend’s sister naked very briefly. I was at their house and the sister walked across a room I could see into – she didn’t realise there was anyone there, and I don’t think she ever found out what had happened (or she was good at pretending not to notice, or she was a closet exhibitionist), but it took a bit of effort for me not to imagine I’d seen my friend naked.

Bamaswitch and Arthur like this

[Arthur]

@Prof Green

“What if they’ve always fancied each other but never said anything? Maybe they still can’t say anything, especially if the theatre group has an ethical thing about what happens in a performance stays in the performance?”

I feel that it would be very hard to keep things platonic after an experience like that. If you have been standing there staring at each other naked for like a few minutes or a few hours or whatever and then you see each other in public it’s kind of hard not to have the image of what they look like naked completely burned into your head!

[Gary]

I don’t think I would mind the extreme exposure aspect (sure I’d be embarrassed to start with) my biggest hang up is other people’s reaction to seeing me naked, if they are ok with it then fine, but anger would be a problem

Ed likes this

[Arthur]

@Gary

“I don’t think I would mind the extreme exposure aspect (sure I’d be embarrassed to start with) my biggest hang up is other people’s reaction to seeing me naked, if they are ok with it then fine, but anger would be a problem”

You mean if they were angry because that you are naked or that you are angry that they reacted badly to you being naked? To me I feel that one way or another even if other people were okay with me being naked I would still feel uncomfortable about it regardless of how they act, but if they really made a big deal of it or if they really were enjoying it that would make it even more embarrassing, especially from dressed women.

[Anonymous]

The “Body at Home” video in the blog has some poses that must have been extremely exposing to the audience in the room. It’s interesting that the videos can do that without becoming pornographic or gynecological. Having plenty of pubic hair helps, but maybe it’s the artistic setting, or even just that it’s a video.

(I was, as usual, hoping that some audience members would strip at some point, but not this time. I like it when people start off wearing very normal day-to-day clothes and strip out of them, more than when they try to dress sexily or provocatively.)

[John]

Personally no and I shave so it’s all there to be seen. I’ve had a mixed response from ladies over the years, even some who don’t mind being naked are very wary of being seen with err legs apart.

[John]

To expand slightly, I don’t want to scare off any more women, but I don’t think I will. This hasn’t been touched on specifically in the experiments, and I think it should. There are different levels of exposure.

It was noticeable in Experiment 1 or 2 was it? when the members of the same sex had to pose their person, the women immediately bent the lady over with legs apart, exposing all her most intimate areas. They also placed her so she could see everyone gazing at her. It must have been in their mind that both this would be the position that would have made them feel the most exposed and vulnerable, also that your next card may have been that the posers had to adopt the same position, so clearly it wasn’t something they weren’t expecting to or prepared to have to do themselves.

A thought for if we do ever get another experiment going.

ps I can’t remember have you got a current application in for me, or do I need to fill another in?

[Anonymous]

I’ve noticed that too – women can be quite cruel to each other in strip games, and (pure speculation…) I wonder if they’re even crueller when playing in a single-sex group. I heard someone interviewed once who said she could never stop at just getting another woman naked. (I think it was a radio documentary about swingers, and she was saying she was an adrenaline junkie.) The mind boggles!

Maybe raising the stakes gives the winner the excuse to be more fully and enjoyably humiliated when she gets her turn as the loser, or maybe it makes everyone more nervous about losing and they enjoy that feeling. Who knows? We need some female participants in this conversation.

Arthur and John like this

[Arthur]

@Prof Green

I do think that there is some truth to the fact that people are crueler members of the same sex, so maybe it’s just that women like humiliating other women more.

[Author]

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