Naked at the YMCA

[WadWorshipper]

No, I just have an issue with guys afraid to change in front of other guys. It's a cultural thing. I grew up in the days of nude YMCA swimming and mandatory showers after PE and sports.

I did too. For a label, I just call them "prudes". Each to his own, and they're the product of growing up with their own bedroom and never seeing other boys naked in school gym class, so they're used to completely privacy in regards to their bodies. Sad. I admit it's hard not to roll my eyes when I see a young guy race off to the bathroom stall to change shorts OVER underwear though. lol

 

[sulvca]

Question, is there any Y in the Denver,CO area that is still old style locker rooms?

 

[al1011]

I wanted to join a YMCA for the purpose of working out and relaxing in a hot tub etc... However I thought as well to relieve some social anxiety if I could get over stripping naked near other guys and then walk the room naked until I got to the shower and shower near other guys. If i could get over that feel like would be helpful.. However when I went on tour of at least LifeTime Fitness, all the guys were changing with a towel wrapped around them. That to me doesnt feel like anyone is comfortable then you combine that with my nerves it makes it worse... It doesnt even have to be sexual but would be nice to make a changing room "a changing" room that just get naked and change.. Then if there is a hot tub in a locker room, have it be so you can jump in not cover up..

 

[pluscachange]

An interesting sociological perspective...

 

[txviewer]

An interesting sociological perspective...

Interesting video. Fashion also plays a big part in what type of bathing suits are worn. If you look back at bathing suits worn by males of all ages up to at least the very late '80s to maybe the early '90s, none of the bathing suits were "baggy shorts" or "longboard shorts". One thing I recall from the '80s were the type of shorts (not bathing suits) called "jams" or "jamz". This is where shorts started to get very long, going so far as to stop right at or go past the knee. Hell, look at the shorts worn by basketball players from the '70s verses what they wear now.

 

[Tony56]

I have noticed in old movies - 40s, 50s, even 60s - that men's bathing suits are quite brief by today's standards, actually more resembling briefs rather than the modern day trunks.

Standards do come and go but the era of the long baggy shorts seems to be out, especially among the younger men. Shorts are breaking above knee, some very much so. My neighbor's son across the street, having returned home from first year of college, has been seen wearing very short white shorts, and he has the body for it.

 

[Tony56]

My neighbor's son across the street, having returned home from first year of college, has been seen wearing very short white shorts, and he has the body for it.

I forgot to add that you can see that he is wearing white briefs under those white short shorts.

 

[ActionBuddy]

... Hell, look at the shorts worn by basketball players from the '70s verses what they wear now.

Exactly!... They might as well be wearing calf-length skirts!

A/B

 

[WadWorshipper]

An interesting sociological perspective...

Yes, all true, I think. I wish he would have mentioned more specifically the outcome of the increased prosperity of WWII allowing for homes with separate rooms for boys, whereas in previous eras, this was highly unlikely as brothers shared rooms for their whole childhoods, and everyone shared one bathroom. "Privacy" was almost a non-thing, and it was completely normal to see other family members naked, so why would you expect any different when you went to school to take showers after gym class. When a boy grows up never being nude in front of others at home, pushback begins at school for gym classes, and eventually you get what we have now: boys at the gym locker room running off to the bathroom stall to change shorts over their underwear. It's sad what we've lost. Quite a far throw from the old days where school swim classes were nude, with girls and other bystanders in the stands. And from mothers would throw a wad of towels to boys and a bar of soap and told them to go down to the creek and wash the stink off, as they then all ran naked down to the water. There were even Ivory soap ads showing this (carefully)!

 

[mdt123p]

I have noticed in old movies - 40s, 50s, even 60s - that men's bathing suits are quite brief by today's standards, actually more resembling briefs rather than the modern day trunks.

Standards do come and go but the era of the long baggy shorts seems to be out, especially among the younger men. Shorts are breaking above knee, some very much so. My neighbor's son across the street, having returned home from first year of college, has been seen wearing very short white shorts, and he has the body for it.

I have some fond memories from college days. I grew up in a society where girls were to be modest but not boys. We could go shirtless in house and wore the really short shorts for swim or sports. It was ok - for both women and men - to admire healthy young men openly (but not women).
In college (90% guys) we had one or two weeks of a festival where guys from other colleges would come over and enjoy shows and sports. Families - dads moms and sisters - came over too and saw how we lived up close. I organized an evening 'mud volleyball' in a muddy field with rain or hosed water. TBC...

 

[mdt123p]

For the mud volleyball, someone had picked out some ultra-short shorts with built in underwear. It was a new water repellant material that looked natural and fashionable. They had a whole bunch in S/M/L and colors for the players. Now the regular showers could not handle such mud and crowds so we had a basic partition and couple of 6-head pole showers setup with a concrete flow direct to a ground drain, right next to the field. There was no ceiling so this was in clear view from the second and upper floors. Players were all fit guys and changed into the new shorts. The atmosphere was exciting with the audience yelling and dancing. No bad behavior tho since we had families around. It was fun to see reactions of the moms and sisters to the sheer raw maleness on display - bulges all around up close and mud splashing. Some of the students in audience got into the shorts to show off.
Then the players had no idea they would be stripping behind the partition and shower in the open. It took a while to get the mud off. There was'nt a choice not to shower after the mud play!! I have to say I saw more great cocks in those weeks than ever...TBC

 

[tony decatur]

Question, is there any Y in the Denver,CO area that is still old style locker rooms?

I don't know about a Y, but you have Lake Steam on Colfax that is heaven! All nude old school sauna. I miss being there....

 

[sulvca]

I don't know about a Y, but you have Lake Steam on Colfax that is heaven! All nude old school sauna. I miss being there....

Really? Never heard about this before. Perhaps I'll have to check it out whenever I'm back in Denver.

 

[malakos]

Wow, why a swipe at effeminate men?!

Much like the cult of the uncircumcised penis, this devotion to common nudity in men's spaces as an ideal is deranged and fanatical, so deviation from what they want to be the case brings out their vicious, prejudiced side.

 

[ActionBuddy]

Much like the cult of the uncircumcised penis, this devotion to common nudity in men's spaces as an ideal is deranged and fanatical, so deviation from what they want to be the case brings out their vicious, prejudiced side.

Says "Debbie Downer"... Such a weird comment.

A/B

 

[malakos]

Says "Debbie Downer"... Such a weird comment.

A/B

The sort of bigotry (towards the shy, the modest, the self-conscious, the chaste, and the effeminate) that falls out of the homoerotic idealizing of men's spaces common on this site is well deserving of criticism.

 

[Triplexintx]

To respect others?? What are we telling the young generations? Geez. Saw this today at an Indiana Y.

I cannot imagine going to management to report someone for being "too naked" in the locker room. How would you define the problem, how many seconds can they be naked before it becomes an offense? If you don't want to see someone naked you don't have to look.

 

[al1011]

I saw I forget at what gym but they had sign posted about decency like cover up as much as possible. I think it may have been at LifeTime. I think people were changing in and out of underwear only when towel was wrapped around them. Might have been just a few doing that but just odd.. If thats the policy then locker room should just be co-ed.. But i'd ignore any sign as long as your not making it all sexual.

 

[chrisjason]

My vote is men's only locker rooms where nudity is the standard. But I would also vote for co-ed locker rooms where nudity was also the standard. I've used them in Germany and Croatia without a problem.

 

[NakedBuddy]

The sort of bigotry (towards the shy, the modest, the self-conscious, the chaste, and the effeminate) that falls out of the homoerotic idealizing of men's spaces common on this site is well deserving of criticism.

Says Chastity Pariah.