Even at the dawn of Spanish naturism at the associative level, the newspaper El País published, on 21 July 1985, this interesting article that we wanted to share with you, so that you see that there are things that have changed a lot and others, that remain immovable in time even though several decades have passed.
It is extensive, but it is worth its full reading.
By the way, just the day of the publication of the article, July 21st but 33 years later, we will celebrate our NUDIST EVENT in Cantarriján. Curious, coincidence? 😉
NUDE WITH CAR
More than 35,000 naturists prepare 'their costumes' for sunbathing on the Mediterranean beaches.
by FRANCISCO J MEDINA
21 JUL 1985
Ever since the man discovered that the external temperature was as warm as that of his body, the suit became absurd. Although that evidence is manifest, those who have decided to dispense with their blankets do not have it easy. There are still armed groups of intolerant stakes that prevent the practice of such an elementary right. To protect themselves from these fundamentalists of public morals, reservations have had to be enabled for which access is required an identity card that identifies the partners as naturists or strippers, that is, people who have no qualms about demonstrating to the natural, as seen in the mirror.
It's inevitable. The first time the marriage and her daughter appear on the beach, with their newly issued membership card and the white sign of the swimsuit marking them as novices among all those insultingly brunette butts, they feel completely naked, observed by all and a little ridiculous. They are barely able to separate the gaze from some fixed point far away or lift their eyes from the sand. When they finally dare to take a look around him, – he, lying face down of course – cannot resist, although they try with all their strength, to compare: sizes, shapes, smoothnesses… Only the girl, who is already playing with other children, has immediately accepted the situation. They hold hands and, a little cheering, head for the water. There, less visible their bodies, they feel strongly to start talking with other couples. "How cold is the water, is it?" and the older partners, who have possibly gone through the same experience, no longer let them go until the nerve laughs run out and after half an hour of conversation the newly arrived couple forgets they are naked.
Naturists say they don't know any cases of someone who, once this first test has passed, has put on his swimsuit again. This prototype couple would become part of the more than 4,000 members that nudist clubs and associations have in our country. A number that has begun to increase with the continuous liberalization that is taking place in Spanish customs. Branko Bruckner, a Spaniard of Yugoslav origin, first-minute promoter of naturist associationism and president of the Spanish Federation of Naturist Clubs, says that only in the Andalusian Naturist Association 10 new requests are answered every day from people interested in becoming members.
The beginning was, however, quite difficult. The first butts that were decided to be seen on the Spanish beaches did so in the second half of the seventies.
Threats and stones
It was beginning to be not so unusual to see breasts released on the beaches of the Costa del Sol, the Costa Brava or Ibiza, but anyone who dared then to go further to the point had to be willing at any time to take a run in front of the civil guard couple, the municipalists or, and this was the worst of some group of moralistic locals who would race them in front of them. Falling into the hands of the representatives of the authority was supposed to be accused of public scandal and face spending a locked night, in addition to paying a fine, as has happened to the Galician pioneers, some of whom are prosecuted.
Currently the situation is more permissive, and in areas like Almeria the civilian governor has asked. the Civil Guard that whenever he stops a nudist, he merely indicates the situation of the nearest legalized nudist beach. Of course, not in all provinces happens as in Almería, where the provincial director of Tourism itself is a naturist practitioner.
Branko Bruckner divides Spain into two areas: the Mediterranean, with legalized associations and nudist centers, where conflict is minimal or non-existent, and Galicia and the Cantabrian, where more spontaneous nudism is practiced and clashes with the police and population inhabitants are more frequent.
The first legalized naturist center in Spain was in 1978. It is the campsite Las Palmeras, located in the municipality of Vera, in Almería. Since then a whole series of complexes have emerged that are still increasing in number, and of which the most ambitious project is the one that the City Council of Almuñécar organizes in its municipality.
The current legislation on these centres is still insufficient although it is already under study by the Ministry of the Interior a very advanced project, for which organized naturist centers have been consulted, with which it is intended to equate our legislation with that of France, where naturism is considered legally, as a more sporting practice. At the moment, legalized centres are asked to move more than three kilometres from an urban centre, to be protected from external views and to be reserved for members of recognized Spanish or international clubs and associations.
With regard to the quality of the services that each campsite or urbanization provides, they must according to their category. A four-star naturist campsite must meet the same quality requirements as a normal one of the same category, with the sole exception that here the right of admission is controlled through the nudist club membership cards. "The associations are not seeking any economic purpose," says Branko Bruckner. "We only check, because this is stated by the legal regulations, that the requirements officially established are met. But campsites and developments belong to private companies that take care of their exploitation as one more tourist resort".
Because nudism is also that, tourism industry. And so they have seen it in several Mediterranean countries years ago. Yugoslavia is the best example. According to the tourist authorities of that country, naturists account for 25% of the total tourists the country receives each year. The Adriatic coast is in this sense a continuous succession of campsites and developments for naturists. But not just Yugoslavia. France, where in Agde, on the south coast, more than 40,000 naturists gather every year; Greece, where nudism has recently been legalized, and Italy exploit this stream of tourists.
Half a million affiliates
The International Federation of Naturism claims to have more than 500,000 members, most of which, 65%, belong to two countries: France and the Federal Republic Germany. The following are The Netherlands, Belgium, the United Kingdom, the United States, Switzerland… The exception is in the Nordic countries, where naturism is so integrated into society that they do not consider it necessary to associate for their practice. But they also form an important tourist group aimed at the nudist centers. In Spain the total number of foreign nudist tourists controlled in 1984 was 35,000. Number reached by the control carried out by the associations through the cards that were presented in the naturist centers. But since the beaches themselves are open to the public – they only need a sign announcing their characteristic of being a nudist beach – the total number of tourists of this type could be far superior.
"Naturist tourism," says Branko Bruckner, "is essentially familiar and most of its practitioners belong to the middle class, with a considerable cultural level. It is significant, for example, that no less than 18% of the partners of the Naturist Association of Andalusia have professions related to medicine".
In France, in 1984 a sociological study of naturist practitioners was carried out which, according to Spanish clubs, is transferable to our country, and which gave these figures: higher tables, 6%; liberal professions, 3%; artists and journalists, 2%; tables, 13%; teaching, 14%; officials, 7%; technicians, 14%; employees, 17%; workers, 3%; traders, 4%; artisans, 1%; farmers, 1%; retirees, 2%; students, 4%; without profession, 6%; don't answer, 3%.
The tourist movement increases the number of nudist beaches on our shores. Putting the nudist sign on a beach is a relatively simple bureaucratic process. Someone, generating a club, association or nudist group, asks the civil government of the province to legalize the beach. This is usually done with places where the illegal practice of nudism is common. The Civil Government then requests a report to the municipality in whose term the beach and the Provincial Delegation of Tourism is located, and decides.
One last enemy is left only to the nudists, although they are quite accustomed to it: the lookers. At first they were shy and located at some distance provided with binoculars. Then they came closer and with the apology of the fishing rod some men dedicate theseed to spend saturday afternoons and Sundays studying the bodies of the nudists. "This annoys us," Mr. Bruckner says, "it's annoying to always have someone bent on looking at the crotch, but we feel more sorry for it than anything else."
The case of the hotel La Parra, located next to a road, is a good example of the survival of the lookers. There, on Sunday afternoons they cluster on the road, located on the small beach of the hotel, groups of men who spend indolent hours sunbathing while by far calibrating the body of the bathers.
However, the lookers they consider most dangerous are those who might attempt to become members of the clubs. Therefore, it is a requirement of the International Federation of Naturist Clubs that new members be couples or women. To accept men alone they have to be presented by members of the associations. Discrimination that clubs justify as a protective measure. "You want to avoid this," says Branko Bruckner, "that we are presented with groups of men who could become partners to have a place to go in times of boredom or despair."
In any case, never refuse nudist being because of the shame of not having an exceptionally slender figure. Hardly anyone has it. And the president of the Spanish Federation of Nudist Clubs says so: "It is true that a young body is more beautiful, but it also has a huge charm a body that has faced the passage of time. Naturism is accepting your body as it is."