There is no doubt that attitudes are changing, but many, many people still need educating about the simple truths of a socially naked lifestyle and, therefore, busting myths, putting the record straight and spreading the word is of crucial importance. For all of us. We can do that individually (in fact we should) but the number of ears and eyes receiving the message is increased by a huge number when delivered via print, websites, social media, TV, and radio. Many of you will have heard me say in interviews that if I were handling the marketing and media for a shower fitting company or bicycle tyre manufacturer, I’d be hard pressed to get any attention outside of those sectors. Not so with Naturism - and so we take full advantage.
People from media outlets are subscribed to our weekly ezine (their choice, to do so, of course) and many others keep an eye on our website activity and follow us on social media. As a result, we handle between three and four approaches every week. Sometimes it is important to make a bigger, more direct noise and we issue press releases, emailing a list that has been maintained and added to over many years now. There are in the region of 2,500 contacts on it.
In May this year, we issued press releases for the Great British Skinny Dip and Naked Heart Walks. My inbox pinged and pinged and I was barely off the phone or SMS services for a number of hours with requests for interviews - including many outlets asking why there was nothing happening in their area! (Headline: National Media begs BN to put on more events so they can talk about them!)
One respondent was the BBC’s Central News Service who asked me to mark out an hour in my diary before offering an interview to all local BBC radio stations. Such was the take up that the session was soon extended to an hour and three quarters. I did 13 individual interviews in that time and there were others later in the day who missed out first time round. BN Women’s Officer, Helen Berriman, and GBSD/NHW team leader, Ron O’Hare, took others when more interviews were requested at times when I was already talking! Goodness knows how many millions of people we reached. Our message was certainly out there that day. We don’t need everyone who was listening to ‘become’ a Naturist, or decide to attend one of the events, but we hope people learned something and/or had their perception changed. The requests continued to trickle in over the next few days and I was grateful to members of the BN GBSD/NHW team for taking one or more on when a local voice was preferred.
Next up, TV. Canadian, in fact. Details are embargoed but a small crew spent the afternoon with us at Spielplatz and British Naturism Sunfolk filming for a documentary to be aired in 2025. Mark Bass took pictures and said, ‘Right from the outset, one of our aims for British Naturism Sunfolk was to create a venue that would attract media engagement and allow us to promote the joy, benefits and appeal of Naturism outside our immediate circle. Many thanks to the many members who volunteered to be involved.’
Lucy Holden, a journalist and author who has written about Naturism before (and was our guest on the Forum Live) was asked by The Times to write about a story from Germany that suggested Naturism was on the decline. I gave her some comments from our perspective and later spoke to presenter Jane Mulkerrins (also a journalist who has written about Naturism before and was our guest on the Forum Live - it’s good to network!) on Times Radio about the story. Then the travel section of the MailOnline, the website for the Daily Mail newspaper, got in touch to ask if we would write an article about Naturism, having taken interest in the German story. Write an article! That was something new - usually it’s an interview or a handful of quotes. I said yes (obviously) and it appeared under my name. That might also sound obvious, but usually only staff writers get credit. It went down well with their readers and they asked for a follow up about Nudefest. Together they received over 80,000 page views. Result!
Late-Night Jo is a BBC radio programme recorded in London but broadcast to all local BBC stations. Presented by Jo Good - who once introduced a radio interview with me by saying to the listeners, ‘I love skinny-dipping, don’t you?’ - it was another chance to spread the word, to many people, and a 15 minute session, not the usual three or four.
TV again, but this time closer to home with ITV’s Lorraine show broadcasting live from Nudefest. Producer/Director Samuel came the afternoon before to get some shots of general activity for airing during the morning programme and was amazed at how many people were willing to be on camera - not sure that 30-a-side volleyball matches are usual? Thanks to everyone who joined in, and also lounged artistically in the background the following morning. Presenter Lucie Cave (fully-dressed) spoke to Martha, Helen and Susan who all represented BN and Naturism beautifully, in front of an audience of millions. Unrelated to the TV slot, Susan also gave an interview for a national women’s magazine; we’re yet to see the results. We had interest for Nudefest from other high-profile TV programmes too, but aside from it being quite a lot of work with a crew on site, we are conscious that an event with cameras around all the time isn’t what many people go for. Don’t worry - I’ve saved them up for events in the future!
A big change I have witnessed in the couple of decades that I have been working with the media is the number of journalists who now actually ask to come to an event to try Naturism for themselves and then write about it. I have always suggested it to them, a first-person piece always being better (for us, never mind for the reader) only to be met with excuses, and maybe giggles. Recently, Charlotte Allbutt from the Worcester News came and walked at the Bishampton Naked Heart Walk and another young, female writer will be camping for the weekend at EveryBody.
There’s been plenty more - the MailOnline completed a little trilogy with an article about Broadland Sun Association in Norfolk; Alan Ellison, host of the GBSD beach day at Findhorn, had a great interview in Edinburgh’s Press & Journal; we were invited to write a piece on a Lake District dip in the Keswick Reminder which volunteer Dugie Eyton-Hughes made a great job of and it appeared on the front page - though sadly credited to one of their staff writers. BN’s International Officer, Anne Nisbet, took on a request from The Guardian, which included posing for some hours on a cold day in a wood in Oxfordshire, and ended up being the lead item in the article that followed; and Helen Berriman has also been in demand, talking to Vanessa Feltz on Talk TV and commenting on a news story about a renewed interest in Naturism in France, on BBC Radio 4’s popular PM show.
There’s plenty in the pipeline too. If you’d like to keep up with it - reading the articles, listening to the recordings, watching the programmes (including many mentioned in this article) - and/or put yourself forward when requests are made for happy Naturists to talk about our wonderful world, then keep an eye on two sections of the BN members’ forum: ‘Nudity reported in the media’ and ‘Media requests’. Member log-in is required and if you are not a member you can fix that here!