Nudist drama bares skin at court

Spain ruling decrees complex breached rights to be clothed

A vacation apartment complex in Spain had strict rules about nudity in communal areas — it was mandatory, and there were even security guards in place to ensure that no one wearing clothes would be allowed into the swimming pool and the gardens.

But not everyone was happy — and a row over the regulations has led to drama at the homeowners’ association, and lawsuits that have gone all the way up to Spain’s Supreme Court.

The rules were passed by the homeowners’ association of the complex, widely named in local media as the Natura World apartments in Vera, Almeria. According to the regional tourism website, the private complex is “on the beachfront in the most visited naturist/nudist area in Spain,” with direct access to the nudist beach.

Eighty percent of the Natura World households are nudist, Spain’s ABC outlet reports.

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday, noting that enforcing nudity in the complex’s communal areas breached residents’ fundamental rights.

The court said two lower courts had been wrong when they found that the homeowners’ association’s bylaws on nudity in public areas of the holiday complex had been passed unanimously.

“A simple reading of the minutes of the community meeting clearly demonstrates that the said statutes were not approved, and that the judgment delivered in previous proceedings did not address this issue,” the Supreme Court decision said.

In light of this, the Supreme Court found that the requirement of nudity discriminated against residents who wanted to remain clothed, and also infringed upon their freedom of movement and right to privacy in the public areas which they also co-owned.

Nudity is “a perfectly respectable and legitimate personal choice,” the ruling said, “but its practice cannot be demanded without a basis.”

In particular, the court said the plaintiffs could not be prevented “arbitrarily, by acts of force, through the hiring of private security services” from using the shared facilities.

“Since the first day, they told us that everyone could go as they pleased and there was never any talk of it being an obligation to bathe naked,” Mari Carmen Jimenez, one of the plaintiffs, told Spanish newspaper El Pais. “It’s horrible what we’ve been suffering; it’s very hard to be prevented from accessing the pool you own.”

The court awarded around $1,070 to each of the plaintiffs for “moral damages.”

Keon West, a professor of social psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London, who has conducted studies into nakedness and body image, says he has encountered a wide variation in attitudes toward nudity in different countries.

“You have Germans who are generally quite relaxed about it,” he said in an interview, compared with Americans who tend to have a more sexualized view of nudity.

Attitudes in Spain toward nudity also tend to be fairly relaxed, he added.

The nude “Spanish beach is right next to the clothed one and you share the same showers. It’s clearly just treated as a different way of living, not something that must be fundamentally hidden or that you should be ashamed of, or that is dangerous to society,” he said.

According to Reuters news agency, public nudity has been legal in Spain since 1988, although some regions have their own rules. Earlier this month, a court overturned a fine issued to a man who walked naked down the streets in Aldaia, Valencia — but noted the “legal vacuum” surrounding naturism in the country.