Naturism Isn’t About Perfect Bodies — It’s About Freedom - Kamil

In this episode of SlavicUncovered, I sit down with Kamil — a passionate and highly knowledgeable naturist originally from Poland and now living in Vienna — for a fascinating conversation about body freedom, shame, social conditioning and the changing culture of naturism across Europe.

We talk about growing up in Poland during the 1980s and 90s, how attitudes towards nudity have changed, why countries like Austria and Germany often feel far more relaxed about the human body, and how modern social media has damaged many people’s body image and confidence.

Kamil shares personal stories about discovering naturism, visiting clothing-optional beaches, sauna culture, and why naturism has nothing to do with having a “perfect” body. We also discuss the difference between nudity and sexuality, family naturism, the pressure people feel to hide their bodies, and why naturism can actually help people develop a healthier relationship with themselves.

A thoughtful and surprisingly deep conversation about freedom, self-acceptance and what society loses when the human body becomes something to fear.

If you enjoy these conversations, you can also find more personal and extended content from me, Asha, on other platforms.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Welcome to Slavic Uncovered podcast. Hello, today I'm Asha from Slavic Uncovered, and I have the pleasure to have with me a very interesting person.

SPEAKER_02 0:22

My name is Camille. I'm originally from Poland, but I live now in Austria and Vienna.

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Yes, and you're such an active naturist, long-term, long-established naturist, we can say, with amazing knowledge on naturism, so inspiring. So tell me Camil, how um how did you become a naturist? Um how your adventure you know uh has started with naturism.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

So uh I was not raised in a naturist family. Um I'm my parents were pretty much open with uh nakedness uh around the household, but not uh outside, not socializing with naked people and in the beaches. Uh it's a small child as it used to be in Poland in uh 1980s. Uh I was walking around naked in the beach, but at some age uh you reached the limit at uh which you were told that you should not go naked anymore uh on the public beach. And then I remember one of the first memories uh when my father uh work at work was at the time that he's from Germany, and uh I was staying with him uh for the whole holidays, and I discovered that everything was mixed at the time. It was a clothing optional environment, well how uh we would call it uh today. Um and uh I could see a lot of adults and almost all kids at my age, I was around 10 at the time, uh, were practically naked all the time. Um and I liked it, uh but it didn't continue when I came back to Poland. Uh so then in my adult life uh I had a very nice environment of uh colleagues and friends uh um when I was studying. Um I was also active in the in the Wii U community, and uh some of us had an idea to visit some uh naturism beaches uh in the Baltic Sea coast. And actually we we went there, we enjoyed it. Um there was a lot of liberty, uh although at the time and uh it was um let's say early 2000s, uh the nature was not uh so popular in Poland as it used to be in the golden age of the 1980s.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Uh yeah, so the 1990s were the golden age. 1980s, I would say.

SPEAKER_02 3:20

I would say so. I remember so I was born in the end of the 1970s, and I remember uh of course the song Help You Welcome Too. Uh the famous one, which is now uh considered an anthem of the Polish, an official anthem of Polish naturalists. But uh it's uh at the time that uh the movement was very visible. There is uh even a good book about it, Middle Hope, not only Hope, uh by Anna Golska that was uh printed uh quite recently in Poland. Very interesting about the history. And uh at that time uh people were pretty much liberated. I I could see that there were some um advertisements about uh naturism in popular magazines, not only the magazines that were only devoted to the really and it was still communism time in Poland, wasn't it? I would say so that it's it was a communist time, it was the end of the coming time, but uh I think that the coming's time was was in that matter uh much more relaxed than uh the 1990s because uh with the time of the transformation there was uh uh backlash uh to um the right wing uh mindsets and uh role of the Catholic Church in in Poland dramatically increased after that time. And uh we uh we lost something. We gained a lot, we united with Europe, the uh Iris Iron Carton was down, uh but we lost something in the sense of uh our liberty, identity, and mentality, right? So so the uh the way of expressing yourself. I I remember that was this um um competitions, uh famous or infamous competitions of Miss Natura at that time. Uh of course, uh from uh today's point of view, like we criticized the beauty competitions, the pageant's competitions, but uh at that time uh I remember uh people who uh under the names and there were the students, there were even the uh students of the last year of the secondary school. Um it was nothing shameful to be a naturalist and and to publish it under your name, even to publish uh a picture in uh in the magazine.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

Wow, that's unbelievable. What are you saying?

SPEAKER_02 6:08

From today's point of view, it's unbelievable, but at that point uh I remember that it was what uh always uh like secretly interested in the topic, but of course um at the time I was a child. And then um with uh my friends uh from my student group who we visited the beaches in the coast. Um and when I was a student I also had a three-month internship in in Hamburg. Um and I noted uh many uh people from there uh they were active activists. So I was in a household, uh I rented in a room in a household uh when uh it was a naturalist household, I would say. So the parents were maybe not going around uh naked around the house, but there was there was a daughter, um let's say an a late teenager uh living with her boyfriend at the time, and they were practically using the uh swimming pool uh naked only. So it was a kind of uh a shock, a kind of uh um completely different words to me. Uh but I also also I discovered it. So uh then uh when I continue uh my way I decided to to enjoy it myself. So I was always when I was traveling around the world trying to find uh naturist places. I wouldn't consult myself a naturalist activist though. I'm not a member of any organization, I'm not uh too much into the naturist clubs. Uh because it is it is just kind of the idea, you uh it's a nice idea in in in your life. You can just enjoy it without the names. You can just enjoy it uh every day in your everyday life. Uh and I like the attitude also of the clothing optional uh places. Uh you can do whatever you want actually. And you don't need to be pushed into that, uh but you should be uh safe and you should be you should know your rights that uh you can um you can actually enjoy your body uh in the places that are um in in which the uh clothing is unnecessary. Because I don't think that's uh when obviously when you're in sauna the rules of uh of sauna they exclude the bathing suit. Uh still many people uh don't know about it and still many people um wear wear their their bathing suits in sauna.

SPEAKER_01 9:15

Or they even know about it, but against I don't know, maybe they don't realize how uh unhygienic it is for their bodies and they choose to sit in those textiles uh in high temperatures.

SPEAKER_02 9:29

Yes, I guess it it's mostly because they are uh afraid of uh being judged and they are afraid of um being uh uh somehow indecent or excluded or or or mocked by by their peers. So it's a very strong peer pressure uh and uh shaming people it's it's uh uh very strong and and worried by the most. So you can shame people and it's especially unshaming women uh by their bodies. Uh there are very high body standards. Um many people say uh I would be happy to be a naturist, but I don't have a perfect body. Uh so they start from judging themselves and uh they don't care about themselves, they don't care about themselves, uh not only about the attitude toward natural about the body image, and uh it's only connected somehow to uh that many people uh have many problems in their daily life and they do nothing about it. There's still a lot of shame about uh psychotherapy. Many people need it, um and some of are even ashamed to uh look for the help, although they need a little bit of help. And that's the same is is is with uh body attitude. Uh they are so much afraid of uh being judged that they might are so much afraid of being uh exposed that uh they uh give up and even secretly they may uh envy naturists uh the freedom, but they will never do it uh themselves and they criticize uh naturists uh with all the names, of course, uh somehow uh connecting naturism to the um sexual promiscuity for them.

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Yeah, so to summarize, you don't need to have a perfect body to be a naturist. Uh and your body is like a temple, that's why you should really look after yourself no matter what size you are and uh what age you are, yes. Uh this relation to our own bodies is crucial to our happiness and health.

SPEAKER_02 12:10

It's very true. So you uh you can enjoy it anytime and you can enjoy it between the generations. Um I witnessed a uh birthday party of a lady who was in her 90s with the four generations of naturists.

SPEAKER_01 12:31

Oh, that sounds beautiful. Where was it?

SPEAKER_02 12:34

Uh it was in Vienna, and there is a place uh actually very close to the city center, so you can go there uh even visiting the city if the weather is hot, and just don't hesitate. Uh there is a uh small island called uh Gesap and uh you can just go there and and to relax. And uh it's also about something uh that you notice in many European cities, um in Czech Republic, Germany, and Austria, in places that you really don't need to uh dress up. Um so for example, in the um in the waterfront, everywhere in the waterfront, why do you need the basic food? The basic suit you don't need it for yourself, you need to protect uh the look of yourself from the others, and it's just uh protecting the others for looking at your body, but the body should not be ashamed for anyone, right? So I can uh imagine that we should protect uh uh minors from the open views of sexuality, but we don't protect anyone from the naked body because we are all born naked.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

Yes, exactly. We are all the same, we are all equal, aren't we?

SPEAKER_02 14:00

Yes, it's uh it's it's like uh it should be it should be normalized. In my view, natural should be uh should be normalized in that way that you can enjoy it, uh you can enjoy it with your friends, you can enjoy it with your uh colleagues from your work, you can enjoy it from your neighborhood with your neighbors, you can enjoy it with your family, but uh it's not something to be hidden or ashamed, it's not uh anything illegal, um so it's just a matter of changing the mindset.

SPEAKER_01 14:37

Yes, it starts with a mindset. So um wow, what an amazing conversation we are having. And uh it's um yeah, when you look at our neighbors, yeah, Poland, Czech Republic, so nearby we are Slavic countries and completely different minds in Italian.

SPEAKER_02 14:58

That's true. This is uh also uh quite uh astonishing considering that we uh have so many beautiful uh beaches uh the Baltic Sea, uh Czech Republic uh doesn't have an access to the sea. And still uh there are so little uh nature beaches. There are some of them, of course, I don't deny, but it's not like the situation in in Germany when you just go around the uh along the coast and you can see that uh in some places uh there are more textile uh environment, in uh other places they're um designed official uh nude beaches and in many, many places you do whatever you want and it's just a matter of choice. Uh you should not criticize people and you should not be uh ashamed of it, right? It's uh also uh a kind of uh of a way that we should uh um a kind of of of uh evolution that uh uh we should look forward. Um of course Poland and and uh Czech Republic uh we are both Slavic countries but we have completely different history, completely different mindset and uh different attitude to life. So uh I guess uh it's just a consequence of that. Uh but uh you don't you don't need to look to anyone else, you need to buy Czechs and Germans, just be yourself and uh try to enjoy and try not to judge other people uh if they're not happening.

SPEAKER_01 16:52

Yes, exactly. And to finish it with some positive, you know, uh message um I've heard that in Poland um it's really the naturism is growing. Apparently every city which has access to any water, natural lake, river uh starts having also naturist places where people have to work, go to relax and uh you know feel freedom from clothes. So that sounds really positive and uh uh we I'm very happy to hear it. So times are changing, hopefully also in Poland.

SPEAKER_02 17:30

I I would be happy if these places in Poland uh would look like places in um in Austria or in Germany that you have uh that you have a safe environment, so if there are any uh creepy people uh there is uh always security that uh can act in that cases, uh also because people can uh go to Nigeria's by playing food for children, and also that there is uh some kind of uh you know it's not it's not it's not uh the the wild uh place. So uh you have uh some place for dining, you have uh playground, um it's it's not completely wild. I mean wild nature in the wild is beautiful, uh but people also expect to um you know to have some basic infrastructure at least.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Yeah, that's right. It's a fascinating topic, and I'd love to talk to you, Camille, a bit longer, but unfortunately we have to wrap up this meeting for today. Thank you so much for accepting my invitation to be interviewed and also sharing your life story.

SPEAKER_02 18:49

Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 18:51

Thank you. I hope this episode gave you something to think about. If you'd like to go deeper for more personal and adult conversations, videos and photos, find me on Patreon, Vimeo, and other well known places. Take care and stay connected to your natural self.