History Main / OurNudityIsDifferent

* An episode of ''Series/NightCourt'' featured delegates from a vaguely South-Asian nation who had no nudity taboo. To them, a woman becomes more sexually attractive when she is wearing more clothes. This trope comes into play when the ambassador gets the hots for Christine, and tells her he's been "dressing you with my eyes." At the end of the episode, she throws on her very cumbersome coat and scarf and says "have a ball," and he reacts with intense glee.

* In Literature/VanasHeritage Inari usually don't wear clothes and Nirvys sense of nudity differs greatly to the standards of her fellow students. In addition, the nudity standards of all northerners differ greatly to the Eldamirians, who perceive Nirvy as being as good as naked, while the northerners see her outfit as an acceptable summer dress.

* In ''Webcomic/KazasMateGwenna'' the naked jungle heroes were called by ''DimensionalTraveler'' Jenny Anywhere (A literal ''WebOriginal/JennyEverywhere'' clone) to go to the ''AlternateUniverse'' of Earth-N. A world where almost everyone is naked, including the super heroes who fly around with ''nothing'' but masks on.

* ''Art/CupidAndPsycheBouguereau'': "Cupid and Psyche as Children" has imagery indicative of {{putt|o}}i art (and artistic depictions of Myth/ClassicalMythology in general) as all characters involved are completely naked.

* In Creator/RobertAHeinlein juvenile ''Literature/TimeForTheStars'' written in 1956, the hero leaves for a decades-long relativity trip and when he returns is shocked to find that standards have changed: his father, late in the 20th Century, would never have allowed his sisters to appear, even at the breakfast table, without hats.

* In ''Art/TheFallenAngel'', nudity is not about sex appeal but about idealizing the painting's subject. Artistic idealism (one of the paradigms of the artistic movement Creator/AlexandreCabanel belonged to) is the abstraction of reality through two filters: the artist's perception and a standard of perfection. Nakedness exalts the human's body natural beauty while, at the same time, conferring a supernatural aura to the subject. In Christian art, nudity is a symbol of shame. Overall, it makes Lucifer's simmering feelings appear rawer and helps distinguish the fallen Lucifer from the still divine angels in the background.

* In Creator/RobertJSawyer's novel, ''Illegal Alien'', the aliens are given a different view on the taboo than humans as to emphasize their otherness. One of the two groups of aliens which make first contact in the novel posses a taboo against internal anatomy, believing that the guts are not to be shown to the world because they are held within. By contrast, they hold no qualms about nudity or sexuality in any manner. This is emphasized greatly in a trial scene in which an alien is asked to explain their anatomy to the court, and they proceed to have great troubles bringing himself to do so, while he has no trouble explaining or demonstrating the nature of their sexuality and, in fact, expresses confusion over the human tendency to hide it. The latter stems from the fact that their females [[BizarreAlienReproduction have four uteruses, and thus usually mate with four males in succession]].

* In Robertson Davies' ''The Rebel Angels'', Maria and her mother host a dinner party for purposes of ensnaring Clement Hollis, whom Maria is in love with. Mamusia instructs her daughter to wear a low-cut top -- they're Romani, so while their legs must be covered, cleavage is just fine.

* In Kilgore Trout's ''Venus on the Half-Shell''[[note]]"Kilgore Trout" was a fictional sci-fi writer invented by Kurt Vonnegut. However, ''Venus on the Half-Shell'' was actually ghostwritten by {{Creator/Philip Jose Farmer}}.[[/note]], an alien race known as the Shonks regard their faces as their private parts. Thus, they always wear masks in public, and arrest the space-travelling protagonist for indecent exposure.
* The classic SF story ''The Wheels of If'' by Creator/LSpragueDeCamp has a scene on an alternate Earth where belly buttons are considered obscene... but nothing else is, resulting in BarelyThereSwimwear of an unusual sort. The protagonist (who is from our Earth) doesn't realize this at first, he just notices that everyone seems to be walking around what he considers to be nude, so he takes his clothes off to fit in... and is promptly arrested for "Shameful Outputting" of his navel (the person explaining exactly what he's being charged with can barely bring himself to say it).

** An apocryphal story has a 17th-century Spanish queen[[note]]Said to be [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariana_of_Austria Mariana of Austria]], second wife of Philip IV[[/note]] passing through a town renowned for its silk production, where the merchants presented her with a gift of stockings. Since they were effectively lingerie in the time period, her scandalized attendant threw them aside, declaiming, "Know that a Queen of Spain ''has no legs''.". The story ends with Mariana, who was around fourteen years old by then, crying as she feared her legs would be cut off once in Spain.

* A common myth about the Victorian Era is that the sight of a woman's ankle was considered outright scandalous. This is largely exaggerated; while heavy layers of clothing was the fashion and bare legs were discouraged, [[https://youtu.be/kkDo9yRab-I ankles were nothing special to the Victorians.]] Some contemporary sources would make jokes in this manner, though. According to ''The Victorian City: Everyday Life in [[Creator/CharlesDickens Dickens]]' London'', "naked" could be used by the Victorians to mean anything from "clad only in underclothes" to "not wearing an overcoat".

* Throughout the Victorian Era, the sight of a woman's ankle was considered outright scandalous. The same was true of men without jackets - in modern-day Britain, it is perfectly respectable to go outside in just a shirt without a waistcoat and suit jacket, but in the 1800s a shirt was underwear and being 'stripped to your shirtsleeves' was nudity. According to ''The Victorian City: Everyday Life in [[Creator/CharlesDickens Dickens]]' London'', "naked" could be used by the Victorians to mean anything from "clad only in underclothes" to "not wearing an overcoat".

[[caption-width-right:350:"Dude! Can you cover yourself up first?"]]

* Some regions of the precolonial Philippines had a much different view on toplessness than Europeans did--wearing a shirt seemed to be more ''class-based'' than gender-based; as with many tropical climates, [[NationalGeographicNudity not wearing too many clothes is practical instead of titillating.]] Spanish accounts frequently complain that working-class men and women alike walked around shirtless, and the shirts they saw [[VaporWear were often far too thin for Western-style modesty.]]

* ''Webcomic/TheLeagueOfSuperRedundantHeroes'': Buckaress has such a {{Stripperiffic}} costume that she "feels naked" wearing [[http://superredundant.com/?comic=119-normal an ordinary sweater and jeans.]]

* In ''LightNovel/BladedanceOfElementalers'', the hero's contracted spirit, Est, considers her legs to be the only private regions of her body. She'll remove all her clothing without a second thought, but suggestions that she remove her knee-high stockings will bring immediate reprisal for perversion, and in some cases death threats.

** When Betty and Veronica, in a story, meet their old version of the '50s (through the [[PortalToThePast Memory Lane]]), Veronica is called out by the two girls for her "skimpy" outfit that [[BareYourMidriff bares her midriff]].

* ''Art/AllegoryOfTheSeasonsManfredi'': As it was the standard in UsefulNotes/TheRenaissance art, nudity holds no sexual appeal unless the artwork depicts the Grecorroman Goddess of love. It's instead, a way to distinguish preternatural beings from the common folk. The four seasons are partially nude because they are neither saints nor divine in nature (from the point of view of that era's canon), but still above normal humans.

* In ''Art/TheFallenAngel'', nudity is not about sex appeal but about idealizing the painting's subject. Artistic idealism (one of the paradigms of the artistic movement Cabanel belonged to) is the abstraction of reality through two filters: the artist's perception and a standard of perfection. Nakedness exalts the human's body natural beauty while, at the same time, conferring a supernatural aura to the subject. In Christian art, nudity is a symbol of shame. Overall, it makes Lucifer's simmering feelings appear rawer and helps distinguish the fallen Lucifer from the still divine angels in the background.