The case for natural parks

Between One Mile Beach and Big Rocky Island, just south of Nelson Bay, lies the stunning Samurai Beach, a part of the Tomaree National Park. 

Nestled behind the dunes is the four-wheel-drive-only authorised campground, where you can pitch a tent, or fancier if you can make it through the soft sand at low tide. 

We have often camped there, lulled to sleep by the surf and the gulls. 

However, there is one aspect of this beach and campground that may strike visitors as strange. 

Stark naked people. Unclothed men, women and children basking in their birthday suits, all nice and legal and friendly. It is a family tradition for many, and last time we were there, we met a group with four generations, all just perfecting the art of skinny dipping and hanging out and about. 

But here in Byron Bay, National Parks says they want to shut down the only clothes-optional beach between Nelson Bay and Papua New Guinea because it is ‘not consistent with their values’. 

Hypocritical bullshit 

So, let’s get this clear. It is consistent with their values in Port Stephens, because it is obviously so much more free, and hippy, and renowned as a centre of counter culture. 

I’ve been to Nelson Bay many times, and I have never seen a single dreadlock. 

Or a person under 65. So, National Parks, stop with the hypocritical bullshit about ‘values’. 

If you really cared about your core values, like protecting wildlife, you might actually put some resources into dog patrols. 

And nakedness is, actually, natural. Humans are the only animals to wear clothes in case you haven’t noticed, and if the environment is what national parks are all about then not wearing any coverings seems extraordinarily apt to me. Grrr. 

There is a protest history here – Mandy was MC and I was legal observer. 

People fought long and hard for the right to swim naked in our Shire, including arrests, fines and ongoing cat-and-mouse with boys/girls in blue. 

I’d be the first to say that Tyagarah Beach is not the ideal location. Isolation is a double-edged sword. 

This was all canvassed when it was created, and it was meant to be a lot closer to Belongil. It was placed further north than planned, to account for children playing at the creek mouth. But it is there, and when you clamber down the sand you can either go right for rude, or left for coy, and there is CCTV, onanists are reported by the regulars, the local police are not aware of any issues in recent times and there is usually plenty of paid parking. 

So, unless Council or National Parks can come up with a better site, like Wategos, or Main Beach, then just leave it be. Of course, some local residents don’t like it – but anyone who purchased in the last 25 years knew it was there so they cannot claim to be ambuscaded. 

But if National Parks remain stuck in the 1950s, then Council can and should act. There are two ways a beach can become clothing-optional. The first is via statutory determination by the state government – like Lady Jane beach in Sydney, and the second is where a local council determines to create one. Like Tyagarah Beach was. So Byron Council are seemingly washing their hands with ink. They may not have power over that site, but they can still make any Council beach clothing-optional just by a vote to erect (sic) signs. And at the very least they could ask the state government to save Tyagarah by designation. 

There are other solutions we could mull over. Perhaps the simplest would be to make all beaches in the Shire clothes-optional, except in designated areas, say close to houses or within 200 metres of the flags. 

Because it is worth remembering the consequences of blanket prohibition are enforcement and criminalisation. 

I acted for people charged with ‘wilfully exposing their person’ before a very old-school magistrate in Byron Bay. They took delight in handing out prison terms, massive fines and criminal records. 

If we are left with no free bathing areas, then it is inevitable that there will be policing and arrests and penalties with all the angst that goes with this. 

And after all, what we are really talking about here is mostly penises. Breasts have long ago lost their offensive taint, and many women these days wear swimwear that, from behind at least, is invisibly hidden in the nether regions. 

A Qld researcher could not find a single example of a woman being arrested for this crime in that state (although there have been here). 

I am hopeful that we have matured to the point that just one strip (sic) of sand could bare (sic) the horrors of exposed ‘persons’. Really, half the population has one, even John Howard. 

In 1883, the Sydney Police Act prohibited any swimming in the sea in daylight hours at all. There were bathing machines like huge wagons on rails so that women could swim in utter privacy. Topless women were being prosecuted in the 1970s. My fellow columnist, Richard Jones, was arrested (but acquitted) in Sydney. Let’s not be the first place in Australia to turn back the times by some sort of prudish game of pass-the-parcel between Council and National Parks. 

We already have nude surfing competitions, nude bike rides, V days on main beach and beautiful drone overhead shots of protesting naked people. Much more is available on every mobile phone with just a touch. 

Surely, we can have one beach patch somewhere in Byron where it is legal for people to swim au naturale. 

♦ David Helipern is a former magistrate and is now Dean of Law at SCU.