Chapter 6: Will the Anti-Nudites succeed in dismantling Stripped for Florida?

Trouble in Paradise - Will the Anti-nudites spell the end of the Stripped for Florida program?

“Is Florida leaving its unclad youth in the cold?” read the headline of the local paper sitting on the kitchen table at Jayden’s house.

“Did you see the paper?” said Jayden’s dad.

“Yes, I can’t believe they showed a tinge of nudity,” said his mom.

A Florida court had ruled that publications could publish nude pictures, so long as the subjects had been legally stripped. The court was adamant that stripped kids should not be discriminated against in any way. But most small town newspapers still would not publish nude photos (despite the fact that, everywhere you went in today’s Florida, you were likely to see nudity in the flesh). But this issue, surprisingly, showed an entire bare fanny. On the front page.

“I know, it surprised me too. Did you read the article?”

“I did,” said his mom, “And I can’t say I disagree.”

This was two days after the cold snap came through.

“Yeah, they really should have come up with provisions for cold weather when they drafted the program,” said his dad. “I guess those Stripped for Florida people live in the Florida of sunshine and fun. They forget about our Florida.”

“We already spent a bundle to get Jayden stripped, and we’re about to spend more on Amee, it looks like they’d think of these things.”

“You’re getting Amee stripped?” said Jayden, walking into the kitchen.

“Oh, hey, Jayden,” said his mom. “Ummm ... yeah, we’re planning on it.”

“Cool!”

“But please don’t mention anything to her, OK?”

“I won’t. So when are y’all gonna do it?”

“We were thinking at a birthday party maybe.”

“We want it to be a surprise,” added his dad.

“So she’ll have to take off all her clothes, right then and there?” said Jayden. “In front of all her friends?”

“That’s how Quick Strip works, you know,” said his mom.

“Once that chip is embedded,” said his dad, “you have only a few minutes to get naked.”

“Yeah,” said Jayden, “or you’re breaking the law.”

“Yep.”

“And so are your parents,” added his mom, thinking of their friends the Stephensons, who had had to pay a stiff fine when their son was caught in town last summer wearing a pair of shorts.

“I wonder how she’s gonna react?” said Jayden.

“Well, Anna will be there, so it’s not like Amee be the only one.”

“Yeah ... well I was,” mumbled Jayden, under his breath, recalling the first day he had to go to school naked.

“IF we strip her at all,” said his dad, picking up the paper. “They really do need to get their act together.”

Conversations like these had been going on throughout northern Florida in the past couple of days, since parents had been faced with sending their kids to school in cold weather stark naked, or breaking the law. And this disgruntlement among the populace was picking up steam. The Times- Union out of Jacksonville ran a piece about Stripped for Florida’s omission of cold weather contingencies. But it was not as slanted and sensationalistic as the articles that were appearing in local papers. Those stories had been planted. Southern and middle Florida may have become a carefree wonderland of nakedness, but north Florida was a galaxy far far away. The riff between the “lower two thirds” and the much more conservative rural north had threatened to defeat the entire program before it ever got off the ground.

The first kids to be stripped by their parents in these rural communities, like Jayden, had a tougher time than kids in the south. They were ostracized by some of their peers (at least initially) and discriminated against by conservative school officials. There was even an incident in Suwannee County of a George-Wallace-esque principal literally barring front doors of schools, refusing to let the first stripped kids enter until they dressed, or at least covered themselves with a blanket or towel provided by the school. This despite the fact that these students were prohibited by law from wearing clothes, or concealing their bodies with textile in any way. (This stunt was about as successful as the original George Wallace’s, by the way, after state officials intervened.)