Chapter 13: Home Front

Back in another part of the galaxy, citizens had found their favourite shows had been interrupted with the remarkable scene of their senior political leaders dressed in their birthday suits. The reaction ... varied.

George McAdams of the Solaris News Channel pulled out all the stops, as did his rivals. He pulled reporters from all other beats, political, social, health, travel, even sports to try to get as thorough a response as possible. After all, it wasn't every day that all of your nation's senior leaders revealed quite so much as this crew had.

On the Earth, a mother with three toddlers in tow was stopped and asked her opinion. She glanced down in despair at her giggling, messy trio, their clothes soiled from playing in the mud. "That would make laundry SO much easier!"

Sports figures were asked if they'd play their game in the nude, and one player of an indoor racquetball game surprised her interviewer. "I do, with my husband, when we're home!" The next few minutes of video had to be edited out, as the sports reporter was so startled by the petite Chinese lady's reply that his mind went temporarily blank — he couldn't think of another question to ask.

There was a huge debate on one channel between two groups of religious leaders: those who thought the practise of naturism was shameful, and those who thought it was in keeping with their religion. On another channel another debate ensued between two groups of medical researchers: those who were more worried about skin cancer and those who were more concerned about Vitamin D deficiency.

An emboldened group of college students demanded that their campus swim facility establish nude sessions, or at least swimsuit-optional ones. To their surprise, they were assured the issue would be placed on the agenda for the next meeting of the Board of Trustees, and could they please have a presentation prepared?

Whig party leader Tom Delancy and the rest of the senior management team were gathered in the large main boardroom of the party's headquarters building, waiting for Cindy Chen, head of polling, to turn up. It was five in the morning, local time, and few had managed much sleep. Many were on their umpteenth cup of coffee. The video screen covering the front of the conference room was tuned to the Solaris News Network, which was showing yet again their fearless leader Lucy Yamashita striding down the ramp of the Lister's shuttle. The wall-sized screen showed her larger than life sized.

A clearly exhausted Cindy showed up, an equally bleary-eyed staffer from her office in tow bearing the rush reports. Cindy would include additional analysis with the more formal reports in the afternoon.

She started to talk before she even took her seat. "Well, it could be worse. We've picked up support from the under-30 crowd. We've also picked up some of the undecided, too."

Cindy zeroed in on the all-important 45 to 60 segment. In the typical election, they voted, more consistently than the younger age groups who would only vote if there was an issue dear to them. The seniors were less fickle: they'd vote as they always had, unless you seriously drove them away from you. The middle-aged were, in her opinion, the "sweet spot". Capture this constituency, you carried the legislature. "The good news/bad news: some support in the middle-aged group have gone to the Opposition, others have swung from the Opposition to ourselves. It's been a draw, almost."

She then pointed to another page. "We polled for their attitude toward social nudity, and toward the current news coverage, and whether the coverage had caused their attitude to change. It turns out that we have a larger societal acceptance toward social nudity than we thought we did." The questions had included whether the news coverage had caused their attitude toward social nudity to change, either positively or negatively, and had included the options of "No, still accepting" and "No, still against".

Tom turned to Erika Mossman, the Press Coordinator. "What bright ideas have we come up with?"

Erika nodded to the only known nudist in the room, Julie Chambers. Tom found himself a little disappointed that Julie was dressed similarly to everyone else in the room; he realized that to be a silly reaction.

"We've provided the Interplanetary Association of Naturists with production assistance in creating a video presentation for public consumption. We'd like to show it to you now for Cabinet approval. We've already forwarded a copy to the President; she's seen it and signed off on it. If Cabinet has no objection, we'll forward the video to all government staff." The young woman, although clearly nervous, was holding her own amidst so many of her seniors.

Tom was impressed with what she said. "That was fast work. Is it queued up?" Erika indicated it was. "Can we see it now? Any objections?"

The Minister of Education, Beatrice Snidermann, suggested, "Anyone who objects can leave the room while we watch it."

Nobody moved. The video replaced the talking heads, and the audio was brought up.

The video was a high-quality piece. There were scenes from Solarian naturist resorts, nude beaches and swimming facilities, showing men, women and children — lots of children — all in the nude, with a voice-over explaining the attractions of the life-style. There were interviews with naturist individuals and families, and some statistical charts. There were scenes from naturist families' homes.