[FOUNTAIN]Perverting nudity can be criminal

The Western art world often distinguishes naked from nude: A naked body refers to an unclothed body in its natural state. A nude body is the idealized form of a body without clothes as perceived by an artist.
British art historian Kenneth Clark made the distinction between two concepts, with nakedness having a timid, passive connotation, and nudity implying balance, confidence.
People often associate nudes with a female figure, but they actually originated with men. In Greece, nude referred to the unclothed body of a man.
The gymnasium’s Greek root is “gymnos,” meaning nude. The gym was a place where young men trained while naked. Most of the ancient Greek sculptures displayed in major European museums feature these naked men. Nudes have been a favorite material for many modern artists, inspiring masterpieces such as Auguste Rodin’s “The Thinker” and Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s “After the Bath.”
Whether it is a painting, a sculpture, or a photograph, and whether the figure is perfect or not, it is a sign of healthiness that we do not gasp when we see a nude. We experience complex emotions and delicate beauty, feeling the vitality that only a human body can show.
However, when it crosses over the boundary of art, a naked body becomes an object of salaciousness. Indecency is the act of stimulating vulgar sexual desire and provoking sexual humiliation or disgust.
The naked promotion ceremony of officers and other stunts like these are beyond the practical jokes that are mementos of barrack life. These recent incidents were acts of lewdness intended to humiliate.
Forcing soldiers to become naked and show the most private state of the body is sexual harassment. An act of harassing a person with a physical assault or a threat is a crime under Article 298 of the criminal statutes.
A few days ago, the government and the ruling party decided to revise the military criminal law so that sexual offenders will be punished with an imprisonment of up to 10 years. The time has come that we have to worry about the sexual abuse of men by men.

by Ko Dae-hoon

The writer is a deputy city news editor for the JoongAng Ilbo.