I understand we're in the locker room, but seriously...put some damn clothes on.

So, I go to the gym. I will mostly not be going to the gym for awhile, because it is finally nice enough weather that I can do things outside in a real place instead of being a person-shaped hamster on a treadmill.

Because I go to the gym in the morning, I shower there, so I can go to class and not smell like a thing that has been sweating. Most of the people in the women's locker room are nice and physically conservative. I have developed a system whereby I take off my gym clothes in the shower stall, wrap a towel around myself, come out of the stall, put my gym clothes away while the shower water warms up, and deftly enter the shower while simultaneously hanging up my towel so it doesn't get wet and closing the shower curtain in front of me so no one sees my naked parts. Then after I shower I put underwear on while wearing the towel so no one sees my naughty bits. The only time I'm naked in any way is during the 10 seconds it takes me to get on a bra, because it's hard to do that while covering yourself with a towel (it always falls off) and I always face the wall so people can't see anything really anyway.

There are some people, however, who were raised in the world where you had to take showers after gym class in school and everyone had to be naked all together. They come from the school of "this is the locker room, I can be naked and that's fine." There is one old old Asian woman in particular who always showers when I'm there, and just rips off all her clothes always.

Let me explain to you all of the things that are totally wrong with that. First and foremost, gyms are a genderizing place. What I mean by that is that people with alternate sexualities are forced to share changing spaces with people who share their physical genitalia, and not with people who share their sexual identity. So, for instance, lesbians and bisexual women are forced to share changing spaces with women who are straight, and this is tantamount to making someone straight share a changing room with the opposite sex. It's not about attraction, it's about emotional comfort, and you parading your naked ass all over the locker room and shower is not making anyone more comfortable.

Second, you're at the gym because nobody wants to look at your fat ass. This isn't the "love the naked fat people" meeting, because that doesn't exist (except perhaps on very, very disturbing pornography sites online). You're here to get more healthy and to look and feel better, but you're not there yet. And even when you get there, wear a one-piece bathing suit, you know what I'm saying? Are you picking up what I'm putting down?

Sometimes, people who are very skinny and obviously get full body waxes take all their clothes off, and that's like bragging. It's still uncomfortable, and they always end up not being that pretty so you feel, like you're watching the 4 hours for $10 porn from Adult World where everyone has pimples on their asses.

There is also a woman who comes to the gym with another person who I think is her daughter. The mother is very very skinny and dresses like an emo kid. She always wears all black under her camo-patterned trench coat with her out-of-a-box black hair, large earrings that stretch your earlobes and lots of eyeliner (which by the way, wearing to the gym at 7:30 in the morning? NOT OKAY). Her daughter is very overweight, and the mother has clearly brought the daughter to the gym to make her be skinnier. Neither of them has an attractive face, but the mother thinks she's all that and works out in tiny sportsbras and tight pants. She also makes her daughter do exercises that are too difficult, so her daughter always looks embarrassed around her. Let me just clue you in, way-too-skinny tiny emo mom: YOUR DAUGHTER FEELS BAD ABOUT HERSELF BECAUSE SHE EATS AND YOU DON'T. SHE CONTINUES EATING BECAUSE SHE'S TRYING TO FILL HERSELF UP WITH THE LOVE YOU DON'T GIVE HER BECAUSE YOU'RE TOO INTO YOUR DAMN SELF.

The moral of the story is: the general public does NOT want to see you with no clothes on, no matter who you are. Do us all a favor, and wear some damn clothes in the locker room.

Respectfully submitted,
HMons