Boys and Their Balls - Part 12

Volleyball

Volleyball isn't a "major league" sport.  It's usually played by friends, just for fun.

I previously posted the photo above of the members of Taylor Camp in Hawaii – hippies and other counter-culture types – playing volleyball.  Clothing was optional in Taylor Camp.

Here's a picture of a volleyball game on Baker Beach, San Francisco's nude beach.

And here's another beach volleyball game.  I don't know the location.  These games were all just for fun.

I have to comment on beach volleyball becoming an Olympic sport, which I think was the most ill-advised Olympic development since the introduction of synchronized swimming.  I don't mean to denigrate the Olympic volleyball players – I'm sure they're all superb athletes and extremely dedicated – but it's obvious that beach volleyball was added to the Olympics for one reason: to draw male viewers who want to see females jumping around in bikinis.  Normally, women's sports account for less than 4% of all media coverage, with one glaring exception: beach volleyball, where the women's games are infinitely more popular than the men's games.  The women wear bikinis.  The men don't even play shirtless; they wear tank tops.  Clearly, hetero males are making up the rules here.

Now, if the Olympic players all played naked, like the ancient Greek Olympians and the guys above, I'd be all for it as an Olympic sport.

Outside of nude beaches, we mainly find naked volleyball games at nudist resorts.

Another nudist volleyball photo, from a Danish nudist magazine.

Looking for a video of naked volleyball, I found a 20-minute unidentified video, from which I've extracted a minute and a half clip (above).  Was it taken at a nudist resort?  The fact that the camera zooms in on butts and dicks suggested that it's from a gay porn film, and the last 10 seconds of this clip made that pretty clear.  It turns out to be from a much longer William Higgins film Wank in the Woods - Naked Volleyball, shot in Czechoslovakia.  They may not be Olympic-class volleyball players, but who cares?  Just like Olympic women's beach volleyball, we're not really watching to see their athletic skills.