Top police officer: public sex 'sometimes OK'

Judith Hödl, spokeswoman for the Zürich police, recently advised the Tagblatt der Stadt Zürich newspaper on how much skin can be displayed in public and later she spoke to the Tages Anzeiger about why it matters where people get naked.

“We have had few reports about public nudity in the city, but it wouldn’t take long until some one alerted us if a naked person walked through the streets. I would not recommend this to anyone”, she said.

On Saturday, the 20th Streetparade will take place with almost a million people dancing to techno music in the streets. Summer has returned to Switzerland after weeks of rain. On that day, there will also be a full moon. Perfect conditions for stripping off.

Even though there will definitely be a lot of skin on show at the Streetparade, Hödl said the police do not receive more complaints of sexual harassment than normal: “When nobody feels disturbed then everything is ok.“

Hödl does not recommend that anyone runs naked through the streets, though it is not illegal to be naked or have sex in public – it just depends on the location and discretion.

So does no one in Zürich get the urge to have sex in public? 

“Either that or the people are simply discreet and think before they take off their clothes. There is no law that forbids sex in public. But when somebody feels disturbed by such sex acts, they can contact the police,“ she said.

Whether the parties will be fined for a transgression or not depends on the time and place in which the sexual contact took place.

Hödl made a distintion between people have sex in a secluded wood rather than near a school with children around. Sometimes the police are called out when an exhibitionist deliberately presents their sex organs to somebody. In such cases, the guilty parties would have to stand before the court for their offense.