Europe's strict 'covering rules' impose fines on tourists wearing swimwear on the street

Get ready. I have to smuggle a budgie.

As I learned the hard way, Europeans like to think of themselves as cultured.

A few hundred years ago, some enlightened thinkers wrote a few books and now they say: “You must not wipe your mouth with your hand” and “You filthy convicts must not wear bathing suits on the beach!”

Impolite.

Anyway.

I would like to argue here that the Dark Ages never left Europe.

While we here in Australia have perfected beachwear, notably with the invention of the board short, in Europe there is the bizarre contradiction of a culture that, on the one hand, is completely comfortable letting body parts hang around in the sand, but on the other hand – apparently – finds bare skin outside of the beach incredibly outrageous.

And we haven’t even started talking about the scourge of European men’s swimwear.

Unlike Australia, where there is a perfect balance, in many places in Europe you can lie almost naked and carefree on the beach and then – or so we are led to believe – eat an ice cream on the promenade or sit down in a beach café and suddenly become a public nuisance.

Across Europe, there are reports of uproar in Old World cities over tourists violating an unspoken dress code when visiting the beach.

In fact, in many places it is no longer unspoken.

A few years ago, Sorrento Mayor Massimo Coppola introduced a 500 euro ($800 AUD) fine for showing bare skin, which he said contributed to “widespread indecent behavior” and damaged the city's reputation.

Meanwhile, many cities, from Sicily to Sorrento to Barcelona, ​​have introduced similar “covering rules.”

Even Croatia is affected by the disease: Sail Croatia revelers who travelled to Dubrovnik were also recently warned to cover themselves, otherwise they too would face a fine.

Traveler Isabella Lakin recently warned fellow globetrotters on TikTok: “Don't wear your bikini top without something over it when you leave the beach. They will get you. They don't want tourists doing that.”

“If you're doing Sail Croatia and you think you can just whizz around town in a bikini top, I wouldn't recommend it. I know a few people who got stung pretty badly last year… and it was mostly people at Sail Croatia who had forgotten the rules.”

Although I am fundamentally in favor of adapting to the environment, I am suspicious of these bans.

Why?

Although I was once politely asked to leave a French supermarket (in the beach town of Hossegor) by security for entering barefoot, not once in the nearly three years I've lived in Spain have I felt judged for coming off the beach shirtless (people were generally more shocked by my bare feet).

I have also never seen anyone complain about female tourists wearing bikinis on the street or urinating in the sea.

It seems to me that European politicians in crowded hotspots are trying to shift the blame for their poor governance onto tourists, thereby diverting the frustration of the locals that should really be directed at them.

In my view, the real loss of reputation for these cities and towns (especially the larger ones like Barcelona) is not the tourists crossing a square in their bathing suits to return to their hotel, but the fact that there is a McDonald's around the corner, a Starbucks up the road, the nightclub beneath their feet and the increasingly unaffordable rents for local residents.

When you get to the point where you have to police the smallest behaviour, like banning thongs (as the Cinque Terre has done), Gloria tops and football shirts (as a restaurant chain in Mallorca has done) or urinating in the sea (as happened on the Costa del Sol), you have to wonder if there isn't a deeper problem here and if officials aren't simply trying to capitalise on the backlash created by Europe's increasingly weak relationship with tourists and shift the blame onto their poor tourism management.

Instead of fining a hungover Contiki backpacker for forgetting to pack a scarf for the beach, why not focus on fixing the things that actually affect your residents?

If you did that, these little grievances probably wouldn't bother you so much anymore.

The fact that tourists dress scantily is more of a straw that breaks the camel's back: the reason is their sheer number (and the resulting change in the social fabric of a city).

And as for clothing, I think a little sideways glance from a local is the best antidote to inappropriate clothing. Forbidding something in writing generally makes people want to do it even more. Just let the shaming take its natural course and don't give tourists a reason to rebel.

Greetings from an annoying tourist…

This article originally appeared on Escape and has been republished with permission