My parents complained that when i was very little i used to go once in the sea with my swimming costume get it wet then insist i had to take it off because it was wet and you dont wear wet clothes! So me and my sister used to end up running around naked on the beach anyway! hee hee

Why do men and women go to the beach and lay around half naked or should I say 95% naked anyway. How is that better than being nude? In some ways nude seems more natural and less sexual. Well I would vote for a law banning anyone with an ugly body from going nude anywhere. I mean really if you want to give your kids nightmares, just let them see some fat pot bellied old man walking naked on the beach. And the same for the women, boobs hanging down to navels, cellulite as deep as a cave. There are reasons most people chose to keep themselves clothed.

Just having some fun, don't take the above too seriously.

It should be fine if little boys and girls go naked on the beach. It's natural, but putting a little girl in a thong makes her a little sex object that is WRONG. Wrong that people see her that way and wrong that she may think that is what she is supposed to be.

Alyson- am with you on the grodi factor of thongs for girls. Not as offensive as "child thongs" but still irks me is that in the US, Old Navy and Gap have come out with "slim fit jeans" for baby girls. My chubby babies/toddlers don't stand a chance of fitting into them! Can you believe it?

As the mother of a boy not too far from puberty this makes me think, what kind of message are thongs, skinny jeans, high heels/platforms on girls sending to boys? Women are sexual objects at the age of 9 and 10? My son has already commented on girls' development at his school and I think that it is the job of mothers to constantly educate your boys and girls on never objectifying the opposite sex and to not make degrading comments about people's bodies. People come in all shapes and sizes (okay, I am speaking about skinny to chubby, obesity is a different issue here), males and females. While we are trying to empower females be valued for more than just their bodies or sex appeal we must also teach males to respect women's bodies and boundaries.
I am sorry, but dressing your little girl in a sexual way is not contributing to any of the above. I even think those little bikini tops for girls are a bit over the edge... what exactly are you covering?

There have been some interesting comment columns around about this: little girls--I mean the 5 to 10 crowd--who are obsessed with their bodies, want to look like Barbie (yeah, right!) develop eating disorders, punish themselves in an attempt to be perfect. Unfortunately it's often their mothers who, with their own obsessions about appearance, encourage this attitude: they have a daft idea that in order for them to stay young they need to be best buddies with their daughters, so try to bridge that age gap looks-wise, I guess.

When my daughter was really tiny I dispensed altogether with a cozzie because until she was potty-trained it seemed pointless. Then we went with bottoms or maillots. The idea of a "bikini" on a toddler seemed ridiculous and looked worse. But the point was she was a little girl and looked like one, not some miniature hooker.

Small wonder pedophiles are making headlines all over the place: they've got endless temptation shoved under their noses all the time.

Following on from the thong bikini debate...
the beach where we always go for our holiday in Riccione offers "animazione" for kids. This mainly consists of teaching the (very little) girls to wiggle their hips to "un movimiento sexy" song (sorry don't know the real name!) which I find highly inappropriate! Why can't they play real games instead of gyrating to music?