Nick Harding | @nickhdg | London - Every now and then Sportscene promotes an image of a torso-nude superhunk paddler or a gorgeous female athlete in provocative clothing. We have been asked by one of our readers to explain our position on this.

Voila: here at Sportscene we take great pride in all of our content and ultimately we will continue to publish such images, yet in moderation!

Our ethos is about providing professional, serious coverage of live paddle sports events as well as discussing themes objectively that affect the canoe world. Consumed by millions of visitors, we produce articles, videos, photos, live streams, bios and so on 24/7 for canoe enthusiasts and canoe professionals alike, and we love doing so! In the pipeline we have for example projects on paracanoe, women's canoe and an interview with the extreme kayaking World Champion Sam Sutton.

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Sportscene is neither gender-biased nor chauvinistic. In fact we are working hard with the ICF, IOC and IPC to promote equality in women's canoe disciplines. We have thousands of female followers and respect from female athletes within the canoe sphere.

We publish images of both male canoe gladiators and female celestial athletes; this content is not pornographic yet always glamorous and tasteful. Example images that optimise this include: bikini-wearing Jasmin Schornberg in an open canoe surrounded by flowers, and, Austrian sprinter Viktoria Schwarz, fifth place in K2-500m at London 2012, shot fashionably looking directly at the camera in golden bikini-bottoms.   

How does our audience receive these images? Well, both genders look at our images of semi-naked athletes differently:

• Awe:  desiring the same body from a fitness perspective
• Attraction: appreciation of the body beautiful
• Respect: athletes have trained all their life to become the best so why not print an image of them in their physical peak

The public desire to see super bodies. There is even now a Facebook appreciation page, not created by Sportscene, for attractive male and female paddlers. So should athletes be allowed to bare some or nothing at all?

Where they have become professionals in their own rights through years of determination, gruelling training and ambition, they do not see their reputations being tarnished by a few mere images of bare flesh. Paddling athletes' achievements out way any photographic material, and you certainly would not question this to their faces.

Everybody knows that athletes like for example Nicole Reinhardt or Adam van Koeverden are "super bad-ass paddlers" as Brendan Curson, Project Director at Saskatoon Whitewater Kayak Club, puts it. The person who stands up to marathon paddler Ben Brown's powerhouse stature criticising his decision to appear topless in a canoe is either brave or foolish. Paddlers are rock-solid mentally, they require absolute focus to even participate in elite events; the majority of paddlers would simply be unscathed by a few comments over an image.

Our paddlesport athletes also have a sense of humour themselves and do agree to do the photoshoots; they do not take themselves too seriously. Torso-nudity is commonplace in canoe sport; men particularly are seen paddling topless like rowers, whether they are training in warmer climates in summer or simply because they sweat dramatically, especially in sprint.

Fully-nude images can be glamorous if they are merely suggestive and do not actually expose certain body parts. Such softcore images are often done for artistic purposes and are thus respected; the current edition of ESPN's annual 'The Body Issue' celebrates the form of those who push human endeavour; there is a poetic image of Brazilian big-wave surfer Maya Gabeira paddling under giant breaking surges, unclothed.

Immediately after the 2008 Olympics kayak sprinter Nicole Reinhardt, six gold medals out of eleven at the ICF Canoe Sprint World Championships and a K4 500m gold medal at Beijing, posed naked in the same edition of Playboy as three other female German Olympians; she only exposed her breasts.

It is quite common for media platforms to publish cheeky images of athletes immediately after Olympic Games when interest in them is still at its highest and when the competitors themselves are still at their physical primes. British Olympic beach volleyball player Zara Dampney, along with other members of Team GB, posed after the London Games for GQ Magazine in a series titled by a titilating pun 'torch-barers'. Spain's 2008 gold medallist paddlers in K2 500m, Saúl Craviotto and Carlos Pérez, did the same after the Beijing Olympics.

Paralympians too have joined the naked craze, again portraying the body beautiful and achievement as well as perhaps challenging people's views on disability nudity. Brazilian celebrity and ex-model, paracanoe sprinter Fernando Fernandes, a naturally good-looking chap, has been framed torso-nude on his front and para-rower Oskana Masters also features in ESPN's body special; she is photographed standing on a pontoon with an oar on her prosthetic legs. Sequentially she is then seen holding a rope swing without her limbs; this controversial image has certainly raised a few eyebrows. 

Flipping the coin over, there are those who see athletes as 'inadequate or unappealing competitors' because they engage in nude advertising or self-marketing. They could believe this for religious reasons or a belief that the objectification and sexualisation of an individual, male or female, is morally wrong. Whether an athlete's reputation is damaged or not depends entirely on the content of the image and how far they go to expose themselves.

Graphic and explicit images of naked athletes, despite being expressions of individual liberty, can be problematic and potentially hinder their career. Sportscene will not publish such content. Tennis player Ashley Harkleroad, who bared all for the August 2008 edition of Playboy, comes to mind. Often complete nudity can augment your popularity, even though short-lived.

In hindsight, with the freedom of the press and freedom of choice, views towards athlete nudism are changing. A line of appropriacy still exists between art and pornography though; gazing at beautiful superhuman bodies which have been portrayed descentantly, nude or clothed, is in fact a rather harmless act. It is important not to try and decode too much from these images; they are only forms of entertainment.

Some feminist theories, like Laura Mulvey on the male gaze, are now old-fashioned. She claimed it was unjust for a man to voyeuristically get pleasure from looking at a woman or an image of a woman's body, yet there was no mention of a woman staring at a man, women looking at each other or freedom of self-expression through exhibitionism and choice.

After all if I were as toned as the majority of current male sprinters are, I would be proud to show off my abs!

Feel free to share your opinion in the below.