BS Summary: This article contains 30 faulty reasoning types, including Confirmation Bias, Appeal to Emotion, and Framing Effect, with Anecdotal as the most egregious example at 12.5% saturation with 252 hits. Analysis detected 2,122 faulty-reasoning hits from 2,015 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 37.1% and a BS Rank of 35% (16,937 of 25,732 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 65.80% of the article peer group.
In a quiet Seattle neighborhood along the shores of Lake Washington lies a 200-foot-wide, two-acre public park that finds itself at the center of one of the most significant ongoing disputes over public nudity in the United States.
The latest chapter of the years-long battle over Denny Blaine Park has come to an end, with the trial’s closing arguments delivered last month, but the park’s fate remains in limbo awaiting a ruling from King County Superior Court Judge Samuel Chung.
<b>Why is Denny Blaine on trial?
</b>
Denny Blaine Park is widely known as Seattle’s clothing-optional beach frequented by members of the LGBTQ+ community.
With increased usage after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic, some of the park’s wealthy neighbors began to push back — particularly Stuart Sloan, the owner of Seattle’s University Village mall and former owner of the QFC grocery store chain, whose over $20 million mansion lies directly south of the park.
In 2023, Sloan personally texted then-Mayor Bruce Harrell photographs he took of naked parkgoers, complaining about the “DISGUSTING” behavior from a “sub-group of people” with “very different morality.”
Harrell responded that he shared Sloan’s “disgust” and would deal with the issue, though he also expressed annoyance at Sloan texting him during his vacation in Maui, Hawaii.
Later that year, the city introduced a plan to build a children’s playground at the park, for which Sloan personally pledged $1 million, but it was scrapped due to public outrage from parkgoers and their supporters, who say the playground plan was an attempt to stop clothing-optional use of the park and brand LGBTQ+ people as sexual predators.
Sloan and other neighbors — who formed the group Denny Blaine for All (DBFA) — then filed a lawsuit against the city in 2025, accusing it of enabling a “public nuisance” at the park, which had become “a regional venue for criminal and uncivil behavior that includes public masturbation, public sex and other types of indecent exposure,” according to DBFA’s complaint.
They demanded that the city prohibit nudity at Denny Blaine and close the park until it could enforce this prohibition.
In response, Judge Chung ordered the city to implement a plan to abate the public nuisance, leading the city to install a fence that divided the park in half, with signage indicating that clothing is optional on the east side of the fence.
Intended as a compromise to please both the neighbors and the parkgoers, the city’s abatement plan instead drew immediate condemnation from both sides.
However, the pro-nudity parkgoers — who formed the group Friends of Denny Blaine (FoDB) — later changed their tune, largely accepting the new system, while DBFA continued its opposition and successfully petitioned for a bench trial, which took place May 27-June 11.
<figure><div class="media media-element-container media-default"><img style="" class="media-element file-default" typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.realchangenews.org/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/p6%20denny%20blaine%20paddleboard.jpg?
itok=Oh_oWMuv" alt="" /><figcaption><div class="field field-name-field-caption field-type-text-long field-label-hidden c">
Beachgoer paddleboards next to the dock belonging to Stuart Sloan, who has spearheaded efforts to ban nudity at Denny Blaine Park. </div>
<div class="field field-name-field-credit field-type-text field-label-hidden">
Photo by Henry Behrens. </div>
</figcaption></div></figure>
<b>The neighbors’ case </b>
The lawsuit began with DBFA suing the City of Seattle, but FoDB joined the case as an intervening third party, largely siding with the city.
DBFA lawyers argued that the city’s abatement plan has failed to stop the lewd conduct and nuisance behavior occurring at the park and that the fence the city installed last year is illegal because it obstructs views of the coastline.
In his closing argument, DBFA lawyer Rylan Weythman pleaded with Judge Chung to make the city close the park temporarily before reopening it at a later date, with nudity strictly forbidden.
While “simple nudity” is legal in Washington state and does not constitute lewd conduct, Weythman argued that simple nudity “doesn’t convey what’s going on at the park,” and the relevant question is whether the behavior would infringe on “a person of ordinary and normal sensibilities.”
“You don’t go to school naked.
You don’t walk into a church naked.
You don’t go naked to the grocery store or to the dentist or to your law firm office.
Every person attended this trial with clothes on, Your Honor.
There are extraordinarily few exceptions where society accepts public nudity,” Weythman said.
Arguing that the park’s “use as a nude beach has exploded in recent years,” DBFA presented photo and video evidence of lewd conduct at the park — much of the evidence captured by the surveillance cameras and 24/7 private security team that Sloan deployed.
“Early in this trial, I showed a video of a man walking around Denny Blaine Park completely naked, other than army boots, and he was masturbating… This court shut that video down before it was over, and for very good reason.
No one should have to witness that kind of conduct,” Weythman said.
“Yet that is what my clients are exposed to on a regular basis… There are too many examples that stand out in our minds: two men masturbating in broad daylight with park rangers at the park; a person giving a handjob while talking to one of their friends on the beach, then 40 minutes later giving a blowjob to a different man.”
Despite arguing for a temporary closure, Weythman said that his clients do not want to shut down the park: “They want the ability to use and enjoy their homes as a place of refuge… They want a place where they can have their grandchildren visit without the fear of exposing those grandchildren to, frankly, things that most people think they should not be exposed to.
They want a home where they can look out their bedroom windows without the shock of seeing naked people walking down the street.”
“We’re asking for a Denny Blaine Park without the public nudity and lewd conduct that prevent the vast majority of Seattle citizens from using that park.
We’re asking that this court order a Denny Blaine Park for all,” Weythman concluded.
<b>The city </b>
In closing arguments, the city defended its abatement plan, arguing that it has successfully clamped down on lewd conduct and other criminal activity.
Denny Blaine Park “should not be closed because park conditions have materially improved since the city implemented its abatement plan,” said Joseph Groshong, lawyer for the City of Seattle.
Since the plan was implemented 10 months earlier, “there’s been a 39% reduction in the number of calls at the park.”
Groshong argued that the city has made significant progress using the fence, signage, an education-first approach and policing when necessary, and these efforts will continue.
Furthermore, a few incidents are not a basis for closure, as zero criminal activity is an unrealistic standard for any public space.
Groshong took issue with DBFA’s conflation of nudity with lewd conduct, saying that “public nudity is not illegal” and that “there is simply no connection between nude use of the park and indecent exposure.”
The criminal activities in question — lewd conduct, drug use, vandalism and illegal parking — are not specific to Denny Blaine but occur “all over the place,” and the city is addressing them.
Groshong also disputed DBFA’s claim regarding the illegality of the fence.
<figure><div class="media media-element-container media-default"><img style="" class="media-element file-default" typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.realchangenews.org/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/p11%20denny%20blaine.jpg?
itok=21sLSn-z" alt="The sign for Denny Blaine Park" title="The sign for Denny Blaine Park" /><figcaption><div class="field field-name-field-caption field-type-text-long field-label-hidden c">
Denny Blaine Park sign. </div>
<div class="field field-name-field-credit field-type-text field-label-hidden">
Photo by Seattle Parks and Recreation Department/Flickr. </div>
</figcaption></div></figure>
<b>The parkgoers </b>
As an intervening third party to the case, FoDB — represented pro bono by Perkins Coie LLP — largely aligned with the city but placed a greater emphasis on the history and importance of Denny Blaine Park, which “is not a nuisance” but “a sacred space,” FoDB lawyer Susan E.
Foster said in her closing argument.
Foster spoke of the park’s history going back a century, including a reputation for toplessness and use by the gay and lesbian community in the 1970s and 1980s.
According to Foster, Sloan would have been well aware of the park’s reputation long before he rebuilt his house right next door.
Foster pushed back against the claim that the park constitutes a public nuisance that harms the community, arguing that the few instances of lewd conduct that have occurred have only been seen because of the constant surveillance efforts of Sloan and his house manager, Carrie Christensen.
“Say someone installed an audio recorder right next to a sawmill, and then they transmitted that sound to some remote location.
Would someone say that they can then complain about the noise and bring a nuisance suit?
I don’t think so… But that’s exactly what we’re seeing here.
Ms.
Christensen watches the video while she’s working.
She’ll go home at night and watch the video.
She’ll replay old recordings,” Foster said.
“These are extremely wealthy individuals who want to control everything around them, including the park.”
Citing expert witness testimony, Foster argued that simple nudity “does not lead to lewd conduct,” nor does it cause harm.
Rather, “naturism can have numerous mental health benefits,” including “positive body image and feeling more accepting of one’s own body” and “more connected to community.”
Foster cited a witness who said the park helped them through their struggles with an eating disorder and negative body image by showing them “what a normal human body looks like,” and it was the only place in the city where they felt comfortable after their top surgery.
Another witness credited his nude experiences at Denny Blaine with pulling him out of severe anxiety and depression.
Foster emphasized that, in addition to the city’s successful abatement efforts, FoDB has “stepped up” to “address the neighbors’ concerns about lewd conduct,” from writing and distributing community guidelines to putting forward anti-masturbation intervention trainings.
The clothing-optional status of the park, Foster argued, is integral to its importance.
“It is the very nakedness and vulnerability itself that heals and brings that community together, celebrating differences rather than condemning or shying away from them,” she said.
“Nothing less than the soul of a long-standing safe space for the LGBTQ+ community is at stake here.”
<b>What now?
</b>
The judge ended the trial by thanking the parties for their professionalism and pledged to issue a written ruling, though he could not say when that ruling would come.
Directly after the trial, FoDB President Simon Thornton expressed gratitude that the beachgoers had a voice in the courtroom and highlighted the unique importance of Denny Blaine.
“As much as the plaintiffs would like to highlight that there is no comparable beach elsewhere in the nation, that just speaks to how one-of-a-kind this is,” Thornton said in an interview with Real Change.
“Typically, when you look at naturist and nudist spaces, or even just queer spaces, they’re often gatekept by things like finances.
You need to buy a ticket; you need to have a cover charge… For there to be a free public queer nude space where people can access that kind of community and the therapeutic benefits that it offers for free right next to their homes in the heart of a city is intensely unique and worth protecting.”
FoDB Vice President Nicole Baich told Real Change that it was at Denny Blaine Park where she formed some of her closest social connections in the city.
“If you come there with good intentions and an open mind and an open heart, you’re going to find some of the most amazing people… I’ve seen people meet, get engaged, get married; they’ve just had their first child.”
Baich also said that nudity at Denny Blaine is not sexualized, as “it is against community norms to sexualize it.”
DBFA did not respond to multiple requests for comment, and the Seattle City Attorney’s office told Real Change it would let the trial testimony speak for itself, awaiting the court’s ruling.
<i>Jordan Z.
Bollag is associate editor of Real Change News.
He is also a political organizer.
You can email him at <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#23494c5147424d41635146424f404b424d44464d4654500d4c5144"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="52383d2036333c30122037333e313a333c35373c3725217c3d2035">[email protected]</span></a>. </i>
Read more of the <a href="/news/issue/july-8-14-2026">July 8-14, 2026 issue</a>.
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