I believe you're conflating two issues. Few people argue against hand-washing with soap. The benefits are proven.
But where did you get the notion that washing the whole body with soap is beneficial or even benign? You've cited many studies, but they all deal with aging and not with skin flora.
Skin flora is complex. I know of no scientific study that has looked into whether skin flora or hygiene is improved by full body soap washing.
Full body soap washing began in the early part of the 20th century, following a steady marketing campaign with ads such as this:
At the time, people bathed little. When they bath more frequently, with soap, odour improved. Soap usage became widespread.
It seemed a reasonable inference that soap was the cause. Particularly since if you stop using soap, you get smellier, even if you bathe.
I believe this inference is wrong. I stopped using soap in 2011. For the first 2-3 weeks, I smelled worse. Then I smelled better. I have had practically no BO since, even in the most sensitive regions. Women have confirmed that I smell good, spontaneously. If you saw me, you would never know I don't use soap.
I'm using an N of 1, but it seemed like the bacterial balance of my skin improved. It also became less oily. I can only speak to my own example, but I have seen many reports from others who went through the same transition as me.
So I'll repeat: where is your evidence that full-body soap washing offers benefits? Are there any scientific studies that support your position?
My hypothesis is that full body soap makes us worse off and that we don't realize this due to the transition period. Our habit was begun by marketing and cemented by tradition. (our parents washed us when we were young)
Edit: I just noticed this sentence:
"There is no evidence whatever that there are any large number of bacterial species or other microorganisms that are actively "beneficial" for human beings"
This seems rather unsupported. Are you saying we do not require intestinal or skin flora?
Second edit: In response to your edit, I found this article:
"I stopped using soap in 2011. For the first 2-3 weeks, I smelled worse. Then I smelled better. I have had practically no BO since, even in the most sensitive regions. Women have confirmed that I smell good, spontaneously. If you saw me, you would never know I don't use soap."
Do you still wash your hair? Do you still shower (i.e. rinse) once a day? How do you wash after when you're especially dirty? (e.g. dirt, grease, etc.)
I'd be curious to hear about your hygiene routine in a little more details.
I shower every day. Sometimes twice if I've done something that made me sweat or it's a warm day and I want a cold shower.
I occasionally wash my hair with baking soda then apple cider vinegar. It was what other people doing the same thing use. Hair is very clean and soft after that.
The frequency of the hair wash depends on how my hair is. If I eat, sleep and rest well, it stays clean for a week or more. If I eat poorly it gets greasy faster and I wash it more.
I use soap to wash my hands after using the washroom and during food preparation, or when something major has dirtied my hands.
Otherwise, no soap on my body. Subjectively, odour improved in all the sensitive areas. I used to notice BO in my armpits and a few areas I won't name. Now I don't.
As I said, this improvement has been confirmed by spontaneous compliments.
Thanks for the link in answer to my question. A tip: if you know the title of an article (here, "Skin microbiota: a source of disease or defence"), and put that article title into a Google Scholar search, you will often find a copy of the article that is not behind a paywall (here, because it is also hosted on the Pub Med Central public access website). Now I have to read the full text of the article, and see what subsequent articles say on the issue.
Another anecdote, I had a very bad acne back in secondary school, I tried everything and I did not get better. Our of frustration I stopped all treatment and I stopped using soap in my face. At some point the acne fixed itself but I never got back to the soap. All in all I have been soap free in my face for 15 years, I do shave with hot water.
Just wanted to make N = 2: I haven't used soap or shampoo since 2010. My skin and hair feel and look great and nobody's ever said anything about my smell.
I honestly think I won't use soap or shampoo for the rest of my life.
Look, I'm not saying you stink, but you need to smell hobo-levels for people to speak up about something like this; a smell level way beyond what would have negative social repercussions.
What I'm saying is: even if you smell a little, not enough to put people over that (huge) threshold to bring it up to you (note the recurring 'Ask Abby' topic of 'how do I tell my colleague/spouse/friend they smell'), you'll still be known as 'that smelly guy'.
(again, not saying you smell, just that 'nobody ever told me' is not enough to believe you don't, and being falsely informed of this topic will have real consequences for people).
I've basically had the same experience that graeme has wrote about in his comments earlier: people have actually complimented me on my smell without knowing that I don't use soap, and I've been in a long-term relationship (3+ years) without me telling my partner that I'm not soaping and them not saying anything to me.
I think it's also important to point out that I still shower or bathe every day (and additionally after I work out), so I'm still getting clean.* I just don't use soap, just lots of water and scrub the hell out of my skin with a washcloth.
*Yes, here we could parse out what I mean by "clean" but you'll just have to trust me on this one.
Much of this discussion has been on soap, and for me personally using soap every day everywhere just dries out my skin, so I use soap daily only in 'strategic locations' (on a meta note, I can't believe I'm actually having a conversation about this). But what I wonder from all the people in this thread saying they don't use soap with a 'naturalism' based argument (if I'm understanding them/you on the reason correctly), do you also not use deodorant? Because you can wash/rinse 3 times a day, even with soap, but (sorry for gross visuals) armpit sweat is going to smell over the course of a day, especially the sort of sweat the comes from stress and not 'just' from being warm. And that smell comes from bacteria too, 'natural' bacteria.
But where did you get the notion that washing the whole body with soap is beneficial or even benign? You've cited many studies, but they all deal with aging and not with skin flora.
Skin flora is complex. I know of no scientific study that has looked into whether skin flora or hygiene is improved by full body soap washing.
Full body soap washing began in the early part of the 20th century, following a steady marketing campaign with ads such as this:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/y1yyuz0p6ybhby3/Soap%20Ad.jpg
At the time, people bathed little. When they bath more frequently, with soap, odour improved. Soap usage became widespread.
It seemed a reasonable inference that soap was the cause. Particularly since if you stop using soap, you get smellier, even if you bathe.
I believe this inference is wrong. I stopped using soap in 2011. For the first 2-3 weeks, I smelled worse. Then I smelled better. I have had practically no BO since, even in the most sensitive regions. Women have confirmed that I smell good, spontaneously. If you saw me, you would never know I don't use soap.
I'm using an N of 1, but it seemed like the bacterial balance of my skin improved. It also became less oily. I can only speak to my own example, but I have seen many reports from others who went through the same transition as me.
So I'll repeat: where is your evidence that full-body soap washing offers benefits? Are there any scientific studies that support your position?
My hypothesis is that full body soap makes us worse off and that we don't realize this due to the transition period. Our habit was begun by marketing and cemented by tradition. (our parents washed us when we were young)
Edit: I just noticed this sentence:
"There is no evidence whatever that there are any large number of bacterial species or other microorganisms that are actively "beneficial" for human beings"
This seems rather unsupported. Are you saying we do not require intestinal or skin flora?
Second edit: In response to your edit, I found this article:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2133.2008....
It has been cited 182 according to Google Scholar. I can't access the full text, but it claims that many skin flora are mutalistic.