Last week, there was a massive
leak of nude photos of celebrities. This probably is not news to most of you at this point, since word spread very quickly. A leak like this has happened before, however, this leak impacted many celebrities—101 to be exact. Kate Upton, Lea Michele, Ariana Grande and Victoria Justice were just a few. Of course, the name that caused the biggest sensation was Jennifer Lawrence.
People reacted how they normally do to this sort of scandal: “Wow, I didn’t think she was like that. I’m so disappointed,” or worse, “I can’t wait to go home and look at these very personal pictures…” Sweet, bro. No.
J-Law, as we have affectionately titled her, is arguably America’s sweetheart. She talks about how she eats pizza before stepping on
the red carpet and is adorably clumsy. She is effortlessly cool and low maintenance and engineered to be likable. You’re either in love with her or want to be her best friend.
Here comes our favorite part: we built her up; we told her she was great. She skyrocketed to fame because we love her, and now we get to tear her back down. It’s one of our great joys as a modern society. We get to do so with one of our favorite methods: slut shaming. A young star can only get so big before we have to find all the skeletons in their closet and expose them.
Granted, it wasn’t you or I who hacked into anyone’s personal phone and found these pictures. Still, we talk about it, and in some cases, we seek these people’s private photos out. In reality, is what Jennifer Lawrence and the other celebrities did all that shameful?
What did they do? Well they took naked photos, specifically private photos that were obviously meant for an intimate partner. Perhaps they were doing this because the relationship had become long distance, or they were doing it for fun. Maybe it’s none of our business why they did it. In any case, do we really find this so inexcusable?
Apparently, this answer is yes. People call celebrities sluts for taking pictures like this in the first place. These women are considered ignorant because they send private pictures taken on their personal devices via the Internet.
Yet in 2012, a Harris interactive poll stated that 40 percent of adults had admitted to sending “racy photos,” adults being defined as between the ages of 18-35. Not 16-year-old girls, but honest adults with kids and jobs and lives, have sent naked photos.
Imagine that. That was two years ago, and those are only the people who were willing to admit to it.
Even so, when a celebrity’s personal photographs are leaked, the accusers reply, “If they didn’t want the world to see them naked, then they shouldn’t have taken naked pictures.” In that case, anything I decide to film on a smartphone is considered at risk; if it is hacked and distributed then am I “asking for it?”
Instead of spending all our time condemning these celebrities who did what a lot of us do, perhaps we should be laying the blame on the person who defiled these women’s privacy by publishing the pictures. This person stole photos that did not belong to them and then displayed them for the world to see. The women whose photos were leaked are victims. They did not choose to be exposed; their exposure was chosen for them.
