When We Talk About Naked Pictures, We Also Need To Talk About Double Standards
By Lauren Evans
I see Kim Kardashian’s latest naked photo uploads and firstly think; “Hot damn” which leads to “Where the heck are my lady lumps? I may as well be an ironing board,” which flips on its head to “Screw it, I’ll just embrace my body as it is.”
I don’t think I would have the courage to post such a picture of myself. Not because I am ashamed of my body – everybody’s bodies are beautiful in their own way, and mine is no exception. I just wouldn’t be able to post sexy photos of myself because of what happened.
Revenge porn really is most unfair. Not only did I have to deal with somebody completely betraying my trust in them, with the addition of the insulting commentary that they put alongside said photos, but also the victim-shaming that came after.
It was as if a young woman taking photos of her body and sending them to a man was a recipe for deserved disaster. How very dare I do something that most people do with their camera phones? And as a woman in particular, what was I thinking – it’s as if I was asking for personal tragedy and unnecessary shaming.
If I was a guy, would it have been any different? Would my photos have been shared in such a disgusting way in the first place? Would those images have had comments sitting beside them, encouraging the internet audience to describe what it would be like for me to be involved in incest? To get these strangers to say what they would like to do to me?
I fucking doubt it.
I know that there have been some recorded cases of Revenge Porn with male victims, and truly I am sorry for them to have had to deal with such an embarrassing and degrading experience.
What I am asking however, is that would men get any of the slut-shaming consequences during and after their ordeal?
You can scroll through Tinder and find a naked guy cupping himself and think; “That’s just fuckboy culture, he’s just a Lad”. What would one think about seeing an almost naked, Kim Kardashian style covered photo of a woman? “She must be a slut. How could she think this was appropriate in any way? Doesn’t she have any class?”
Women should be able to celebrate their bodies in whatever way they feel like. They can be fuckgirls and Ladettes if they want to. That’s what we call equality.
What we need ultimately is for none of the awful comments that come after. If you see a picture of a lady, and something stirs deep inside of you to make a negative comment, ask yourself first; “Would I be saying this if this was a picture of a dude?”
Exactly. But don’t you go on thinking that you should keep those thoughts to yourself, oh no. What I’d really like you to do is Optimus Prime those mother fuckers. Turn them into something else. Change your views and think equally.
But don’t even get me started on Dick Pics.