I have something
to get off my chest. It’s my opinion about the recent posting of nude pictures
of Jennifer Lawrence and other celebrity women. But if I wanted it to be my
shirt and my bra because I wanted to take a topless photo of myself to share
with my boyfriend, I should be able to do so without fear that my picture would
end up in the hands of anyone but the person or persons with whom I chose to
share it. It is shocking and, to an idealist like me, sickening that the
general response to this has been largely “well, that’s what you get when you
keep nude pictures of yourself on your phone” and “they are celebrities; they
have to assume they have no privacy” and not “this is a disgusting violation of
these women’s rights and personal lives, and the scumbags who stole these photos deserve to be
arrested.”
The world has
changed dramatically and rapidly since the days of chaperoned courtships,
wedding night deflowerings, and women who were encouraged to “just lie back and
think of England” rather than enjoy and embrace their sexuality. In an age
where many relationships not only begin but are maintained
virtually/electronically, and where significant others are often separated for
long periods of time, the ability to still be intimate via phone or computer is
nothing short of a godsend, in my opinion. I’ll go a step further: if someone
wants to choose to share a nude photo
of him/herself with anyone of his/her choosing, s/he should be able to do so
without fear that anyone but the intended recipient is going to see it. I am
the first to agree that there is no actual privacy any more, and if you don’t
want others to see something you need to avoid putting it on the Internet. But
the advent and greater usage of the cloud changes this issue pretty dramatically.
A photo that exists on my phone or computer (or the phone or computer of the
recipient of a photo of a personal nature) should not be able to be made public
without the express permission of the person(s) in that photo. End of story. Honestly,
I don’t think that photos or words I put anywhere
should be available without my consent, but one of the big issues with this and
other technology-related privacy issues is that the law is archaic at best and
woefully ignorant at worst. Until the legal system is adjusted to deal with
virtual intellectual property and privacy in the same (or better) way as it
deals with literal intellectual property and physical privacy, these types of
incidences are going to become more common…but no less disturbing.
But hey! Jennifer
Lawrence is a celebrity, right? Her entire life is in the public eye; her
entire career is built on people having access to her personal life, right?
WRONG. Jennifer Lawrence- and the other women involved in this crime- are actresses and singers. This is their job; it is not who they are as people or
women. Much as it pains me to say it, even a pariah like Kim Kardashian
deserves not to have her sex tape or nude photos published without her
permission – no matter how many other embarrassing or stunningly stupid acts
she commits in the public eye. Just because a person chooses to make his or her
living doing something that depends on the viewership, buy-in, and interest of
others does not mean that all aspects of his/her life are open to the public.
Not to muddy the waters, but this issue was recently addressed, in part, when
Jennifer Garner and Halle Berry went before the CA state legislature to have
the laws regarding the photographing of the children of celebrities changed to
better protect the privacy of not only the children themselves but their
families and their peers (and let me tell you, this issue suddenly hits a lot
closer to home when the kids in your school can’t go out for carpool because
some asshat is blocking their path in an attempt to get a picture of some
A-lister getting her daughter at the end of the day). The law passed,
thankfully, and here’s hoping it sets a precedent for lawmakers to reexamine
the entire way we approach not only technology and privacy but celebrity as well.
But there are two
more issues at play here that I have yet to hear/read anyone talk about, and I
think they go much further back historically and are therefore more deeply
rooted in our culture. Because these were nude photos of young women, many people
are saying/writing that they shouldn’t have had those photos on their phones in
the first place and that they shouldn’t have even been taking them, much less
sharing them with their significant others. This is a direct attack on both
sexuality and on women. A strong statement, I know, but I stand by it. These
young women are, one can assume, both comfortable with and proud of their
bodies and their sexuality – as well they should be. I would hope that they are
enjoying full, satisfying, and safe sex lives with whomever they choose,
whenever they choose, and however
they choose – including privately
sharing sexy pictures of themselves. I sincerely doubt that it would have been
as newsworthy nor would we have heard a peep about “getting what they asked
for” if the male co-stars of these young women had had their privacy violated
in the same fashion. I wish I were wrong; I wish that the reaction would be the
same, however wrong-minded, if it meant that this were no longer an issue
involving the shaming of the sexually confident and the singling out of women.
The laws involving
privacy and intellectual property need to change in this age of advancing
technology. More than this, as a society our attitudes towards sexuality and sexually
confident women need to change. A tall order, I know, but maybe the silver lining
(ha ha) to this is that people will begin to examine their attitudes, alter
their behaviors and work towards making the aforementioned shifts occur. As I
said, I’m an idealist- and this is my step in that direction.
