This comment was by Archy on the post “Revenge: The Gift That Keeps on Giving“
The thing about reputations being “ruined” is that the more and more this [nude photo revenge] happens, the less damaging it SHOULD get. When more and more people openly share their sexuality it becomes less of a worry because it’s not the rare person in a sea of conservative minds but just yet another in an endless supply of such imagery. If 50% of your co-workers had nudes of them flying around, or we knew that they took nudes for their partner, then who honestly would care?
The big problem really is how we treat nudity in our society. Why do people care if someone gets caught nude? What is there to judge? Someone took pics for themselves or to share with others? Would I care if my child’s teacher was a stripper and had nudes of her around? Hell no, that is their business and having nudes, porn of yourself should not be a negative judgment on your character. I say high 5 to them for being open and sharing something beautiful with others. If I were an employer I would rather live in a society that didn’t care if people got nude, had sex on camera etc as long as they remain professional at work, don’t wear work clothing in the videos/pics, don’t do anything illegal. Why should people lose respect for someone who got nude on a pic? There’s no reason!
Of course when it is meant to be private and shared as revenge, THAT is a huge breach of trust and not a good thing! Keep it private or discuss it with the other person if you want to share it, DON’T do it as revenge. It’s silly, probably illegal (I think it is here in Aus) and damages your own reputation along with the other persons. If that person is evil, then leave them, hate them, but there’s no point in harming them.
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photo: flavio / flickr
About the Editors
The thing about reputations being “ruined” is that the more and more this [nude photo revenge] happens, the less damaging it SHOULD get.
This would call for someone to take the plunge. In order for nudity to become common place enough for nude revenge to lose its effectiveness a lot of people would have to be on the front line and bear the brunt of facing a lot of trouble for this change to come about.
Its like warfare in the days of the Roman Empire. Sure the Romans were confident that they would win battles but they knew that in order to do so a lot of people were going to die. Solution? Force prisoners (captured enemies) to take the front line.
In effect the question is, “Who is going to take the front line in this battle?”
Well in regards to sexting it use to be rare but now it’s increased in popularity, it’s made sexting not so bad to do (at least I don’t view it as bad). When more and more people sext it becomes a normal behaviour. So who is taking the plunge? 1/5th of 18 year old girls report sexting if I remember correctly, probably as many guys too, I think that will help to make it less damaging to a reputation when someone does spread a picture.
I could imagine premarital sex being seen as quite negative in earlier generations for certain areas, now more are doing it so when we hear that such n such had sex before marriage we actually think it’s normal, who cares, good luck to them, etc. The same could happen with nudity, it happened already for bikinis I believe and showing skin, what was once indecent is now NORMAL.
For this to be the case there would have to be virtually no distinction between private and public in the first place, not likely any time soon.
I read an article a couple of years back about an airline pilot who was fired because his ex sent some pictures of him half in his uniform to a paper.
What a ridiculous development. So, when you change clothes as an airline pilot, make sure you take the pants off last. Because, of course, how could anyone trust a pilot who is ever partially nude? This will make the medical check-up for pilots quite challenging….
“Why do people care if someone gets caught nude?”
As a computer technician I’ve encountered nude pictures of co-workers and their significant others on occasion. It is not a comfortable feeling because it feels like I invaded their privacy. It was something I wasn’t supposed to know. Some people will get an added thrill from this. I think to some extent it creates an imbalance in the relationship. One person knows something about the other person that they weren’t supposed to know.
One very pretty woman at work (I want to say girl. She’s in her 20s and 20 years younger than I) would never talk to me when I was in her area. I understand. She’s probably hit on constantly and just assumes I’m hitting on her, but I think it’s part of friendly customer service to chat. I never took it personally. One day she brings in her laptop and asks me to fix it. It was massively infected as I’m checking it a picture of her pleasuring another woman pops up. She apologized profusely, which only made me more embarrassed. I close it, tell her not to worry about it, fix her problem and never mentioned it to anyone at work.
It changed the whole dynamic of the relationship. Now I try to avoid her when I’m in her area because when I talk to her that picture pops into my mind. She now walks up to and starts conversation with me and unfortunately I’m not as adept at deflecting unwanted attention. The revenge stuff is only effective when people you know find it.
I guess I’ve learned to care less over the years. I recently did a photography course and saw a model in her underwear, normally as a guy I should be thinking WOOT but I was too busy trying to make sure the pictures looked fine, etc. Afterwards I found I could still talk to her fine, I just don’t think about it. Nudity to me is no big deal, I’ve seen friends naked, even seen friends having sex but it just doesn’t affect me like that. I feel bad that the young woman in your comment felt the need to apologize, to me that is a major shame because it’s not something to be sorry about. You saw her with another person, to me that’s no big deal and personally I’d treat it as if it is just a picture of her with a friend fully clothed, talk to her as you normally do etc.
I guess it’s a learned skill to try ignore what popped into your mind, if she is that cute would other thoughts have popped into your mind that could be as distracting? If so how do you deal with those? Maybe try use those tactics to deal with this picture. I think avoiding her or changing your behaviour after it would probably make her feel more ashamed, you may find you probably won’t picture it in your mind after a while especially if you tell yourself it’s no big deal. I have a feeling that when it’s made into this massive deal then it becomes hard to deal with, I view it as “good on her, who cares if she did it as long as she and the other consented and all is well”.