Since the Jennifer Lawrence photo hack, Internet security has come under scrutiny. But why do many young women feel the need to take and share nude selfies in the first place? Don’t get me wrong: I think hackers are morally reprehensible and should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. But I also think that we need to build an alternative to the dogma “If you’ve got it, flaunt it.” Young women are told that it’s a sign of being proud of your sexuality to “sext” young men””a philosophy that has turned girls into so many flashing beacons, frantic to keep the attention of the males in their lives by striking porn-inspired poses.
Today if you watch the famous Algerian-French singer Enrico Macias singing to his late wife, Suzy, about how he “won her love,” their dynamic seems as if it’s from another planet. Some might watch this decades-old video and imagine her passivity indicates that she wasn’t empowered. But I see something else in her shy manner and dancing eyes: a drama between them that was not for the public to see. The words of his song are certainly moving””“In the exile’s nights, we were together/ My son and my daughter are truly from you/ I spent my life ”¦ waiting for you”””and yet there was even more than what those beautiful lyrics revealed.
The pressure on girls today to take sexy selfies comes out of a culture that routinely equates modesty with shame, instead of recognizing it for what it really is: an impulse that protects what is precious and intimate.
I have a right to walk through Central Park at night all alone with $100 bills hanging out of my pocket. Common sense and prudence tells me not to do it. Computer and social media are totaly insecure. If you post it someone can get it. Common sense and prudence tells you not to do it.
I am simply unable to imagine why a woman would take a nude selfie, or why people make tapes of their intimate behavior, much less the foolishness of storing such images out of their physical possession or sending them over the air.
I’m with the two of you. But I do wonder if we’ve missed a huge wave-trend and we’re pretty much the tiny minority that does not take nude selfies.
I can’t conceive of a good reason to do it, but maybe 95% of the nation has?
Sarah, I think the answer is that huge numbers of women have lost all self-respect.