“When will women learn? Learn what? That our bodies do not belong to us? That we have no right to determine who sees those bodies, touches those bodies, fucks those bodies, and shares in those bodies? Honey, we don’t need to learn that. We already know the answer. We don’t have those rights. We are not allowed to be the masters of ourselves, only the gatekeepers.”
The post went flat out viral – at the time of writing it’s gotten 19,807 shares. It’s struck a nerve with people everywhere (I’m disinclined to say ‘women’ here), because she’s fucking right.
Blaming women for taking nude photographs instead of the total fuck bois who share and publish them contributes to rape culture. Publishing nude photos of people without their permission is a sex crime. It’s akin to digital rape.
This is 2015 and there’s a high, high chance that you or someone you know has taken a nude photo, either for themselves, or to send to someone they trusted.
Clementine Ford accompanied the post with a Facebook-appropriate, semi-nude photo, with the message “Hey #Sunrise Get Fucked” scrawled on her chest. She told the world without shame that she’s one of millions who have taken nude photographs:
“I have taken nude photos and I have chosen who gets to see them. That doesn’t make me a fool or ‘asking for trouble’ or somehow deserving of assault. It means that I expect they’ll be kept private and treated as personal. It means that I expect to live in a world where sexual predators, revenge pornographers and misogynists aren’t defended on morning television shows while their victims are demonised as having made a mistake. What do you know, it turns out that I actually think we should act as if men are better than that.”
And then, just because some COMPLETE AND UTTER MORONS DIDN’T GET THE POINT, douchebag after douchebag messaged Ms Ford, asking her for nudes.
So she published them. And so will we.
You can see all of them here:
And this is how some d-bags choose to respond to a post about women’s bodily autonomy and rights to privacy.
Posted by Clementine Ford on Thursday, 18 June 2015
And fyi, there will be more to come.
Have been sent about 20 requests for nudes since posting that FB status. Screencapping all of them to share later.
— Clementine Ford (@clementine_ford) June 18, 2015
Asking a stranger for naked photos is sexual harrassment. Asking someone for naked photos because you’ve read her intelligent, bang-on post about victim blaming and consent is straight up fucking stupid.
If you haven’t read Clementine Ford’s post yet, and are preparing to argue that “ppl who take photos of their boobs r asking for it lol”, then read it first.
I have taken nude photos of myself and sent them to lovers. I’ve taken nude photos of myself when I’m bored. I’ve taken…
Posted by Clementine Ford on Thursday, 18 June 2015
Sunrise has since deleted their Facebook post, and Yahoo7 have apologised.
“We apologise unreservedly to anyone offended by a post that was made on the Sunrise Facebook page regarding nude photos and online security yesterday, and in particular to the victims. Whilst it was not our intention we appreciate that the wording of the post was insensitive. The post has been removed.”
We’re lucky in Australian culture that steps are being taken, however slowly, to stop victim blaming women for getting raped. It’s well past time that we started applying this attitude to perpetrators of digital sex crimes, too.
