Taylor Swift And Why Naked Pictures Aren’t So Bad

jtrain10 years ago

I’ve looked at every photo of every celebrity released since “Nude Monday.” Several times. And then again. Here are some things I’ve learned:

1. Kate Upton is the only celebrity who comes off as even remotely well-adjusted. Her photos were fun, normal, and lacking in self-consciousness, like a gal who really loves and trusts her boyfriend, Detroit Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander (oof, more on that in a second). The rest of these girls’ photos are dripping with desperation. “LIKE ME,” they scream with serpentine poses and WTF costumes. (Et tu, Jennifer Lawrence?!) Then there’s Upton in the middle of all this, just tits out and thumbs up. Take it or leave it, motherfuckers.

2. Speaking of Kate Upton’s boyfriend Justin, dude’s got some ‘splainin’ to do. The ratio of Kate Upton to not Kate Upton on that camera roll was one to one AT BEST. I’ve got odds they don’t make it through September.

3. Intellectually, I’m acknowledging there must be some immorality at play for me to so thoroughly indulge in these women’s private moments made public. However, I feel zero guilt. It’s possible the Internet broke my conscience. Yet, I’m certain that if a stranger on the street offered me nude photos of a good female friend, I’d decline, or at least I’d regret looking. There’s something about the “otherness” of these famous people, their constant exposure making them something other than human. They already sell their bodies for consumption, so I’m forced to wonder what difference is it if their clothes are off? What veil of puritanical values are we hiding behind? The very thing that made a woman like Jennifer Lawrence famous is the very thing that drives people in droves to photo-sharing sites to see her naked. That impulse to see her freakish beauty is so instinctively human that I find it hard to blame anyone, save for the guy(s) who went to awful and ridiculous lengths to obtain them.

What I find most interesting is that if these nude photos were simply of Jennifer Lawrence or Victoria Justice or whoever getting out of the shower, this would be a non-issue. It would still be an invasion of privacy, no doubt, but the feeling embarrassment would be nil. It’s a pair of tits, end of story. What’s humiliating, and what makes this all so scintillating, are the poses, the self-objectification, and the overall sexuality of these shots. It’s an implicit acknowledgement of their own attractiveness, which is kind of a no-no in a world where you’re graded on how humble you stay.

So, for me, this is kind of a “hallelujah” moment, even past the fact that I can take “to see J. Law’s boobies” out of my personal mission statement (really streamlines that bad boy down to “learn how to ollie a skateboard”). I’m so fucking tired of of the faux-humility PR game these starlets are dump-trucking into our open maws. Google “Jennifer Lawrence humble” and get steamrolled by puff pieces on how she farts sometimes or that she tripped once at her prom. At the offensive vanguard of all this sits the Queen of “I’m Just Like You, Except I’m Rich and Famous and Nothing Like You,” Taylor Swift, who just released her video where she dances awkwardly. Then she refused to jump off the stage at the VMAs in a staged “rebellion” of standard pop spectacles. The grand irony of all these “uncool” actions is that they’re designed to make her MORE POPULAR. I find myself hate-watching interviews with her because I can’t believe someone can be so disingenuous. Like this one. She comes off as something far worse than just the popular girl in high school; rather, the popular girl who talks to unpopular girls because she sees it as charity. It’s sanctimony squared. Every action, every word is so calculated to appeal to the most amount of people while flagrantly denying that she’s trying to appeal to anyone. It’s appalling.

What Taylor needs–what I need–is that infamous fall from grace. We need egregious beaver shots and pouty looks at the camera. Come on, Taylor, these other girls with leaked nudes are now free to be complicated, arrogant, rich, famous, beautiful, and human. They’re free to be themselves, probably for the first time in ages. You are something else entirely: a walking lie, our modern obsession with contradictions. You don’t need the weight of society’s expectations on you. Shake…shake it off.

4. Bar Refaeli has a pretty gross anus. I wouldn’t have guessed that.

Image via YouTube