The Obsession with Naked Celebrities

Last weekend, the internet went into overdrive as leaked naked images of female celebrities like actress Jennifer Lawrence, singer Ariana Grande, and model Kate Upton were uploaded on the site 4Chan. It once again sparked discussions about women’s rights and everyone’s obsession with seeing a naked celebrity.

            In her article for The Guardian, Hadley Freeman hit on the people who argued that these celebrities who have naked pictures have brought it upon themselves to be exposed in this way. She further stressed that this exemplifies sexism not just in the entertainment industry and in the internet in general. Whenever a news item is posted with a woman being in the headline, they always presented by their sex.

            The Internet’s obsession with naked celebrities is has gotten more rabid because in the internet everyone is on the same level no matter if you’re an Oscar winning actress with a lot of memes under your belt or your just a regular douche looking up at the images of naked female celebrities. At the same time, it highlights their celebrity status, the naked images generates more buzz because these are from people who we idolize, loathe, live vicariously through etc. It becomes a trending topic because these are people who appear to unattainable, living a seemingly perfect lives, and an image of them in all their naked glory makes them like us. Ordinary.

            This latest scandal will definitely make the discussion about sexism and women’s rights in the forefront again in blogs and forums but also how secured our private images really are. Majority of people who have naked pictures of themselves would probably think twice now about taking some more naked selfies of them. But what we all should remember is that what we probably look alike in our nakedness and looking at these images violates their rights of having small piece of privacy in their public lives.