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[Victoria Stecker]

... victim blaming is used to silence and intimidate victims and allows those who assault them to keep doing it with minimal consequence. And it puts the onus on women to avoid being assaulted rather than on men to stop assaulting them.

This perfectly describes the environment of the recent situation. So yes, it absolutely is victim blaming.

I guess the distinction that I make is that in the case of rape, the problem is widespread and cultural. In order to get the hundreds of thousands of annual rapes that occur in the US, you need a shitload of men and women to commit rape. This is a cultural problem, and the solution will be a cultural one.

The phone hacking, on the other hand, was commited by a handful of people (I think the estimates I've seen have been few dozen dedicated guys). This is less of a cultural issue (although it has its roots there) and therefore I think it has to be treated differently.

On the issue of rape, victim blaming is used to distract from the real issue - a culture which encourages or at a minimum permits rape.

To a certain degree, this is absolutely happening here: rather than addressing a culture which treats women's bodies as property/commodities, we're just telling the women to hide.

On the other hand, the perpetrators of this particular crime are a small handful of dedicated assholes, rather than just being any random guy. In that regard I think it's different enough to warrant both approaches.

@ Miz:

It may seem unbelievable, but there's a FUCKING RIDICULOUS portion of the US population, both male and female, that will do what Silas described, blaming women for putting themselves in a position to get raped rather than blaming men for committing rape. I'll get depressed if I start digging up sources right now, but they are there. It is insane, it is terrifying, and it is quite real. I am very thankful to be male in this fucked up country.

[Mizhara]

Allright then. I'll just have to jot down another thing that's frankly unbelievable from a Scandinavian viewpoint. You guys are weird.

[Victoria Stecker]

It's unbelievable from any rational viewpoint. But if you're raised hearing it and never question it? It sticks. You hear your parents say it, you hear people on TV say it, you never stop to think "WOW, THAT'S FUCKED UP." Instead, it just becomes ingrained and accepted.

That actually describes a lot of the shit that's wrong with my beloved country...

[Havohej]

The woman that gets her nude pics stolen has no blame or responsibility for having been hacked. Except she put her pics at high risk on a place it was expected something like that to happen.

The woman that gets raped has no blame or responsibility for having been raped. Except she choose to wear a short skirt and expose herself to sexual temptation, increasing the odds to attract someone with sexual issues.


I don't see the difference, except on a matter of degree of violence. Care to explain again ?

I'll try.

The violation here, the one everybody's so "oh those poor girls" about, is that unintended people are seeing their nudity.  "Every time you look at these pictures, you're literally raping these women" etc.

The rape victim did not put the penis inside of herself.  She is not to blame in any way.

These celebs put their nudity on the internet by uploading their nudity to the internet.

[Havohej]

@Jace: If you see someone trying to silence the people who took and uploaded those pictures anywhere, feel free to let me know. There haven't been any in this thread nor where I've seen this debate elsewhere.

I have seen it in this thread done by most people defending the "no sympathy for them" side. Consciously or unconsciously, call it whatever you want, you did it.

While you agree that it was a crime, you make every attempt to say that they do not deserve sympathy (and so, that they deserved what they got). If that is not trying to silence them our of their "victimization" as you call it, I don't know what it is.

You've got that wrong.  They were stolen from.  They are victims of theft.  By all means, get the authorities involved, hopefully catch and punish the hacker(s).  But don't come out crying about how violated you feel - you put nudes of yourself on the internet!  Instead, they should've put on their big girl panties and said "Hah, uh, yeah... well, this is embarassing.  I took some sexy pics and/or silly vids with my boobs swinging around for my boyfriend/fiance/husband/drinking buddy/personal trainer/whoever-the-fuck-I-wanted to, and there you have it...  Awkward!  If you have any information regarding who may have actually hacked our account, please contact this number."

[Silas Vitalia]

I think we are none of us in a position to dismiss the psychological and emotional impact of having your most private and intimate moments made public to every single person you know and millions of people you don't.  Your parents, relatives, family, friends, and enemies.


I've never understood 'celebrity worship' myself... having a real detestment for both celebrity culture (putting people up on pedestals) and also invading their privacy to feed a salacious public.  As much disdain as I have for whatever x stupid celebrity is doing, I have 10x disdain for every person buying a checkout line celebrity gossip magazine.


Havo I don't think your argument about them 'sharing' really works though; the internet is a part of all of our lives and we have a reasonable expectation that some of our information is secure.

If your bank account were to get randomly hacked and you lose your entire life savings, would you have no sympathy for yourself for storing your money in such a location?

[Havohej]

FDIC Insured.  Analogy doesn't work.

If, however, somebody hacked AOL and exposed my cybersex chatlogs from the 90's when cybersex was a thing, that'd be embarassing.  It also wouldn't be the end of the world.

[Silas Vitalia]

FDIC Insured.  Analogy doesn't work.

If, however, somebody hacked AOL and exposed my cybersex chatlogs from the 90's when cybersex was a thing, that'd be embarassing.  It also wouldn't be the end of the world.

Well how about someone hacks your email credentials and does the full suite of identity theft protocols on you? Generating debt in your name, signing up for all sorts of awful things, billing you, etc, making your life miserable for years, unable to get financing for new purchases and wrecking your credit.  You'd consider this 'your fault' for using internet email?

[Victoria Stecker]

FDIC Insured.  Analogy doesn't work.

If, however, somebody hacked AOL and exposed my cybersex chatlogs from the 90's when cybersex was a thing, that'd be embarassing.  It also wouldn't be the end of the world.

Well how about someone hacks your email credentials and does the full suite of identity theft protocols on you? Generating debt in your name, signing up for all sorts of awful things, billing you, etc, making your life miserable for years, unable to get financing for new purchases and wrecking your credit.  You'd consider this 'your fault' for using internet email?

It's going to be a different matter for celebrities as opposed to ordinary people. None of these women are going to see their careers or lives ruined by this.

The girl next door who has her webcam hacked and pictures distributed to everyone at her high school? Now we're in the neighborhood of life-ruining shit between the personal humiliation and the bullying that'll go with it.

One the one hand, these women are celebrities and that made them targets. On the other hand, these women are celebrities and that will largely insulate them from the worst of the effects.

[Havohej]

FDIC Insured.  Analogy doesn't work.

If, however, somebody hacked AOL and exposed my cybersex chatlogs from the 90's when cybersex was a thing, that'd be embarassing.  It also wouldn't be the end of the world.

Well how about someone hacks your email credentials and does the full suite of identity theft protocols on you? Generating debt in your name, signing up for all sorts of awful things, billing you, etc, making your life miserable for years, unable to get financing for new purchases and wrecking your credit.  You'd consider this 'your fault' for using internet email?

I'd consider it my fault for having my SSN and other pertinent information transmitted over non-secure media (i.e.: email, rather than trusted and verified https sites like CCP's account page for example), yes.  And I would still expect the feds to do their job and sort it out.

[Havohej]

FDIC Insured.  Analogy doesn't work.

If, however, somebody hacked AOL and exposed my cybersex chatlogs from the 90's when cybersex was a thing, that'd be embarassing.  It also wouldn't be the end of the world.

Well how about someone hacks your email credentials and does the full suite of identity theft protocols on you? Generating debt in your name, signing up for all sorts of awful things, billing you, etc, making your life miserable for years, unable to get financing for new purchases and wrecking your credit.  You'd consider this 'your fault' for using internet email?

I'd consider it my fault for having my SSN and other pertinent information transmitted over non-secure media (i.e.: email, rather than trusted and verified https sites like CCP's account page for example), yes.  And I would still expect the feds to do their job and sort it out.

EDIT: And Vik's right with the post above mine - this isn't career or life-damaging in the least, for any of them.  Hell, Kim Kardashian even followed The Fappening with a new round of her own attention whoring to try and ride the wave of increased interest the Fappening victims are seeing.

That's an aside, of course.

[Kala]

But don't come out crying about how violated you feel - you put nudes of yourself on the internet!  Instead, they should've put on their big girl panties and said "Hah, uh, yeah... well, this is embarassing.  I took some sexy pics and/or silly vids with my boobs swinging around for my boyfriend/fiance/husband/drinking buddy/personal trainer/whoever-the-fuck-I-wanted to, and there you have it...  Awkward!  If you have any information regarding who may have actually hacked our account, please contact this number."

But...it is legitimately, a violation.  Hacking personal data from an account is an invasion of privacy, stealing your personal data is theft.
What that personal data contains is relatively immaterial to that violation and crime having occurred.
Not sure why they should have to justify having taken naked photos in the first place - or any photos - as whoops, how embarrassing, my bad, I was caught out. 
It's no one's business why they're there or why they were taken, or what they are photos of.  It's personal stuff.

And yes, that personal data was synced from their phones with the apple icloud.  So it went onto the internet. But it needed hacking to become public.

Really not understanding the importance of the fact these photos were nudes as to why they should be apportioned so much blame for someone stealing their stuff. As far as I knew, taking a nude photo wasn't a crime.  Hacking someones data though, is.  They just don't seem like comparable things in terms of blame to me.

It's going to be a different matter for celebrities as opposed to ordinary people. None of these women are going to see their careers or lives ruined by this.

The girl next door who has her webcam hacked and pictures distributed to everyone at her high school? Now we're in the neighborhood of life-ruining shit between the personal humiliation and the bullying that'll go with it.

One the one hand, these women are celebrities and that made them targets. On the other hand, these women are celebrities and that will largely insulate them from the worst of the effects

The effects may end up being different - though a gross invasion of privacy for both.  But the underlying principle regarding apportion of blame remains exactly the same, in my eyes.
It isn't the celebrities fault someone hacked her stuff.  It isn't the girl next door's fault someone hacked her stuff.  The fault is with the person who hacked them.

[Havohej]

Not sure why they should have to justify

I haven't said anyone should justify anything.  Saying "Oh, welp, I took some pictures." isn't a justification.  It's an acknowledgement of fact.  You don't have to justify anything that isn't wrong.

[Kala]

alright, let me put it another way.  I haven't understood why the default appropriate response should be embarrassment, rather than anger, when someone didn't do anything wrong.

[Havohej]

I may have misrepresented my opinion, then.

I don't think they should even be embarrassed about this.  What I was trying to communicate is that an acknowledgement of the pictures existing and expression of embarrassment would have been more appropriate than the typical "Oh it's so shocking/horrifying/mortifying/terrible/shameful."

Be mad about it, be indignant about it, flip the bird at some paparazzi, whatever.  But don't act like a rape victim, because they were not, in fact, raped.