Female of Legal Age Has Private Sex Life, Has Stood Naked… Holy %#@&!

I’m sure if you marginally follow popular culture/mainstream media, you’ve heard that Vanessa Hudgens – otherwise known to me as “that girl from yet another crappy Disney production; this one happens to be called High School Musical” has been facing the music due to a leaked photo of her standing in her all-together in her bedroom, smiling.

Reuters is reporting that Disney, vehicle for Cold-War-era anti-communist propaganda and enforcer of the status quo, is standing behind their star. As much as I hate Disney and all that it stands for, I’m happy for her that she didn’t get totally screwed by the whole thing.

What I’m not happy about is how people (ie. mostly parents who swear by Disney “wholesomeness”) are reacting.

Look at this gem of a quote, from that Reuter’s article, describing some parents’ reactions (emphasis mine):

“She’s damaged,” Renee Rollins-Greenberg, a Los Angeles mother of two, told Reuters. “She’s got this teeny-bop audience, young preteens and younger, who are admiring her and thinking she’s this wonderful, pure innocent person. Eighteen is awfully young for this kind of display.“

Last time I checked, 18 was of legal age in the U.S. to strip down in front of a camera for money (or for fun). Obviously, multiple people determined that this was an appropriate age somehow, and as arbitrary many of those age minimums can be, 18 is the legal point that you can do almost everything, besides drink, gamble, and rent a car for cheap, so it seems like a good enough age for me.

Even if you doubt whether the picture was intentionally or unintentionally leaked to the public, it wasn’t exactly from a Hustler photoshoot. Firstly, it wasn’t a highly publicized before anyone actually saw the (single!) photograph. Secondly… I’m not going to link to it here – the beauty of the internet is the ease by which one can obtain information – but suffice it to say that the most erotic part of the photograph is that she’s naked. There are many, many more titillating photographs, with people in various states of undress, to be found in the electronic medium.

The whole fuss everyone’s making angers me, because for all intents and purposes, this photo is the kind of thing that any consenting adult – yes, parents, at 18 years old she’s an adult – could be “guilty” of. With the internet and point-and-shoot digital photography, it is simpler than ever to send a visual erotic greeting to your partner, your enemy, or some girl/boy you’re creepily stalking. And fun!

What I care about and want to know isn’t why she did it. In my opinion, that’s her own personal decision; if she chose freely and willingly to do it, without coercion, then more power to her and her comfort with her sexuality.

What actually bugs me are these things:

1. Who the *(&% put it out there (assuming it wasn’t her)? Her co-star boyfriend? Some douche bag who had access to his hard drive? Hackers? A shitty publicist who decided, “Hey, let’s put a naked picture out there. Sure, it’ll cause scandal, but this way, they’ll know she’se a “woman” and it’ll boost her future career! It’s a sure-fire way to get attention outside of teeny-boppers and their parents.”?
   
   If it was all her choice… well, I doubt it was her, but I actually don’t care as much “why” if it was just her decision, because then she would have been in complete control of the situation. Well, of course, besides the possible pandering to a male desire to objectify attractive (and “barely-legal” for those males way past college-age) females in a culture that undervalues women if based solely on their accomplishments, but overvalues them instead for their “accomplishments”. See “Paris Hilton”.
2. It is almost always pictures of naked young female stars/starlets. I could be missing something, but the few times I’ve recall anyone freaking out about male stars/”starlets” (starlots? mini-stars? demi-stars? stars-in-training?) is:
   1. when those horrible pictures of Crisco Adler and his saggy junk came out (I didn’t know who he was, even, until then, and then in just seconds I knew too much), and,
   2. when Daniel Radcliffe was doing naked promotional pictures with a horse for that play he was doing, in which he was supposed to be ridin’ dirty with a girl on some poor animal for a scene.
3. As a continuation of 2, note that those pictures were made a big deal of, not just because the subject was naked, but something was horrible and grotesquely “shocking” about it: saggy junk, the faint and lingering hint of bestiality by some underage guy who is otherwise depicting a boy-wizard. Also, note also that buzz about this stuff usually doesn’t leak into the mainstream media like it does for females.

‘Scuse me while I run screaming in the streets. The idea that she could be “damaged goods” because of this alone is making me go insane.

 

 

(Note: Yes, yes, I know parents are angry about it because she’s supposed to be some “role model” for kids. 1. Refer to my “not a Hustler photoshoot” comment. 2. It wasn’t taken with the intent of showing those aforementioned kids. I don’t think anyone actually thinks she posed like that to expose their little minds to the wide, wide world of smut.)