Celebrity outrage over nude photos promotes body shame

Hardly a day goes by anymore without some celebrity's nudity popping up in the news media. A couple of weeks ago, it was Congressman Anthony Weiner's eponymous organ supposedly bulging through boxers in a tweet to a college woman (photo at left). More recently, actress Blake Lively is denying the authenticity of nude self-photos circulating on the Internet, while Jennifer Lopez and her legal team are trying to block the release of video of her dancing nude on her 1997 honeymoon with former husband Ojani Noa.

But it didn't end there. On Friday, it was mixed-martial artist Tito Ortiz's turn to proclaim his innocence in tweeting a full-frontal self-portrait (photo below). "Someone hack my f**king phone," he reportedly tweeted after realizing what had happened.

Oh please.

First of all, Nakedism makes no comment about, nor are we in a position to evaluate, the claims of innocence of the various parties. Whether publicity stunts, flirtations gone wrong, or genuine invasions of privacy, we cannot say.

But the fact remains that in every case, the denuded party claims to be aggrieved or outraged or victimized. Such a state of affairs (pardon the expression) would simply not be necessary if people weren't so terrified by the fact of unclothed human anatomy.

It wasn't always this way. In the 1970s, a number of celebrities posed nude without shame for magazines like Playgirl. But most of these were seen as attempts to rekindle publicity for a dying career. (The same may be true for Ortiz, who hasn't won a fight in some time.) In any case, it never caught on as a trend.

Since then, digital cameras and the rise of the Internet have transformed the ease with which photos can be produced and distributed, not to mention their ubiquity. Americans are awash in digital photo sharing, and many of those include naked flesh.

But one thing hasn't changed: People are still ashamed of being seen naked. In fact, the shame has arguably increased since the 1970s. If the so-called sexual revolution produced lasting results in some areas, it produced only a backlash in the realm of body acceptance.

Despite the taboo nature of nude photos, people continue to take them and pose for them. As we reported last month, as many a quarter of Americans are thought to have taken or posed for naked pictures. Many of these, like the Ortiz photo, appear to be self-portraits.

Perhaps what is needed is a celebrity — preferably many celebrities — to come out of the closet with their nude photos and say, "Yeah this is me, naked. So what?" If enough opinion leaders set a good example of body acceptance, maybe real change would follow.

We have
some simple
advice for celebrities:
Don't get mad —
Get naked.

Our advice to celebrities — and everyone — is simple: Don't get mad. Get naked.

Sadly, Tito Ortiz, despite his reputation for being controversial, might have been one to get the balls rolling. Unlike retired basketball player Dennis Rodman, whose occasional nudity seems to underscore an attempt to show how unusual he is, Ortiz's photo reminds one of the typical in-the-mirror shot that so many of us have seen and taken in a moment of self-pride.

But instead Ortiz chose to react with an expletive and a denial, which, true or not, was designed to distance him from the act of self-revelation.

I'm not sure why he bothered. After all, his girlfriend and mother of his 14-month-old twins happens to be Jenna Jameson — a porn star.