It’s a breach of privacy, not a joke

About a week ago it was confirmed that private pictures of the Wisconsin Women’s Volleyball team were leaked and being spread rapidly around different platforms. Some people have spoken out in their defense. Others made memes mocking the players and their situation.

Some videos make comments further sexualizing team or making jokes about their significant others leaving them to chase the women on the team or even blaming them for the leak. 

Anything other than defending these women and agreeing that it was a violation of their privacy is frankly disgusting.

Female athletes are allowed to exist in all the same ways that male athletes are. That includes doing silly locker room celebrations and having their privacy respected while doing them.

Have you ever seen headlines reading “Men’s Team Leaked Photos” because I sure haven’t. In fact, when I looked it up (which was a scary move honestly, I don’t want to see that) the articles that come up are about leaked pictures of new jerseys.

That’s not to say explicit photos don’t get leaked from both men and women. 

However according to a study titled “Nude Leaking: from moralization and gendered violence to empowerment”, when nudes are leaked society acts differently “that, on the one hand, condemns women who express and experience their sexuality, and on the other hand, are tolerant and permissive to the manifestations of male desires.” The same study also found in their results that the men whose nudes were leaked faced less backlash and judgment.

The difference in reaction alone says enough. The saddest thing is seeing other women joking about what happened and asking why they would do that and overall placing the blame on them and not the people circulating the photos.

Everyone deserves respect and privacy.

That doesn’t change if you happen to take explicit pictures of yourself or not. Their rights to privacy didn’t stop at the click of a camera.

I am proud of the college for defending the women’s team and not shaming or trying to punish them. It’s a step in the right direction for how we view situations with leaked explicit pictures. 

Now the rest of the people that are laying the blame at their feet or joking about something that will follow them forever need to take that step and develop some empathy.