Emily Ratajkowski – of “Blurred Lines” music video
fame – and Kim Kardashian – of, well, fame
fame – posed together last week for a dual topless selfie that
blew up the internet. “We are more than just our bodies,” Ratajkowski captioned
the photo, “but that doesn’t mean we have to be shamed for them or our
sexuality.” In other words, two young women who launched their careers by
sexualizing themselves are tired of being either criticized for it or reduced
to sex objects, so they defiantly sexualized themselves again to make that
point.
Kim and Emily (Kimily?) have had each other’s
(usually bare) back lately in terms of warding off body-shaming and criticism
for their compulsive nudity. Emily came to Kim’s defense recently after the
latter took heat for getting naked again on Instagram. Emily wrote Kim a supportive note saying, “It's so important that we let women
express their sexuality and share their bodies however they choose.” This
empowered Kim, who followed up with another nude selfie captioned, “#liberated.”
Some critics, feminists among them, aren’t
buying the women’s claims that they are feminists fighting to liberate female
sexuality. Those critics reasonably suspect that Kimily are exploiting that
excuse and capitalizing on the notoriety. But if sincere, the duo may believe
they’re liberating themselves through nudity, but they’re actually digging themselves
deeper into the hole they made through excessive nudity in the first place.
Kim Kardashian was introduced to the world
through her BFF Paris Hilton, who was the Kim Kardashian of her day. Then Kim eclipsed
her friend’s renown by appearing in a sex tape that some claim was shrewdly orchestrated
by her own momager, Kris Jenner, who understood the potential of exploiting
Kim’s sexuality. Kim has since gone on to become arguably the world’s most
famous woman, largely through flaunting her iconic curves and sometimes posing
nude.
Emily Ratajkowski first blew up large by cavorting fully naked in the music video for Robin Thicke’s song “Blurred Lines,” a
gig she got after Thicke saw her topless on the cover of an erotica mag. That video
shot her to the top of the sexiest women list of every men’s magazine. She has since
continued to pose topless for magazine covers. In an attempt to move on to more
respectable gigs, she secured a small but prominent role alongside Ben Affleck
in Gone Girl – in which she seduced
Affleck and went topless.
In response to the criticism, Ratajkowski told InStyle, “The implication is that to be sexual is to
be trashy because being sexy means playing into men's desires. Why does the
implication have to be that sex is a thing men get to take from women and women
give up?” But female sexuality is not
considered trashy – it’s acting trashy
that is considered trashy. She seems to be missing the point that when she puts
her sexuality on public display at the drop of a bra, then she is giving it up to every man who looks,
and she is courting a trashy reputation. If she doesn’t want that, she needs to
keep her sexuality more private.
Especially as a man, my opinion on the topic
is easily dismissed as sexist, “body-shaming,” and repressive. “It’s my body, I
can do whatever I want with it” is the feminist motto today. But I’m not
telling Kimily what to do with their
bodies (I’m actually perfectly happy for them to share their sexuality). I’m
telling them what they can expect if
they persist in getting near-naked for the world. They can expect to continue
to be seen as little more than boobs (literally and figuratively) and ass.
“To me, ‘sexy’ is a kind of beauty, a kind of
self-expression, one that is to be celebrated, one that is wonderfully female,”
Ratajkowski wrote in an essay for Lena Dunham’s website. That’s true – but
if she, Kardashian, and others like them truly want to be celebrated for
anything besides sexy self-expression, if they want the world to respect them
for their other qualities, then a little modesty is in order. When even Miley
Cyrus calls you “tacky,” it’s time to rein it in a bit.
This is not just a criticism of women; if a
male celeb perpetually presented himself provocatively, occasionally posing for
bottomless selfies, he would be considered trashy too, if not perverse. Yes,
our media and pop culture relentlessly and shamelessly sexualize young women –
the younger the better, tragically – but the way to counter that is not to push
the envelope of it while pretending that you’re breaking down cultural barriers
about nudity. The way to counter it is to remind our culture something that we
all once accepted: that it is possible to be drop-dead sexy without also being
trashy.
And as role models, what is the message
Kimily are sending to young girls who idolize their beauty and success? Those
girls are absorbing the lesson that that Lifestyle of the Rich and Famous is within
reach if they too are willing to bare all and/or leak a sex tape. They’re
learning that breasts can get them immeasurably further than brains or
character.
Sorry Kimily and feminists (Kiminists?), you
can’t have it both ways. Of course a woman should have the right to share her
body however she chooses – but choices have consequences, and she can’t hypersexualize
herself and then complain about the public getting the wrong idea about her. It
is incredibly naïve to believe that a beautiful young woman can share topless
photos of herself (no matter how artistic or tasteful) with the world, and not have
men (and women too, for that matter) feed like vampires off her sexuality.
Should it be that way? Perhaps not, but
that’s the way it is; it is human nature, which hasn’t changed in thousands of
years, and Kim Kardashian and Emily Ratajkowski aren’t going to pave the way
for a cultural paradigm shift through topless selfies. They’re only going to be
ogled.
From Acculturated, 4/4/16
