
Being A Victim Of Revenge Porn Forced Me To Change My Name - BrandonMarc
http://thoughtcatalog.com/dr-holly-jacobs/2013/11/being-a-victim-of-revenge-porn-forced-me-to-change-my-name/
======
jakewu1982
This is not a black and white case. You need to read Ryan Seay's side of the
story to get a better perspective of how things likely went down -
[http://jacobsvsseay.com](http://jacobsvsseay.com)

~~~
mistermann
The essence of his side of the story is that the pictures and videos were here
idea, and she enthusiastically produced them and sent them to her, and that
their subsequent appearance on the internet was not his doing but the act of
hackers who compromised his account and perhaps also obtained videos from
Justin TV. He has enough evidence posted that it seems plausible and in my
opinion that she's being a bit less than honest in her public persona about
what actually happened, basically, that he coerced her into producing the
content which he then distributed, when the reality may have been she's a bit
of a wild girl in secret and would like to keep that aspect of her personality
a secret.

An excerpt:

In closing, if I could impart any words to Ms. Jacobs, it would be the
following… I’m sorry that someone did this to you, but it wasn’t me. It never
was, isn’t and never will be me. At some point, you will have to accept that.
Please don’t underestimate people’s ability to forgive. While it may not be
possible for me to do so, people will understand if you reverse and tell the
truth. From your constantly changing timeline and story, I’m concerned for you
and I hope you’re talking to someone. It has been almost a half-decade since
we last spoke, yet you seem to have crafted this detailed and elaborate
construct in your head of what I have been doing all of these years. If this
is sincerely what you believe and isn’t part of some elaborate and malicious
plan, then I hope you get help; it’s frightening and sad to see. It can’t be
me and I have absolutely no desire for it to be, but I hope you’re talking to
someone. While I’m considerably angry with you and appalled by your actions, I
don’t hate you. This is merely the beginning of our legal battle and it will
assuredly get much worse from here, but in all matters besides these, I wish
you well. We disagree on many matters and we will continue to disagree on many
matters, but above all things, be honest, stay strong and please, don’t do
anything stupid.

------
diminoten
I can't imagine myself caring enough to deal with this the way she did.

I think it might be a gender gap thing - I literally can't understand this
reaction.

Obviously I'm not an idiot, and would never cause this kind of pain to someone
else, but it's foreign pain. It's the kind of pain I read about, and
understand it exists in this world, but have no frame of reference for, like
starvation or something like malaria.

And what are employers doing, attempting to confront their employees about it?
Are these employers not educated enough in how the Internet works to know
precisely the intent of those who've contacted them with this information?
Perhaps an employer notifies the victim of the harassment, but certainly
doesn't attempt to take consequential action against the employee regarding
the material.

~~~
ohazi
> And what are employers doing, attempting to confront their employees about
> it? Are these employers not educated enough in how the Internet works to
> know precisely the intent of those who've contacted them with this
> information? Perhaps an employer notifies the victim of the harassment, but
> certainly doesn't attempt to take consequential action against the employee
> regarding the material.

While I understand where you're coming from with this... it seems pretty
naive/optimistic to honestly expect most people to behave this reasonably.
Most people are not as smart as you and/or have some holier-than-thou moral
perspective to throw into the mix and wouldn't have the first clue how to
respond appropriately to something like this.

~~~
bambax
Many people may indeed have a holier-than-thou moral perspective, but
certainly not all of them?

------
saalweachter
A lot of crusaders get it backwards, trying to protect society from porn (or
its cousin, prostitution).

I would like to live in a society that was safe for porn.

~~~
thenerdfiles
I see the point here. Attempting to put legal dogs onto this type of issue
does not at all cover the scope of how society's perception pans out.

The fact that a legal system might punish someone does not in any way
demotivate the behavior but merely makes it more intractable when it does
happen. That someone is punished doesn't change the motivations behind the
victim's name change, and other efforts.

The question still stands, for companies or institutions of victims like this:
Do we want to affiliate ourselves with someone who has a love life that cannot
be respected[0], that is out of line with our organization's ethos?

Punishment does not at all address this cultural problem: _What_ is porn ?

[0]: "But the presence of Hip as a working philosophy in the sub-worlds of
American life is probably due to jazz, and its knife-like entrance into
culture, its subtle but so penetrating influence on an avant-garde
generation—that post-war generation of adventurers who (some consciously, some
by osmosis) had absorbed the lessons of disillusionment and disgust of the
Twenties, the Depression, and the War. Sharing a collective disbelief in the
words of men who had too much money and controlled too many things, they knew
almost as powerful a disbelief in the socially monolithic ideas of the single
mate, the solid family and the respectable love life." \--
[http://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/the-white-
neg...](http://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/the-white-negro-
fall-1957)

~~~
johnchristopher
> The question still stands, for companies or institutions of victims like
> this: Do we want to affiliate ourselves with someone who has a love life
> that cannot be respected[0], that is out of line with our organization's
> ethos?

If you do not align with the victim in these 'revenge porn' cases then you
reinforce the extortionist's position. Does that align with any organization's
ethos ?

~~~
thenerdfiles
It's not clear to me that the extortionist has a "position" or that it goes
without saying that any organization who does not sympathize is at the same
point aligning with the "revenge" sentiment.

Incidents like this can happen without the "revenge" component. Bots and
malware might do this.

The organization believes it has PR to manage.

------
droopyEyelids
Man it's a horrible issue here. I'm glad they're making progress but worried
about adding some more 1st amendment exemptions.

I can imagine this turning into a tool the powerful use to suppress "damaging
information" or something along those lines. Maybe so long as it stays
restricted to uncensored pictures of nudity things will go well.

~~~
mathgladiator
I don't think this is a 1st amendment exception at all; I'm surprised laws
around likeness rights (or even copyright) are not at play here.

~~~
andrewfong
Copyright belongs to the photographer, not the subject. So if the ex took the
photo, the victim is out of luck.

Likeness rights are a bit weird and vary by state, but generally, they only
apply to using a person's likeness to advertise or imply an endorsement of
some product or service.

That said, there are more privacy-centric laws in various states that might
apply here. But those laws don't really draw clear lines in the way that
likeness or copyright laws would. Instead, these privacy laws usually turn on
whether the information being disclosed is "newsworthy" \-- not exactly a very
objective standard.

~~~
crag
"Copyright belongs to the photographer, not the subject. So if the ex took the
photo, the victim is out of luck."

Only if the subject gave permission (usually by signing a document) to the
photographer.

This is a very different situation. A jealous ex posting pictures he took of
them all over the net. This girl had the right to expect those pictures to
remain private.

If he broke the law is debatable. But there's no denying her ex is a first
class punk.

~~~
andrewfong
> Only if the subject gave permission (usually by signing a document) to the
> photographer.

Permission from the subject is not required under U.S. copyright law. Unless
there's some other agreement in place, it belongs to the photographer. From
[http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-
fairuse.html](http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-fairuse.html):

"""The owner of the “work” is generally the photographer or, in certain
situations, the employer of the photographer. Even if a person hires a
photographer to take pictures of a wedding, for example, the photographer will
own the copyright in the photographs unless the copyright in the photographs
is transferred, in writing and signed by the copyright owner, to another
person. The subject of the photograph generally has nothing to do with the
ownership of the copyright in the photograph."""

Permission may matter for likeness rights, but as I mentioned earlier, that
generally only applies in the context of advertising or implied endorsement.

> But there's no denying her ex is a first class punk.

Agreed, but it doesn't change the copyright analysis.

------
lcedp
The guy is a total dick of course, but more importantly what never stops to
amaze me what kind of dicks are the "normal" people that surround us on the
work and other places. So suppose nude pictures of my
coworker/acquaintances/etc appear and everyone becomes aware of this - well I
will see these pictures and it might certainly give me some giggles but I
won't think anything bad about this person - what's wrong with naked body,
anyway? and who haven't taken such pictures at some point? Those crowd people
are far more scary then the asshole who shared it in the first place.

------
knackernews
I know love makes you do stupid things, but we live in a time of instant
publishing, cloud galleries, face recognition and the biggest lie in college
that is "I won't show anyone, I promise".

Even celebrities with hundreds of thousands to burn can't control how their
images go around on the internet. So when your clothes are off and you're
worried about strangers seeing you, don't use the camera. Who knows when app
will show up that allows any photo of a face to be instantly matched up
against the billions of profile pics on Google+ / Facebook.

------
robomartin
I hope this doesn't come out wrong. She is a victim of a horrific crime. There
is no doubt about that whatsoever. Anywhere else this guy would have been
beaten to a pulp. If someone did this to my daughter...well, let's leave it
there.

Having said that, I have to wonder about the mental framework within which a
girl thinks it might be a good idea to allow the taking of nude pictures and
videos of herself.

Please, someone help me understand this, because I clearly don't. The
explanation and justification would be far more powerful if it came from a
woman.

For a model or aspiring actress it might very well be par for the course and
that's that. That anyone else would think this isn't something that will one
day come back to bite you is beyond me. In the case of the OP we are talking
about a PhD student which, to me at least, implies a certain degree of
intelligence and, hopefully, good judgement.

Never write an email, take pictures or videos you don't want the world to see.
Never. Ever.

Then there's the other side of these situations. No honorable man would even
propose his girlfriend to engage in taking such pictures or videos. Why?
Because if you truly care for her you will always actively protect her.

If drinking and drugs were involved it could be another matter. We could
rightfully question the moral and ethical choices made by people willing to
compromise their good judgement this way.

Yes, I tend to think in some cases it takes two to tango. The guy is a
slimeball who deserves financial consequences and jail time. If the pictures
were taken with her consent, she is at fault for not showing good judgement.
It was stupid and sometimes you pay for doing dumb things.

What she experienced was extreme and it should be criminal. All I am saying is
laws only protect you AFTER a crime was committed, not before. The only way to
protect yourself from this kind of crime is to behave in such a way that it is
impossible to find yourself in that predicament, ever.

Another way to put it is: Killing is a crime with many laws and case law
covering it. This is not going to protect you if you walk into a dark alley in
a seedy neighborhood and get killed. Yes, the murderer is likely to go to jail
if caught and convicted. What got you killed was your decision to enter that
alley in the first place. You can't live life thinking there are no criminals
around you. Passing laws does little to change this.

If you are a woman reading this please remember: if you are in a relationship
with someone who wants to take nude or compromising pictures or video of you,
run away from that man as quickly as you can. He does not respect or protect
you. He does not look after your best interests. He is an asshole. If you
allow it be prepared for these pictures to end-up anywhere at all. Do not do
it. It could come back and ruin your life. And please, don't drink or do drugs
to such an extent that you lose the ability to exercise good judgement.

Got to wonder about the girls in those girls gone wild videos. How many of
them will look back at what they did and think it was a good idea.

~~~
indrax
Nude pictures are fun. For all the reasons it's fun to take pictures at all,
plus love and sex.

In a relationship that isn't really obviously screwed up, you have basic trust
for the other person.

Part of that trust ought to include encryption, but that's another story.

I think that this situation is atypical. Leaked or lost personal photos might
be available to the whole world, but most don't go viral linked to your name.
So the 'normal' risk of a douchebag boyfriend is relatively low.

And why is it a risk at all? Why isn't it just safe and fun? What's the harm?
Take this passage:

>My professional reputation? Tainted. My parents’ perception of me as their
angelic baby girl? Blown to smithereens and then reassembled in the likeness
of a leper. >I sobbed daily.

Where is the harm here? It is coming from her potential employees, colleagues,
and sadly her parents. They're the ones with screwed up attitudes about sex.
It's their fault, not her fault, because she did nothing wrong. I _hope_ their
views are not as harsh as she thinks. But even if she's imagining it those are
the ideas we get from our culture.

I get that you're worried about it coming out wrong, but much of your post was
similarly victim blaming. The actual solution to murderers in alleys is to
send police into the alleys. Not restructure our lives to be tolerant of the
constant risk of murder. We should not just cede power to evil because the
alley is dark.

And this is not a physical attack, all the harm is in the views others take of
the victim. Your judgement of her judgement is part of the harm that the
attacker expected.

A betrayal of trust should be blamed on the betrayer, not the betrayed. Is
there room for learning better who to trust? Sure. Should we expect people to
act like they can't trust anyone they love, and add scorn because they were
the ones who encountered trust-evoking douchebags? No.

Personal porn should be fun and safe and relatively inconsequential, for all
the reasons that love and sex and photos are fun.

------
juskrey
I think she is very seriously deluded towards her life in general.

