Shame On The NY Post For Resorting To Slut-Shaming Melania Trump

It's rather funny that in an election allegedly about the pride and power of feminism, we've seen so much slut-shaming.

The New York Post shared an article showing Melania Trump this close to naked, a throwback to a photo shoot she did 20 years ago, before she even met her husband. 

The repulsively sexist and repugnant article, which goes on to be titled "Melania Trump Like You've Never Seen Her," shares racy photos shot in 1995 from a now-defunct French men's magazine.

Times

The piece begins, "Decades before she was sporting designer dresses on the stage of the Republican National Convention as Mrs. Trump, Melania Knauss posed nude in a photo spread for a now-defunct French men's magazine, The Post has learned..."

Ummm... so what? 

Wherever you stand in this election, and whomever you may or may not be voting for, I think we can all agree that Melania is not running for president. Correct? That'd be her husband, right? So why are we hitting below the belt?

This woman, potential first lady or not — and still a human being, regardless — posed for these photos in her twenties. Before she knew her husband. Before this presidential bid was even a glimmer in his eye. She was a model, a very successful one at that, and this was part of her job — and it was no one's business then, and especially not now.

There's nothing about this cover that we can look at and use (or SHOULD use) to influence us one way or another in a year when we're allegedly aglow about our changing world in which the feminist ideal is something of some merit and value in the presidential process.

I'm really opposed to shaming Melania Trump for posing naked. Don't RT that cover please. She did nothing wrong 1/2

— Jennifer Gunter (@DrJenGunter) July 31, 2016

Let me share something with you: None of you even know what feminism or empowering women means. Or, if you do, you don't actually give a crap. Being a woman who happens to be voting for a woman for president doesn't de facto mean you support feminist values. Being a feminist would mean having the freedom and the ability to make an informed choice and vote for the right candidate for you, depending on the issues important to you, whomever that candidate may end up being. In fact, thinking that you should vote for a woman SOLELY because she's a woman is the clear opposite of that — if you wish to vote for her, please, but do so because you think she's the best candidate. But you know what IS a feminist value? Not trashing and degrading another woman just because you can. Just because it makes you feel bigger. And that's what is happening here with Melania. Trump has issued a statement saying these photos took place "before he knew his wife," which is a way of saying it doesn't count; she wasn't yet in his life, and therefore her actions were insignificant to the larger picture of the opus that is him. But actually, it's kind of a back-handed and dismissive statement in its own right. And speaking of Trump, it's odd that The New York Post seemed to have achieved the impossible. For the first time ever, I went into a conversation feeling as if Trump was being treated unfairly. It's true: this entire event was completely out of line and he should, rightfully, be completely incensed this crap was being pulled on his wife.  Because, seriously, world: WTF? What do his wife's photos have to do with anything? What does she have to do with anything? Do the photos make her of less value as a woman? As a human being? Are we so used to sexualizing and objectifying and degrading females that a major metropolitan newspaper splashing these photos on their front page is acceptable to anyone?

The NY Post published naked pics of Melania Trump. I was so disgusted I almost didn't look. — Paul Lander (@paul_lander) August 1, 2016

Twitter suggests yes. And that is horrifying. The photos existing isn't. The way people react to them? Sure as hell makes a major statement about just how screwed up our world really has become.

Melania is a private citizen. Melania isn't running for president. Melania is a mother with a child who is absolutely old enough to pass upon these papers and see photos of his mother, or go to camp and be abused by his peers over something that has nothing to do with him, either.

Of course, I know anything is possible. It's not impossible Trump or someone on his team leaked these photos for the simple reason of distracting us from other crazy stuff going on. But he wouldn't do that to his own wife, right? RIGHT? Gawker thinks maybe.

Are we forgetting that on the Democratic Party side of the aisle we have a potential First Dude who was staining his intern's blue dress with semen twenty years ago? Roughly the same time Melania was taking those photos? Is that a front page story now? Does anyone care? Is Bill just a rascal but Melania a dirty, dirty girl? Has anything changed?

People, citizens, humans, fellow womankind, whomever is reading this: Please listen to what I'm saying:

Any time you reduce the value of a woman to her sexuality. Any time you reduce the value of a woman to her appearance. Any time you refer to her "hotness" as a measure of her worth, you're being a sexist assh*le.

It's completely misogynistic, demeaning and disgusting. And if you're doing so while patting yourself on the back for being a feminist and voting for the woman candidate, you're the worst kind of hypocrite EVER. You cannot claim to support the candidate who supports women's rights and gender equality and then sink to this level. It just doesn't play.

There's plenty of place to criticize either candidate. But their sexuality, or that of their spouse, should never be a part of either argument, pro or con.

The angle that Melania Trump is unfit to be first lady bc she took nude pics is the left's version of body shaming. pic.twitter.com/pPJuMvqjaz

— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) July 31, 2016

It's worth noting this isn't the first time nude photos of Melania have been used in this campaign. Earlier this year, anti-Trump ads ran in Utah featuring racy Melania photos as an exhibition of Trump's "lack of family values."

And there's also the chance that The New York Post, a conservative publication, placed this story in order to distract people from actual real issues (i.e., everything that happened during the recent conventions). And you fell for it hook, line, and sinker.

Slut-shaming and sexualizing of women once again. We've come so far, huh?