Putting Shame Where It Belongs

“But, I just wish I’d never shared my nudes with him. I wish I’d never taken them. I’m a total joke.”

Those were the words a 20 year old young woman said to me. She had no idea if her friend was actually going to share them or not. She didn’t have the stomach to look. That was my job. It was early in the morning and I was on my computer creating an account for her to upload any URLs or images of her online abuse — ie nonconsensually shared intimate images — into our tech partner’s survivor portal.

I found over a dozen websites where her nudes were shared. A simple online search on Google returned two full pages of her abuse content. We needed to collect each URL, create a case account, and then request each platform remove these images.

“I just feel like no one will ever see me the same again,” she wrote.

And then we needed to scan for more images. I was already moving into these steps but I could not stop thinking about what she'd said.

While I felt anger for what she — and thousands of survivors I know — have been through, I knew that anger wouldn't help. We needed to go deeper into the roots of her shame.

“I’m a total joke” — these four words were sitting with me while I worked to create her case and begin getting her content down. The images were hard to see. Her innocent and loving photos shared with her friend had evolved into content she never agreed to. Yet, those four words showed me where her mind had already gone.

The list every survivor recites

I stopped uploading the URLs into our form and asked her: whose fault do you really think this is? A few hours later, I got a list of replies. I shouldn't have taken them. I shouldn't have trusted him. I should have known better. I should have—

I've heard some version of that list from almost every survivor I've sat with — hundreds of them, at this point, at every hour of the day and night. The details change. The list doesn't. It's always some variation of I did this to myself, recited like a confession, when the person on the other end of the phone did nothing but exist while someone else made a choice about her.

Years ago, I was talking with a therapist and he said that we often want to blame ourselves first because if we admit that it was not our fault, it kind of implies that the world is chaos and this could happen again. It's why many people often victim blame. It's not always about them being jerks. Sometimes they are just scared it could happen to them. Never okay to victim blame, but that kind of made sense to me.

I explained that to the young woman I was working with and she said, “well, it could happen again. I feel out of control of my own body and life right now.”

Shame is a reflex, not a verdict

I have worked with and alongside over 2,000 survivors of sex trafficking, domestic violence and image-based sexual abuse. All forms of harm designed to take the power from the person being abused. And, when you start to take your power back by — for example — taking your images off the internet, going to therapy, sharing with a friend, reporting your abuser to the police — you are going to have a rollercoaster of emotions. Some survivors react with anger. Some self isolate. Some self harm. And almost all have some level of shame. But shame should not be a self-verdict. It's a reflex that shows up without facts, often before real healing and justice has had a chance to take hold.

So that night, I didn't go back to the takedown requests right away. I told her this:

“What someone else did to you is theirs to carry. It's their shame. And their shame should not get free rent living inside your mind.”

Taking a photo isn't a crime. Trusting someone isn't a crime. Anyone who takes joy, profits, spreads, or otherwise engages with someone's nonconsensual intimate images — that's where the shame belongs too. Not with you.

We went back to the URLs after that. Case account, platform after platform, request after request — our tech partner's automated system will do most of the work to take down the abuse that never should have been on the internet to begin with. And I know the takedowns won't be the climactic ending to her journey. It's one mile in thousands. But it's vital. That is why I do what I do.

If you are holding that list right now

If you're the one holding that list of shame right now — I shouldn't have, I should have known, I did this to myself — I want you to put it down, the same way I asked her to. Even if just for a moment. The shame was never yours to carry. It belongs with the person who chose to hurt you, and nowhere else. Write that down. Tell a friend. Scream it into a pillow. Anything but holding it inside and letting it weigh your heart down.

I know she could not fully hear me as I was telling her that this shame is not hers. She may never fully feel it. But I said it because I hope somewhere inside, the conversation we had will start to bloom inside her as she seeks her own path to being whole again.

If you're a survivor and need support, reach out to us — it's free and confidential, no matter where you are in your journey.