Emily Ratajkowski wants to make something very clear: just because she posts sexy photos of herself on social media, doesn’t warrant others the right to freely use her body and images at their disposal.
On Thursday’s episode of High Low with EmRata, the model revealed she’s had “extremely brutal things happen” to her that often results in more money going out than coming in. Among these was a nude photo leak.
“[It] was one one of the most traumatizing experiences of my life. I lost a patch of hair the week it happened,” she said on her podcast. Things got so bad, Ratajkowski feared her budding acting career would end right there.
“It was at a point where I really wanted to be a serious actress and everyone was telling me that I’d been photographed naked so much that it was gonna be hard for people to take me seriously,” she explained. “There was a lot of conversation that these photos had been leaked intentionally, a lot of slut shaming.”
These “extremely intimate” pictures, EmRata said, weren’t up for public consumption. There’s a reason she didn’t share them on Instagram, because “they were intended for someone that I was in love with.”
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That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Ratajkowski was a victim of the 2014 celebrity iCloud hack and was forced to bring in a lawyer and tech team to scrub her leaked photos from the internet. There have also been instances where her body was turned into an art without her consent. She had no choice but to buy the “artwork” herself.
More than once, photos of her have been published in books – and sold — without her approval.
“I’ve had books of photos of me sold without my consent. I’ve had people profit off of my image—usually men—and I’ve got no cut off it, actually a lot of the times it’s cost me money,” she revealed.
While many, including her podcast guest Iggy Azalea, have turned to OnlyFans as a way to control and monetize their images, EmRata said the platform doesn’t necessarily fall in line with her views on modern feminism. However, she’s open to it.
