Laura Freeman Laura Freeman

Proud to be a prude

Forget compromises – women must learn to say ‘No, I’d rather not’

issue 22 April 2017

What advice would you give to this modern moral question posed by my friend’s younger sister? A boy at school had asked her to send him a selfie. Nude, naturally. She was dithering. She liked the boy, a sixth-form crush, and was keen to endear herself. But she knew that if she sent a naked picture he’d pass it on to his friends.

She had thought of compromises: just her breasts, or her bottom coyly reflected in a mirror. It hadn’t crossed her mind to say ‘get lost’. Then, she explained, he’d tell his friends she was a prude. That, to her, was far worse than the First XI seeing her in the nuddy.

It made me glad to have been at school in the age of the Nokia, when the best a boy could hope for — and most weren’t bold enough to ask — was a tiny pixelated photo, which with good eyesight and an active imagination might just look like a naked torso.

I don’t know what my pal’s sister decided.

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