If there's anything truly shocking about this, it's that it took as long as it did:
Nicole (Snooki) Polizzi is causing a buzz in the media just one day after her fellow "meatball" Deena Cortese was slapped with handcuffs for disorderly conduct at a bar in Seaside Heights.
In photos obtained by Egotastic and The Daily Mail, the pregnant reality star poses nude in front of a mirror, making seductive faces as she shows off her tanned physique in several cell phone pictures.
"Clearly these are old and personal photos that were not meant for the public," her rep tells Us Weekly. "It's a shame someone decided to leak them for obvious personal gain."
What personal gain, exactly? In the wake of the News Corp scandal, are tabloid sites actually paying for hacked nudes? I have a hard time believing whomever's responsible would have the stones to demand money for these.
There's also the slim chance Snooki leaked them herself, which seems incomprehensible to normal human beings, but really isn't any less inexplicable than agreeing to appear on five seasons of arguably the worst thing on TV since The Anna Nicole Show.
It's really the post-millennial right of passage, isn't it: the "inadvertent" leaking of nude cell phone pictures. I can't be arsed (as the Canadians say) to fully research this statement, but by my estimate, every female celebrity who ever existed has taken ill-advised, low-res snaps of their goodies for quick SMS-ing to a loved/well-liked one.
The exception being Dame Judi Dench, and more's the pity.
That this shit keeps happening is testimony both to the persuasiveness of certain boys/men and the poor judgment of certain girls/women. I think it's been pretty well demonstrated by this point that unless you're keeping your self-produced amateur erotica on a non-network enabled computer locked in a safety depost box, there's a decent chance it's going to make its way into the public domain.
I'm sort of pissed about this. I mean, speaking as a person who used to stay up until 4 AM playing Missile Command on a freaking Atari 2600, I am eternally grateful to be too old for the temptations of today's current crop of video games. I shudder to think of the 400-lb, pasty white vampire archivist from the first Blade lookalike the 21st century version of the 12-year old me would be.
But at the same time, my generation missed out on the Golden Era of bathroom photo goodness. Oh sure, I had a couple Polaroids of girlfriends in bikinis, but this was pre-scanner and pre-Internet, so even if I'd been so inclined to share my wondrous bounty with others, I couldn't.
I suppose what takes me aback is just how...*expected* it seems to be. Like part of the dating audition process requires the submission of nudes. And while I understand there's no dearth of male members floating around the innernets (stay classy Brett Favre), the burden seems to fall disproportionately on the ladies.
Which brings us back to Snooki. I guess I'm sorry she has to go through this, not because of any sense of betrayal, but because I'm not sure she even comprehends what's going on (I doubt taking the pictures in the first place was given any more thought than having sex with "The Situation"). I'd be willing to bet these latest photos are just the latest in a series of barely comprehended "love offerings." Because it isn't like she's been shy about being an embarrassing whack job in the past.
In a way, it's a hopeful thing, this collective "meh" at this news of nudes (as well as Madonna's recent breastcapade). Maybe we've reached the tipping point in terms of celebrity upskirts and nip slips (bet those weren't in the OED 20 years ago). Perhaps this constant glut of nudity and readily accessible pornography will lead to an eventual disillusionment with such things and an attendant rise in interest in matters of actual import.
Yeah, probably not.
