Leaked Nudes Victim Shares Her Story To Stop Victim Blaming Online
The recent news of a Telegram group leaking nudes and revenge porn has seen victims getting victim blamed and slut shamed online.
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In light of news regarding leaked nudes on a Telegram group by an alleged law student, a Twitter user Joanna shared her experience as a victim in a bid to stop the victim blaming she’s seeing online.
I just want you to know that it’s never your fault. I may not know you or your story but it’s never your fault.
Joanna on Twitter
To help everyone understand the circumstances that led her up to the point where she became a victim, she recounted her childhood days.
When Joanna was a young child, she was born with an eating disorder. She had trouble eating and if she did eat, she would throw up. After her parents consulted with a doctor, she was given appetite inducing pill.
The medication worked but then Joanna couldn’t stop eating. Her parents were happy that she was eating and didn’t see it as an issue. However, she quickly gained weight and reached 60kg by the time she was seven years old.
My experience with leaked nudes.
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
A thread. 🧵
This happened to me when I was very young, around the age of 13. But I’m going to speak about what happened from the start so that you guys would understand better on how I felt, and the position I was in at that period.
When she entered primary school, she started getting bullied in school due to her size, how she looked, and her inability to speak Bahasa Melayu or Tamil. The bullying not only came from her peers but from her teachers.
This carried on until she entered secondary school where she grew to 104kg. No one wanted to sit beside her in class due to her size and they even called her “Smelly Indian.”
She tried making friends in school but it never worked and lunchtime was the worst. They taunted her and said no one will love her for her size.
She used to laugh off the comments because making friends with boys was taboo for her mother.
But deep down, she was hurt and really believed that no one will ever love her for who she is.
Just sharing some photos of me in primary in this thread. I never really had any friends in primary and I was pretty much a loner. The friends I had used to make fun of me all the time, and I just laughed it off because I thought that these were how friends behaved in school. pic.twitter.com/XZgb7ETiwX
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
Then Facebook came into everyone’s life. Joanna decided to sign up on Facebook to make online friends since she has no friends in real life.
It was through Facebook that she made some new friends and she felt so happy.
One of the many friends she made online was an older guy from Johor. He was mutual friends with a few of her friends from different schools.
The guy was very nice to her and always reminded her that she was beautiful. They soon become close friends and became boyfriend and girlfriend a few months after.
Joanna noted that she agreed to be in a “virtual” relationship due to all the peer pressure in school and she did like the guy for his kindness towards her. At the time, she was 13 while he was 18 years old.
Although her friends didn’t believe that she has a boyfriend, she didn’t care because she felt like her life has changed.
Joanna introduced the guy to her parents as a friend and they seemed ok with it. However, she still kept her relationship a secret because she was very afraid of her mother. She has always been closer to her father who has been her rock of support.
When the relationship soured
Everything was rosy until her boyfriend had to go for National Service and he promised that he’ll call whenever he could.
Joanna said the relationship started changing and became uncomfortable because he kept saying inappropriate things to her and pressured her to send sexy pictures.
She told him it made her feel uncomfortable and refused to send the pictures but he never stopped asking.
When she told him he was emotionally blackmailing her, he said “You are so fat yourself, and I still chose to be with you. If I leave, you won’t have anyone. This clearly shows that you don’t trust me. What’s the point of the relationship?”
He threatened to leave her which made her so hurt and depressed. After all, she has no friends to confide in such matters and she couldn’t go to her parents either. So she succumbed to the pressure and sent him a semi-nude picture and was very afraid ever since.
He sent to her his nudes as well but she deleted them immediately. She asked him to delete her picture and he promised he did. Whenever she asked about it, he accused Joanna of not trusting him.
He sent me his as well without me asking and I deleted it immediately. And I told him to delete it after viewing it and he said of course. But it bothered me mentally for many days and I kept asking him about it. And this was what he always said: pic.twitter.com/m6egv6Zt3z
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
When she finally confided in someone she trusted, the friend told Joanna to cut herself to feel better and that breaking up was a bad idea.
Joanna couldn’t stop self-harming afterwards. No one in school knew except the girl she confided in. She started cutting her thighs when the scars became too obvious.
Somehow, her boyfriend got to know about it and broke up with her because he doesn’t want someone with scars.
Joanna fell into depression and when the guy asked to come back, she told him she has moved on. He kept texting and bothering her but she never once relented. Then one day, it all stopped.
But we ended. And I recovered from it. Only for him to come back again and beg me to get back in a relationship with him. And I told him I’ve moved on but he constantly kept texting me over and over. He went to all my friends and begged them to get back with me. pic.twitter.com/EmZAnIDZvq
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
Joanna thought it was all over until she received a text from a random number saying they found a phone outside a club and it has a folder with her nudes in it with her number.
She freaked out and passed the number to a male friend. When the friend called the number, a woman picked up the phone and he hung up.
Then, Joanna received a text saying “I tried to help you but since you gave my number to someone, I’m going to viral your photo and number.”
She tried reasoning with the person but got blocked instead. After doing some digging, she found out that the number belonged to her ex-boyfriend’s current partner and they teamed up to destroy her.
Strangers started harassing her and asked to spend a night with her. Some of them also sent an MMS of the semi-nude picture she sent to her ex-boyfriend. Her ex-boyfriend insisted he knew nothing about it and disappeared.
He also tried to send the images to Joanna’s mother’s phone and it caused Joanna so much panic attacks.
Soon people in school and tuition classes knew and teased her about it. She got dirty stares and they started spreading rumours about her that she was a slut.
She didn’t know she could go to the police about matters like these so she tolerated the daily attacks and shaming.
It started again
It went on until she was around 15 years old when she started to work on herself and began a weight loss transformation. She studied hard and did well in school so her teachers never bothered her. The improvements helped with her mental health.
Two days before SPM, she received a phone call from a friend who told her someone spray painted her name on the school wall with vulgarities. Her semi-nude photos started resurfacing again.
I asked her what she meant, and she sent me a photo. My stomach sank to the pit of my stomach. Someone had spray painted the school with so much of vulgarity about me and the photo started resurfacing again. This was 2 days BEFORE SPM. My mind went blank. pic.twitter.com/oRD9Zz7cYi
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
This time around, they circulated a photo of another girl and said it was Joanna. The harassment never stopped.
Fortunately, she managed to ace her SPM but she received a printed letter in her mailbox a few days after.
In the letter, it turned out that one of her friends in school was the one who spray-painted Joanna’s name in school because she was envious of Joanna’s grades and weight loss transformation. She hoped Joanna would fail her SPM.
The anonymous friend only felt remorse when her brother got into an accident and was fighting for his life in the hospital after the spray painting incident.
Joanna said she didn’t curse the anonymous person or the family and said all is forgiven.
But the only thing I did was post up a Facebook status with the letter in hopes that the person read it and I said that I hope your brother recovers well. Everything is forgiven. Take care. And that was it.
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
She decided to speak up about her experience after years of keeping it to herself after news of the Telegram group that leaked women’s nudes surfaced during the pandemic.
READ MORE: Victims Of V2K Telegram Group Come Forward To Report Abuse
She was also a victim in the Telegram group. It makes her sad that the issue is never ending and she has lost many friends to suicide due to all the slut shaming and victim blaming.
I’ve lost a few of my closest over the years to su*cide because of this and all the s*ut shaming that came with it and the victim blaming. Some people just choose to judge without knowing what is really going on. I wish things change. I really do.
— 🌙 #JusticeTourMY (@OfficialJoannaJ) February 18, 2023
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