Transcript of Find Your Light - Episode 1 - The First Nude with Sean Fader

Adam MacLean: Hey Peepadoodles ! Welcome to Find Your Light - a Post Shame podcast. I'm your host, Adam MacLean. “FInd Your Light” t is a show where we shine the light on shame and imagine a post shame world. In Act 1, we'll meet a Post Shame Warrior. Someone who I think is up to something special and has a tool to teach us to help dismantle shame.
Then in Act 2, we'll play a little game of armchair quarterback by re-examining someone's public shaming through the lens of Post Shame. If they had had access to this tool before their downfall, do we think they could have come out a better leader and helped others dealing with something similar? We'll see.
And now on with the show!

Hey, Peepadoodles! Thank you so much for listening to the podcast today. Episodes one and two are going to be a slightly different format than what I described in the intro. The first 15 minutes of today's episode are going to be me reading aloud, an essay that I wrote in 2017, that really is the birth of Post Shame.
After that, our guest will be Sean Fader, who's featured in the essay and it'll all make sense later. So now on with the show!

***

First published on PostShame.org, November 22nd, 2017.

On my 28th birthday, back in 2010, I picked up my iPhone 3GS and downloaded Grindr. I was newly single, had just moved into an apartment with four (some nights, five) roommates in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and everyone was talking about a new phone app that made hooking up with guys easier than ever before.
The app was groundbreaking in that it used GPS to show you the profiles of other gay men nearby, sorted by distance (e.g. 737ft away) and in addition to photos it listed their interests and preferences.
I made a profile with the username AdamMacAttack, said I was looking for dates, and used a photo of myself smiling earnestly.

I came home from my raucous birthday celebration and having recently become single was feeling lonely and a bit “wanting,” so I opened the app. I had a few messages from guys in the neighborhood and got to chatting with a handsome guy less than a mile away with a bright face, sparkly eyes, trimmed beard, and a hairy chest. (This is categorically “my type”.)
The messaging quickly became salacious; what I imagine phone sex was like in the 80s & 90s with vivid descriptions of what we would do once together. Nowadays, this type of messaging is commonplace on dating apps, but the reason I remember this conversation vividly is because I placed my phone just below my chin with the camera facing down, pulled open my underwear to reveal my erect penis and snapped a photo that I sent as part of our conversation. After sending the photo the guy on the other end of the chat said:
“Hot. My name is Sean Fader. I’m an artist. You can look me up online. I’m doing a photo project where I go to guy’s apartment after I’ve met him on a dating app and upon entering I immediately set up my camera equipment and take a portrait of him as I imagine him to be based on the avatar and persona I’ve gotten to know while messaging with him. After the photo is taken, we can have a proper date, hang out, maybe have a sleep over, but after I’ve gotten to know you a little better I take a second photo that’s more of who you actually are and people can see those photos side by side to asses the effects of gay dating apps on our identities and our community.”
I, very drunk, immediately responded with, “I LOVE THIS! VIVA LA ART! WHAT IS GRINDR GOING TO DO TO GAY DATING WORLD? WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO GAY BARS? CAN’T WAIT TO DO THIS. PASSING OUT TALK TO YOU LATER K BYE”

The next morning I woke up hung over and checked my phone, re-reading the exchange. I scrolled up to see previous messages and was shocked to see that I’d sent my first “dick pic”. I wrote to Sean, “Yikes, that’s really unlike me to send a dick pic. Please don’t share that.”
Sean agreed to keep the photo private and asked if I was still game to do the photo shoot. I agreed and invited him to come over that evening. Ever since college I’ve thought about the differences between our online avatars and our everyday selves, about what’s captured in a photo versus what’s happening when the photo is taken. I found the premise worth exploring and I got excited to meet Sean.
He arrived that evening, we exchanged pleasantries, went up to my room, set up his lights and camera, and I got into my underwear. We decided I should recreate the moment of taking and sending that first dick pic. I said, “Well, that’s not really me though. That was the first one I’ve ever sent. Am I an exhibitionist? I’m not really sure if I am.” Sean stared back at me and said, “It’s who you were last night. It’s who you were on Grindr.”
He took several full body photos from a side view. The image he captured is busy but still. There’s a lot happening on the sides of the image and you see a boy trying to pose and simultaneously capture a photo of himself. It’s self-assured yet vulnerable. And, you can see some of my erect penis coming out from the top of my underwear.
After that Sean and I put down our camera and phone and had a sleepover.

The next morning I woke up with anxious ambivalence. It was the type of morning where my inner monologue was too loud to have another person in the room for fear they’d somehow be able to hear what was happening inside my head. After Sean got up to go to the bathroom I sat on the side of my air mattress (remember, I had just moved) fidgeting with my phone still connected to the charging cord thinking: “What have I done? Is this porn? Will that photo be on a wall in a gallery? Will it be on the internet with - the holy grail of online embarrassment - my erect penis and my face in the same image? Oh boy, this guy has got to get out of my apartment…” and in that instant when I looked up Sean was crouched down next to me with his camera and when my eyes caught his lens he snapped a photo.
Completely startled, I said, “What are you doing?”

“That’s the second image. That’s who you really are.”

Sean and I hung out once more a few weeks later. We talked about art. We exchanged texts and emails for a while but never dated. He had a gallery show about a year later that included images from this project. The work was now called “SUP?” a play on the way many Grindr exchanges begin, with an abbreviation for “what’s up?”
Images of me weren’t in that first gallery show but they were on his website and when the Huffington Post ran a feature on Sean there was a link to more of the boys he’d been on dates with. After that article came out another of the boys Sean photographed asked for his photos to be taken down.
My boyfriend at the time of the Huffington Post article was concerned I had these photos out there and thought I should do as much as I could to get them scrubbed from the internet. He said, “This isn’t your brand. Imagine getting passed over for a job because these photos are out there.”
I saw his point but said, “I believed in the project. I fully consented to the entire experience. If I don’t get a job because of it, did I really want that job?”
However, I reluctantly emailed Sean and asked him to take down the photos of me.

This experience made me curious about what else is out there that didn’t “fit with my brand.”
***
The Misshapes are a DJ trio that hosted a weekly party at the famous New York club Don Hill’s in an era before social media completely changed the way we relate online. They had popular MySpace pages and their website, Misshapes.com, was filled with photos from the parties and became a popular destination for gazing at youthful fashion and the remnants of a waning Club Kid culture before Instagram or Pinterest were invented and while George W. Bush was still in office. I attended this party more than a dozen times in my early 20s and after fishing around a bit I found a series of photos of me in the basement of Don Hill’s in various states of undress, really letting loose.
I have a vague memory of when these photos were taken. I was probably experiencing a compounded high of being drunk, coked out, and being looked at; the rock star feeling every 25 year old is looking for when they go out in New York City looking to see, be seen, and feel the flash of a camera.
In reality, it was less glamorous. I’m embarrassed by how sloppy I look. I’m embarrassed to have been photographed getting naked and I’m left wondering why I felt the need to take off my clothes. What made me think this was a safe space for that? Many of us have had nights like this. Some would argue it’s a healthy pressure release and a normal growing pain. I take full responsibility for my actions in the photos while having a deep remorse that a moment I wish was transient and ephemeral was instead captured in a series of photos now online.
I found a contact email on the website and wrote to the Misshapes team asking for the photos to be removed. I said,
“It has come to my attention that there are several photos of me on your website that I wish to have taken down. Not having signed a model-release for these photos to appear on the website, and considering their nature, I request their removal. I've attached small jpegs of the images in question.”
After a year of follow up I received confirmation they had been taken down. I was surprised and relieved.

This left me with two experiences of my naked body being online and my discomfort with the way the past is interacting with my present and potentially my future. Both experiences left me uneasy and uncomfortable with examining my past, but I had an opportunity for recourse and was successful in both instances having the images removed from the internet.
I felt lucky.

Since then there have been countless photo hacks and leaked images of celebrity nude photos. In response to her iCloud account being hacked and images were released online the actress Jennifer Lawrence went on the record in Vanity Fair saying:
“Anybody who looked at those pictures, you’re perpetuating a sexual offense. You should cower with shame. Even people who I know and love say, ‘Oh, yeah, I looked at the pictures.’ I don’t want to get mad, but at the same time I’m thinking, I didn’t tell you that you could look at my naked body.”
She continued with a message for the tabloid community: “You have a choice. You don’t have to be a person who spreads negativity and lies for a living. You can do something good. You can be good. Let’s just make that choice and—it feels better.”
In 2012 when Matt Lauer interviewed Anne Hathaway after she had upskirt photos published online he asked "What’s the lesson learned from something like that...?" and she answered,

"I was very sad that we live in an age when someone takes a picture of another person in a vulnerable moment and rather than delete it and do the decent thing, sells it...And I’m sorry that we live in a culture that commodifies sexuality of unwilling participants."
I am coming out about my experiences in order to stand up against what Lawrence and Hathaway went through. I would like to advocate for a high bar to determine when something is newsworthy and demand consent for images and recordings of people’s bodies that are intended as private communication or sexually compromising.
I strongly believe free-speech is essential to democracy and what makes America so extraordinary. The internet and the new ability to rapidly share information about a person against their will requires us to examine what consent means online and find ways to balance consent with freedom of speech.
If a celebrity or elected politician has a sex tape that they consider private I do not believe anyone should be allowed to publish it without their consent. It would not be considered newsworthy based on the fact it was a consensually made video recording intended as a private communication.
Publishing paparazzi photos of naked celebrities on hotel balconies would be considered a sex crime because they did not know the photo was being taken and it violates their right to their own body and image while on private property.
If a celebrity decides to go for a jog on a public road and take their shirt off, that would remain fair game considering it’s a public dwelling space.

If someone takes a sexy selfie to send to a partner and it leaks to the media it should not be allowed to be published unless the person in the photos grants consent.
If an actress is simply getting out of a car and asks that photos of their genitals not be published they should have that request honored.

However, the issue of someone like Anthony Weiner sending naked images to an underaged woman would remain classified as newsworthy and important to publish if it was determined that an elected official was breaking the law.
In 2015 I started to develop the idea of being Post Shame: finding something in your past you fear could be hacked/leaked and used against you. In releasing the potentially “shameful” story on your own you can disarm its power. Furthermore, if you can find a stance of leadership based on what you learned from the experience you can inspire people toward productive change and help dissolve shame for those who may be suffering from something similar.
PostShame.org is intended to be a safe space for people to share their stories and post images or recordings they would like to release in order to disarm a potential scandal and find a community supportive of the new stances of leadership they wish to stand for.
The only way Anthony Weiner could have become #PostShame would have been years earlier and before he engaged with an underage woman (and was truthful in his desire to only connect with women of consenting age) and said something to the effect of:
I am coming out as a person who likes to anonymously message with women and share naked photos of myself with them. I have broken no laws and all parties involved have granted consent for photos to be exchanged. I have shared this information with my wife and the way we deal with this is private to our relationship.
Of course, that type of public admission would require a huge amount of self-reflection and honesty within a marriage.

Millions of people have sent graphic images in private text conversations. “Sexting” has become a common way of connecting for people with smart phones.
I believe Anthony Weiner was an effective politician and stood up for many worthwhile causes. If he wanted to continue on that path of leadership and standing up for others it would have served him to examine his past and look for opportunities to become #PostShame and share his story.
I am #PostShame as a person who has appeared in photos naked, aware that some of them are online, and there are many more that I’ve sent in private communications to consenting adults.
I am coming out about this in order to halt any attempts to hack and leak images or recordings of me while I advocate for strong protections for private communications, a more robust conversation and legislation regarding consent online, and laws to prevent the posting of revenge porn.
I’ve included links at the end of this article to Sean Fader’s artwork and a link to the photos from the Misshapes website intended to only be viewed by those over 18 years of age.

***
In 2017, I attended the opening of a group show in that included a new assortment of images from Sean Fader’s “SUP?” project. As I walked toward the back of the gallery I saw an older woman and a young man standing directly in front of the before-and-after photographs of me which now included an additional panel of text from my Grindr conversation with Sean.
The young man turned around and recognized me. With a grin he asked, “Is that you in the photo?” I blushed, took a deep breath, and said, “Yes. I was younger then with less grey hair.”

The older woman appeared surprised and gestured to the man as though they’d been discussing the photographs together and she said, “Well, which image is the real you?”

I was so surprised by the question and the fact it wasn’t about my being naked. I said, “They both are, I guess. It’s funny, these photos have resulted in me examining my past and creating a project called Post Shame where you can find strength and cultivate a new type of leadership based on being honest about your past. I’d like to run for office one day.”
She looked surprised and said, “If you’re going to run for office, you better get used to having all your dirty laundry out there. Might as well have your bits hanging on a wall in a Chelsea gallery and get it over with.”
I agreed. “Yeah. Do I have your vote?”


***

Adam MacLean: Welcome to our guests Sean Fader. Thank you so much for coming on. Everyone has just listened to this reading of the post shame version, one essay of which you are a star. Sean Fader is a fabulous artist who also has some other talents. He happens to be the professor of practice and photography at Tulane university.
He got his MFA from the art Institute of Chicago. He got his masters from the Maryland Institute college of art in Baltimore. He got his BFA from the new school in New York. I mean, were you doing your BFA when we met? Where were you in 2010?

Sean Fader: I was about two years out of my MFA.

AM: So you're two years out. Grindr comes into the world. It's on all of our phones. I describe it in my essay as it was on my iPhone 3GS…

SF: 3GS?!

AM: Yeah. I remember which one it was -

SF: Were we on the 3GS at that point, when I read that, I was like, was it actually, that was that the phone did I have that phone? It's funny because actually when I talk about it as the Genesis for that work, it was not initially about Grindr.
It was actually started, a friend of mine, Kate has a really beautifully, wonderfully dark, like macabre sense of humor. And she posted one of those Facebook end of the year things where you can find out the five most used words in your status updates. And hers were like, “chipper” and “fabulous”. It was all these like really positive words.
And these wouldn't be the words that I would pick for her. And I went to her house and we were hanging out and I was also single and OKcupid was out, and I swear to God, such a large portion of people that I talked to said that their experience of putting themselves online with sort of similar, it all happens in a Pinot Grigio vacuum.
Do you drink a bottle of Pinot Grigio? You're sitting there by yourself and you're like, I should date someone. And then you find yourself like filling out an online profile.

AM: That's what I describe in the essay. It's like -

SF: This is like this standard story that everyone told me all over the place. Right? So I'm, I'm in a Pinot Grigio vacuum with Kate Ford, like typing up my thing at her house.

AM: And OkCupid's questionnaire is like, what's your blood type? Like, do you pee in the shower? How do you want to be buried? The OkCupid questionnaire was intense.

SF: but then somebody pointed me to, OKCupid trends, which is a blog where a statistician would like break down things like the cameras that made people look the best and like the votings, all this other stuff.
So I got really kind of obsessed with OkCupid, but it was really this sort of moment where I was trying to figure out, like, how do I sell myself to the world? Right.

AM: The conversation around people as brands was becoming so loud, like you're developing your personal brand. And we were all just starting to figure out what, like filters on front facing cameras were, that was all starting right around then.

SF: I got really obsessed with the spaces of dating and well, I call them companionship websites. I woke up one day and thought to myself, oh my God, I should do this project. And I thought, no one is ever going to say yes to this. And I asked three people and every single person said yes.

AM: I remember what I wrote back was this like 'Viva La Art'! Like, let's explore, let's get into this conversation. But then the regret that I felt immediately afterwards was like, so consuming. But now, I mean it's 12 years later and I love this story,

SF: But I will say that that was not outside of what happened to me. Right. In which like people were like, yes. And I would have to be like, tomorrow, let's do this tomorrow because you think about it too long.
And you're like, pull the plug on it. I knew I had to do it to myself because when I asked people and the first three people said yes to that first day, I was like, holy shit, what am I doing? I'm now going to start showing up to strangers homes and like making art with them?! That I meet on dating sites on the internet.
This is a terrible idea. I'm going to be killed. You know.

AM: I mean, I had no idea that the terminology around that like whole like, “Hey, what's up” would take the whole gay community by storm because it's so specific when we say to each other like, “sup”

SF: I mean, there are a lot of things I didn't expect. I think there's also this weird state right in the space of Grindr in particular. And I actually think Grindr is one of the most fascinating apps that's ever been invented. I always joke that it's like the holodeck, right? You go in there and like, it's always what it needs to be. Right. It's like the room of requirement or something. It's like, they're everywhere you go.
You, you could be in a gay bar, but historically spaces that felt safe to hit on another man or to hit another woman or like, right. Have always been bars. Right. Because we sort of like are like, that's the place where you're allowed to do this. Otherwise there's like, it has to be super cruisy and on the DL, but like that's the place to openly hit on people.
But grindr felt like, because I was like out in the world, it seems like it was okay. And like all of a sudden you're like at a rest stop and you know, you open it by accident. And like the cashier is like writing you, which has happened to me.

AM: The cashier at a rest stop may be passing all the time. And this piece of technology has now made it so every single person cashing out kind of has an opportunity to see them as a queer person, if they're also on Grindr. And that person might've been S-ing a lot of D in the bathroom at that restaurant.
And if my mom is listening and she doesn't know what S-ing, all the D stands for it, that's fine. That's fine. She can Google it if she wants to. So in the 12 years since this, I mean, sup as a project still exists. A lot of it's still on your website. It's been in museum shows, it's traveled. What percentage of people allowed their photos to stay up?
And what percentage of people have the experience I did where they felt a regret and said, oh, can you take these down? I'm really glad that I've had this journey where they went back up, but what percentage of people have this like waffling back and forth experience?

SF: That was one of the funnier moments when you called me and you're like, can you put them back up? It's like, okay, that's a new one.

AM: Well, it was very specific because I was like, so since this project, it turns out Post Shame has been born and these photos are essential to its birth.

SF: I thought that was like a sort of amazing moment. You know, it's sort of swings back and forth. I try to do my best with honoring anyone's desire.
If it's something I can control, like taking it down or putting it back up on my website, that's fine by me. There was one person who asked me to take the images down, but they were like on the HuffingtonPost. Right. Like I was like, I actually am not in control of that. Like I can write them and ask them.

AM: They had already had a whole life of their own. Yeah.

SF: Right. Like they're out in the world and in different way. And what I think is the reality, right? I'm not the most successful artist in the world, but I'm successful enough. Right. I, at that time I was still much younger and much earlier on in my career.
And I think people didn't imagine that, they could walk into a major Chelsea gallery and there would be them on the wall. Right. You know, you even talk about that moment.

AM: It's quite an experience, although I did believe in you from the beginning. So I'm just going to say that I always knew they were going to be in the gallery wall.
Like there was a piece of me that was just like, Ooh, this is, uh, this is going to be a journey. So I'm glad my prediction came true.

SF: I'm so glad that you saw this in me, but you know, I think not everyone is there. Right. Not everyone is totally taking these seriously. People have their own agendas for wanting to be part of it.
You know? I think there's a lot of ego that happens, right? Like, oh, somebody wants to take a picture of me. Yes. I want that. And I mean, you've been talking about that, right?

AM: Yeah, that one, once my inhibitions were down because of the drugs and alcohol, I, when I look at those photos, I'm like, wow, this is a person who really wants to let loose and is really happy to be seen.
But the fact that it couldn't be a ephemeral and it was suddenly on the internet was truly shocking.

SF: Yes. Well, this is yes, exactly. Right. So I think in some ways there are other people that fell into that category and also like some people I dated and didn't go well, right. And so there are people who I don't actually know for a fact, but I think probably truly hate me, like breakups don't always go to the best. You know.

AM: I don't know what you're talking about. I've only had perfect breakups in my life.

SF: Best friends with your exes.

AM: Dragged being dragged.

SF: But, you know, so I think consent and especially in this space where I always want to do no harm. Right. I also don't want to have my practice taken away from me to something that was very clear in the beginning.
Right. I never told anyone, like no one will ever see these photographs. I was like, actually I hope the world sees these photographs. Right.

AM: And you had a model release. I mean, it was very

SF: Yeah, I had everyone sign one, everyone's on model releases. Yeah. All of those things, but even in the space of like having a model release, which I had for you, when you came to me and said, Hey, can you take that down?
I was like, yes of course. Can I undo someone who's snapped a picture of it in a gallery. Can I undo someone who's written a blog post about it or written an article about it? Like I can't undo those things. And I think the most interesting thing is that you're not the only person whose boyfriend it was an issue for.

AM: Right. That I was having this journey where again, because I was like, it's an artistic project and it's an artistic exploration and I'm proud to be a part of it, even though my naked body is being exposed in a way I might not be comfortable with, but I, I always kept returning to, it was real. That I did indeed take a dick pic that I did indeed send it that I did sign a model release and like, yes, many of those steps might've had like, alcohol involved, but I still kept checking in with myself to see if it was always consensual.
And it was so when it was a boyfriend who said this isn't part of your brand, which is so fascinating, but that was what he was focused on was I think I know you as this online brand and I want to support this known version of you as an online brand. You should really have these photos taken down. And I was like, no, your online brand should be the same as your real life brand.
And in real life, there's naked photos of me on the internet. So yeah. What is it about the boyfriends? I actually, that's a whole separate like relationship Esther Perel podcast, probably of like asking the boyfriend's like, why was it important for you that these be taken down. I was so fixated on these nudes and that story.
And the fact that online shaming is gendered that in my experience of coming out with my nudes, I was realizing that when women have their nudes released, they immediately get threats of sexual violence on Twitter. And I didn't have that experience. So I was going on and on and on about how my recognition was, you know, so this revelation I had that online shaming was gendered.
You know, I thought I was really helping a conversation along and it wasn't until my show with Danielle James, Safe Space, where she really, handed me back to myself by helping me learn that online shaming was also racialized. And so that's what Post Shame version two is really committed to is exploring who gets shamed for what and why online.
But I remain so grateful and that's why I've split up the Genesis of post-game into episodes one and episode two, version one and version two, is because I spent a lot of time in this version one just really ruminating on your online persona and how nudes can affect it. And now I'm totally fixated on what happens to people the way they're dragged on the internet and if it affects their job prospects and how that's so different for people who look different than me.

SF: Yeah. I mean, I would also just say it for the record. Like there's also people who have made careers out of it.

AM: Are you like referring to like OnlyFans? What I want to say about only fans is it's still a very bold career move. And I don't know a lot of people who balance both, like, I don't know many people who are at their bank job and then also have an only fans.
It, do you think that story is common?

SF: I don't know. The only person I know who I talk to about their only fans accounts and how much money they make, which, oh my God,

AM: Is Post Shame version three, where just you and I start like an aging twinks onlyfans, is that what we're going to do together?

SF: It's going to be twunks.

AM: Twink Twank Twunk gorgeous.

SF: But he was making like $250,000 a year. And then, then like, just that it, he was just going to flip houses with that money and I'm going like what? Okay.

AM: Also the gay trope that it automatically always leads to real estate and like all roads lead to flipping houses in Palm Springs.

SF: Oh, it is Florida. Yeah, it's Florida, but you know what?
Most sex workers I know somehow end up as nurses, but that doesn't surprise me.

AM: Well, it's because they're so caring. I mean, nurses are actual angels and sex workers are also angels

SF: and they're not afraid of fluids.

AM: You heard it here first. Deep cuts with Sean fader. It's really just that they're not afraid of fluids.
They're just good at handling fluids

SF: and handling people. But I, lots of friends who I have ended up as nurses, I'm all for it. We need lots of them right now. Everyone become a nurse.

AM: So in 12 years, since the Genesis of Sup?, what do you think is the biggest shift from 2010 to 2022? Be it the fact that you think now the project is of a different time, or do you think it's still as timely in 2022 as it was when it started.
Are you shocked by the way that it's referenced in your total body of work? What do you, think's the biggest understanding? 12 years later,

SF: I would say when that in 2010, I felt like there was still like another version of shame in all of this, which was like online dating. We were just getting out of it's shameful to online date, right?
Like 2008, 2009. It still felt like you didn't tell people you met someone on the internet. Right? Like when we met, it was just, it just at that time where like the gays had embraced the grindr and like, that was acceptable, but straight people were still pretty ashamed if they met on the internet.

AM: Right. And would I have introduced a boyfriend to like friends and family and said we met on Grindr. I don't know if I would in 2010.

SF: Right. This is what I'm saying. It's like, I think that in a weird way, like our interaction was sort of ahead of its time. I think. Actually, It isn't until like five years later where that work starts to make sense for people, right?
Like this sort of general population is starting to be like, oh, I know what this is and I understand that. Right. I've been on a date. Like it it's a lot of people really at that in 2010, hadn't been on a dating website. Right. Like, so they were really like trying to unpack a lot of the ideas around like how we're performing in digital spaces to like catch someone or like find a partner.

AM: And learning how to commodify parts of our bodies.
I mean, there's this whole thing where people learn their angles and you go to some cute boys, Instagram, and it's all the same selfie. It's always the same angle. It's always the, maybe one Peck is bigger than the other, or they know their clavicle like is always popping in the right light or, I don't know.
And then as far as nudes go, people start to learn what parts of their bodies get the best response.

SF: Yes, absolutely.

AM: And let's not even crack the surface of all these people who I see on different social media sites where I'm like, oh, they're in defeat. There's like sneak attack foot photos in here where it's always like, oh, you're on the beach.
But like, this foot is well featured. It's because foot fetish is like totally a thing.

SF: Yes. It's all the thing. I mean, I think there's weird ways in which like that's gorgeous. Right? We've all just let our weird kink sort of out of the box. I was on 14. What I done, I was companionship website. So grinder match.com OkCupid.
I was on every single one I could get on. And the thing that I ended up really realizing if I was on grindr, I would get the headless torso as their main picture. Then they would send me dick our ass or something like that. And then I would get all of like what kinks they were into whatever. And then I would see them over there on OkCupid.
And it would be the same photo, but just like from here up, like they were like using different sections of the same photos across things. And there was a period of time in New York city where I could sit in any gay bar and tell you everyone's favorite books and what kinks they were into, or at least according to OKCupid or like match.com and Grindr or Scruff because everyone was on both of them.

AM: And because you had gone on those hundred dates, viewer, encyclopedic, knowledge of all these people.

SF: I think cause I was on all of the sites all the time, looking at them, am I trying to like, think through how are people dealing with this like weird new space, right? Which felt constantly like you are marketing . Yourself as an individual to do various things right? Find love, get laid.

AM: So does this lay the groundwork for the metaverse? I really don't want the metaverse and Oculus goggles to be the norm, but you're reflecting back to me that my dating life is often in a metaverse.

SF: I think what I took as the takeaway from that, and it's way turned down from the extreme, like metaverse like world, but we're, we're, we're sort of positing.
Is that the space that is created by these apps by these websites dictates very much who we think we're supposed to be in those places. Both the app, the design, the way that that app is sold to people and the hurt inside of that, especially then there was a lot of like self policing through performance, through lots of other things, right.
That, you know, Grindr big, got a really bad rap for a really long time about being really homonormative. It was like Normcore, homo, right. But real issues around race, real issues around weight, real issues around age about like gender performance. Like it became a really, I don't know it was the Facebook of sex apps or something.
Right. Whereas like all the bad things kind of came out, but that wasn't happening on OK cupid, right. Because of the structure of them that really was dictating how people behave in this space. The frame matters, right? Like we think I'm just using this technology to express me. But the limitations within that are already an issue.
Photoshops tools have an aesthetic. So when we create something in Photoshop, the aesthetic is the aesthetic that Photoshop has given us, right. The way in which I present myself on Instagram is limiting. Right. I'm working within this very small set of constraints. I am constantly being controlled by those things.
I think all of these complaints and like, there's this whole conversation around like Facebook, knowing that Instagram is bad for teenage girls, but pushing all the self hate because it gets more clicks. Right. And then there was the whistleblower that came out saying Facebook knows all this stuff, all this other stuff.
Right. So we are, we do get really obsessed with all the harm. And I was giving a lecture recently and I was pushed by the amazing and brilliant Tina Rivers Ryan, the curator at the Albright Knox.

AM: Shout out to Buffalo, New York, my hometown, Albright Knox, the best art gallery in Western New York.

SF: So I'm giving, I was getting a lecture in Buffalo and she was pushing me saying things like, how do you remain optimistic, right.
In these digital spaces when, when there are so many problems and sort of my response is, well, I think where we're seeing just harm tends to be in communities that are the prevailing social norm class. Right. But if we look at communities that have been told that they're not normal, that they're ugly fat to sit to, to like say to this, to that, whatever, whatever, whatever.
Those people are oftentimes finding community in the same spaces that are doing harm to like cis white, hetero communities. Right. And I, it's not exclusive, and it's only a personal theory, but I kind of think that in a lot of ways, like you want to like shut down all social media, it's all terrible. Like all those little queer kids in middle america, that the only person that they ever found in their lives to talk to, to stop them from feeling alone and maybe committing suicide.
Right. And that is, I say middle america and I mean, every place in america, right. Just because you're in a major city, like New York doesn't mean you feel accepted. Right. But if you have an avenue to find those people and whether that be Grindr or that be Instagram, I feel like that is invaluable.

AM: This is the internet as the sharpest double-edged sword that we've ever had, that the opportunities to connect are remarkable.
And like you said, could save people's lives and prevent suicides. And it's also the way to publicly shame people so fast that all my boyfriends thought that my nudes on the internet were, a distraction that I needed to take care of.

SF: Yes correct, all of those things all at the same time,

AM: All at the same time.
Let's take a break right now and we'll come back for Act 2. We'll be right back. And welcome back. So in Act 2 of Find Your Light a PostShame podcast. We take a look at a public person, who's had a moment that could have benefited from Post Shame, or they chose to kind of take a PostShame stance, but we're going to do a little game of armchair quarterback and offer advice to that person and talk about it and retrospect of what we wish they could have done.
So today we're going to look at Jeff Bezos, who exactly three years ago in February, 2019, decided to write a medium post and come out that he was being extorted by American Media International, the parent company of the National Inquirer. And he said, they've got my nudes and how dare they try to extort me.
And here's all the lawyer Lee letters back and forth, and they're not going to get me. So, Sean, what do you remember thinking in 2019, when you saw this headline and you saw the news break?

SF: I actually just remember that story differently because I remember the sort of Twitter volley between Trump and Jeff Bezos, more than anything else.
I, for some reason, in my brain, it was like Trump was threatening to release dick pics from Jeff Bezos because the Washington post was writing mean articles about him.

AM: I want to have recognition that there are so many of these stories, especially when it comes to public shaming, where all the pieces are kind of glom together.
And we have 330 million Americans in this country. They each have a different version of this story. You know, many of them don't care. Don't remember it at all. Many of them remember it as Trump threatening him. Other people who are news junkies, you know, are reading every single word about this story.
But it's since been revealed that the national Enquirer and Trump had a lot of shared goals before the election, during his time in office. And who knows probably even still,

SF: Probably now,

AM: Anytime something happens in the news that has to do with shame. I have all these friends that text it to me. So it's very interesting that I occupied this place in people's minds where like, just the word shame comes up and they're like, text it to Adam for better or worse.
That's what I occupying people's brains. So all these people are sending it to me and they're like, look, Bezos this post shame about his nudes. And I was like, uh, Did you read this medium post closely? He's Post Shame about being extorted. He's Post Shame about how dare someone try to get money out of him.
And I re-read his medium piece recently and it details there's 10 photos. There's all these like descriptions of, you know, him in, in boxer briefs, you know, with a, uh, bulging member. And I'm like, Ooh, like the way we write about Anthony Wiener at about like dick fix this way, it's so lame

SF: I was like, almost vomiting. I had to skip ahead a little bit because I was like, I was like, oh God, Jeff Bezos oh my God, why am I imagining? I mean, in just a bathrobe right now. Don't do that.

AM: I know. And they were so insistent that every time they described the photos it's that he was wearing his wedding ring and the photos because that's the transgression.
Right. What I had wished for in that moment would be that Jeff Bezos would have written and these photos aren't shameful. I wish he would have added one more sentence to say sexting is a meaningful form of communication for millions of people. I wish that we had better stats on how many people actually sext or where are you at in your life?
If we're 12 years from sup, have you sent a nude recently? Are you comfortable saying it on the air?

SF: Well, let's be real. The pandemic has not been very good to my, uh, sex life. So, um, but, but yes, relatively recently.

AM: Yeah. Okay. So it's something that we still do, even though we know and understand all the ramifications of it and claim that it's being normalized.
It's like, but are we still comfortable doing.

SF: Adam, I have to tell you that I made, and I forgot that I have not said this to you out loud, so this'll be really great in this moment, so I made a decision a long time ago that if there was ever some like great reveal of like a trove of nude photographs of me, I was just going to do a show with them.

AM: So what you're saying is that we are at the precipice of my new art career, that this whole thing is an art project, and it's just supposed to be dick pics galore. Is that what, is that?

SF: Yes. I mean, of course, I mean, it is sort of post shame-y in a way that I'm like cool let's do a show, but I was just sort of interested in like.
If I could imagine, like 15 years later and I become famous and I, artists don't really become like celebritized, but like imagine that that was a possible future for me. And all these people came out of the woodwork being like, I have the nudes, I would be like, great, this is fabulous. You've held onto it for that long.
That to me tells you, it's a great picture. Let's put it on the wall that like, it would be like curated by everyone else. Like, did you hold on to that picture? That long you must have liked it. It must be a great picture that like, that was a curatorial process for a show.

AM: That's really interesting. I'm trying to think of like other artists that kind of like who takes their image back in that way.
And I mean, here she comes, Kim Kardashians is one of the only artists here she comes, Kim Kardashians. One of the only artists that is so aware of her image being recycled, you know, coming back around.

SF: I am a photo professor and I have her selfie book in my office.

AM: That is the selfie book. Is that Rizzoli's logo at the bottom?

SF: Yes!

AM: Of course, of course. Honestly, everyone loves money. Oh my God.

SF: Going back to the idea that someone's like, I know what my angle is. It's the same photo for an entire book.

AM: Well, didn't she say that the inspiration for that book was that she was trying to think of a meaningful gift to get Kanye and she decided to make a selfie book for him.

SF: I did not know that

AM: In her mind. What better gift could you give than a gift of photos of yourself? It's really remarkable if I took my iPhoto like hidden album and just made one of those iPhoto books and just started giving it to boyfriends as a gift and being like, these are all the dick pics, like hard, hard cover.
Get it, get it.

SF: So I am going to state for the record that thinking about other artists I've taken their image back. Um, Richard Prince took my image, used it in his own work for a show to Gosia and I took it back.

AM: So maybe share that story because I know it's from your wishing pelt series, which I attended.
And I did put my hand on your chest hair, which is like, already like that sentence. Like that just works for me. The fact that it had to be in an art project context is pretty remarkable, but I put my hand in your wishing pelt and I made a wish it's actually a very emotional experience. It was, it was very interesting.
But Richard Prince, did he take a photo from your Instagram?

SF: No. When you came, you gave your phones. One of my handlers, my handler used your phone to take a picture of said person like yourself, making a wish on my chest hair and just the expression was to seal your wish, you have the post an image to Instagram with a hashtag wishing pelt, so I can keep track of all the images.

AM: I love your work so much. I just, I've been a believer from the beginning. I love this. I love that. That is the mechanism to like close the loop on the interaction. That's very interesting.

SF: There's weird things that come out of my brain in the middle of the night. And that was one of them. I, yeah, also there's the wishing pout swag, which got really weird for a while. You could buy lucky chest hairs and on that class and like whole thing.

AM: Okay. Marina Abramovich has nothing on you. Like this is the artist is present on roids.

SF: Yeah. I mean, I was standing for 10 hours a day. She was sitting all right, come at me.

AM: You heard it here first, yeah come at me come at me marina.

SF: Marina's got nothing.
Richard Prince took a screenshot of someone's Instagram who was wishing. Comments on it first, then he takes a screenshot of it. Then he sends it to his assistant who then print it large-scale on canvas. And then they sell them for a hundred thousand dollars.
Right? So there's like thousands of people that this has happened to. Most people don't know because most of them go into private collections and then they, then the show opened the Gagosian and all of a sudden there was like this giant image of me with a girl who actually I know rubbing my chest hair and I'm like, what is going on?
And then I find out it's Richard, Prince's new work and blah, blah, blah, all this other stuff. And so I had Lyme's disease at the time. I'd just been diagnosed with Lyme's disease. So I was exhausted and my mentor had just died. And I went to her Memorial and I was listening to everyone talking about like who she was in the world, who she wanted to be her ethics.
I was on a plane ride home and I was like, what would Barbara do? What would Barbara do? What would Barbara do? And I was like, she would take her work back. So on that plane ride, I was like writing a press release, telling everyone that my work was in a show, curated by Richard Prince. at Gagosian I was updating my resume to add, Gagosian to wrap my resume.
And I was like, there, I'd taken it back. I just reframed it. That's my work, not his, like, that is what I'm going to do. And we had all these conversations about like showing up with champagne and being like, have a fake opening party for my work right at Gagosian.

AM: Oh I like that. I like that. That's next level. That's way beyond the press release. It's just showing up to negotiate with champagne.

SF: The plane landed. And I was like, I had written like, oh, there's a conceptual hole in here. There's conceptual hole in here. conceptual hole. I called the close friend and said, uh, who's a genius writer and said, um, can you help me?
There's like some holes in this that I need some help with. And he was like, totally, let me take a look. And he was like, oh my God, this is amazing. He's like, here's your conceptual files? I mean, like sent it back to me. And I was like, oh my God, he just goes through it, like eat. Like, re-wrote the whole thing basically.

AM: Hey, art is a collaborative process.

SF: And then I sent it out in the press release to whoever is on my email list and moved on and then got a phone call like, Hey, uh, you know, would love to include your work in the show about appropriation. And I was like, I haven't appropriated anyone's work. What are you talking?
And they're like, yeah, but it's really interesting. So you should make work for the show. It's your you're great do it. So I was like, oh, okay. And I was upstate at a friend's house and I got a text message and I do not know this person. And it says, Hey, I'm the collector that bought your work from Gagosian thought you might want to borrow it for a show.
Let me know. And I'm like the appropriation artist color rashes, the world of like the artists thinking about like the internet and like how we're all offering things together in the space of the internet that crashes together. And then like the DSS mocking out of the hand of God comes down. Right. And it's like, but what if we just throw the collector in there?
And I was like, I'm sold, I'm sold. I'm going to make something it's going to be great. So then, uh, I went and met him, and his job early on was social media placement of brands in celebrity Instagram.

AM: You're kidding. No, the person that bought that piece, that's what they did for a job. So they like get it. They're like in on the,

SF: Oh yeah. So I meet them and I'm like, oh my God, this is crazy. Like, that's your job? And he had been Lindsay Lohan's manager.

AM: Okay. These are the things that come up. Every podcast, episode, Monica Lewinsky, Britney Spears, Hillary Clinton, and Lindsay Lohan. These are the things that come up every single episode.
Yeah. I'm going to have to start hashtagging every episode with hashtag Lindsay Lohan, she comes up all the time.

SF: It was interesting. I understand why she would in this space, but anyway, I was like, oh, okay. So what we need to do is I'm going to make this piece. And we're going to put it in the show and we're going to make it famous because you're going to bring Lindsay Lohan to the opening and she's going to take a selfie in front of it and she's going to post it to her Instagram.
And so we're going to celebrity place, this work into other people's Instagram.

AM: I'm actually so on board for this,

SF: Right, so this is like the original Genesis of that work. And then he stopped talking to me, even though he kept saying, you can borrow the piece for the show. You can borrow these for the show.
He stopped talking to me and I went on with a piece. So I reappropriated my own work and then put another panel next to it. So that, that said our pictures are for each other. Share hashtag collective authorship, hashtag art selfie, hashtag wishing pelt next to the piece with a selfie stick. And, uh, everyone was encouraged to take selfies with the work and send it back to Instagram where whey was natively home.
So we were sending her home. So, yes, I took back to my work more than once.

AM: Wow. Authorship ownership. It's all comes from the nudes baby. I will stand by the statement that nudes can be the big bang for changing the way people think and feel about their experience on the internet. Either their own nude that's changed their own perception because they felt scared and then got over it.
And maybe how to post shame moment, or maybe someone who's never sent a nude and has a lot of compassion for their friend or coworker who has had their news release. Uh, in my essay, when I talk about Jennifer Lawrence is iCloud hack and Anne Hathaway's up skirt photos, people. Once they hear those stories, they are immediately like, oh, well, that's not okay, but you probably shouldn't have, let Sean take your photo, but that's not okay.
And I'm like, nope.

SF: I wasn't like secretly like running around your house, taking inappropriate photos of you when you weren't looking for, you know, with, with no prior consent.

AM: I know, but people are prudish in certain ways.

SF: You know the other thing that I, you know, I want to also say is that with all of those photos, with every single person, I put those photos in front of them and said, are these ones okay?

SF: Right. Like everyone got a second shot at saying no.

AM: Oh, okay. Interesting. Interesting.

SF: Yeah. I didn't do anything. Even if they signed a release, I didn't, I didn't use any photographs at anyone said, please don't use that photograph.

AM: Well, then you are part of a new generation of more thoughtful artists. You know, Emily rodesh Koski, her whole platform now is talking about reclaiming her image.
And about the times that she felt like it was taken from her wrongly. So thank you for being part of the new generation of thoughtful artists who are continuing this conversation around consent. And thank you for being on, Find Your Light and talking about who gets shamed for what and why and how we can help create a more PostShame world.
Is there anything else that you feel should be included? Is there anything else that you feel about post shame that you want people to know?

SF: Well, I'm going to say something about consent. It has to be able to change. We have to recognize that people's ideas around consent can change, right? So you do your best to try to listen and work through things with people.

AM: That's the ultimate compassion. Thank you for bringing that up. That is such a, an important and thoughtful piece of this conversation. Thank you.

SF: Well, I'll circle back to just you and Miss shapes, right? Like when those photographs first appear. You probably felt very different about them then 10 years later.
Right. And that is absolutely okay. Right. And there are certain things that I can't control once the cat's out of the bag. Right. I mean, I will say after I made that work, I decided I was never going to photograph anybody else ever again.

AM: You were like, portraiture has done for me. You're like, it's too personal.

SF: Yeah. I'm like, it's over. I can't do it. It gets too involved. I can't imagine a world in which it's easy to maintain healthy relationships around consent for extended periods of time without upsetting someone, because it is actually, that is actually impossible.

AM: Wow.

SF: Right. There are certain things that like, no matter what I do, someone is going to come back and be upset about it later, even though they gave consent in the beginning.
I was so exhausted with the mental hurricane that was trying to maintain also don't date people that you want continuous consent from. That's also a pro tip.

AM: Hot takes from Sean Fader Pro Tip.

SF: A hot takes from me. Don't say anyone who you want continuous consent from, because that oftentimes ends when the dating ends.

AM: Right? I mean, right. Wow.

SF: So there's like a lot of complicated things that happened in that work around my ideas of consent. And I will be honest. I didn't always handle them the best way because I was juggling. How do I do always, I can't always just think about this other person because it's also my work.
And also there's things that are now like out in the world that I can't control. Right. And they did sign off on that and I respect that like consent changes, but also I don't even have that photo. Like photograph is like all over the internet.

AM: I think it's really interesting that you're bringing up the fact that allowing consent to change requires us to truly stay in the moment that, you know, a model release is signed and it's very important to have a legally binding agreement to set the stage for what it is your relationship is, but it is the ultimate compassion to allow for consent to change.
As people learn and grow and change themselves that they may want to change how they interact with it. So it was just a reminder that we have to cultivate each moment fresh. And my favorite thing about Post Shame is that you stand in the present and you look in your past for something you want to transform for your future, but then you have to do something with it then, you have to release it. You have to tell people you have to come out and then you have to stay in the conversation. You have to stay in the moment.
Sean, thank you so much for taking the time. It's always a fascinating conversation with you and I love you 12 years in and I'm just so grateful for you and helping with the Genesis of PostShame love you so much.

SF: Thrilled that 12 years later, there's, this is like born fruit in a totally different direction than I could have ever imagined. It's amazing.

AM: Love You

SF: Love you bye!

Sean Fader: Bye

Adam MacLean: Y'all, how good is Sean Fader? I love that conversation. I'm so grateful to Sean for taking the time and having this conversation with me. And thank you so much for listening.
If you're listening to this in a podcast app, you know how to find us already, please subscribe, like comment do all the things it helps other people find the show. If you'd like to find Sean Fader on Instagram, his handle is photo art star a special thanks to our social media manager, Jose Rodriguez Solis who's on Instagram @ cacidoe CACIDOE and to our producer and theme song composer.
How good is the music for the show? Like, are you loving it? Are you totally loving the vibe? That's special thanks To Zach Wachter. We look forward to seeing you next week and stick around for the PostShame journey and check out PostShame dot org. I'm Adam MacLean, Instagram, @ AdamMacAttack thanks. See you next time. Byeeeeee.