"If In Doubt..."

"...don't." This is a wise bit of advice my precious Grandma gave me and reminded me of throughout my formative years.

I have to admit that any time I didn't apply that bit of wisdom to my decision making, I regretted it horribly and found myself in a bad way.

So...when I see the headline that Scarlett Johansson is among the other unfortunate women who have taken nude photos of themselves with their phones and had their accounts hacked, I find myself wishing that they had someone in their lives who loved them as much as my Grandma loved me.

I mean seriously...what did I miss? When did it become a good idea to snap photos of yourself naked, and save them to your phone and carry that phone around with you? Like...would you carry your diary around with you? Noooope! (Chuck Testa!) You would not. You'd hide it because it had private thoughts and feelings in it that you didn't want anyone to read or know. And those are just words! Don't you think nekkid pictures would be more private than a diary? I would! And I wouldn't be carrying them around with me...on my phone! A phone that could get stolen or lost! A phone that has a network attached to it. No!

And before you snark something like, "If you had a body like Scarlett Johansson's, you might understand," let me explain...

It isn't just Scarlett or Vannessa or Rihanna. It's apparently all kinds of young people...heck, older people, too...guys and girls, men and women...they've all lost their minds! What on Earth compells someone to do this?

I'm totally not a prude. I honestly don't care about nudity...if you want to be naked and take little freaky photos and have the whole world see you and your goods, rock on. That's totally your business. (Literally...ha!)

BUT! If you take a photo of yourself on your cell phone and it ends up getting out there for the whole world to see, you're not allowed to complain about it.

If you're in high school, and your boyfriend begs you for an intimate shot and you cave, BOOM! You've probably just porned yourself. That's right, I just made porn a verb. You've porned yourself and at some point, that silly boy is going to show his friends your private parts or forward it to someone else or post it online and then there you are. You're going to break up with that dude and you won't be able to get those pictures back and where does that leave you? Embarrased, ashamed, regretful...and naked. For everyone. Which isn't what you intended, but it happened anyhow.

If in doubt, Scarlett...if in doubt, ladies and gentlemen...don't. Think beyond five minutes from now. Those thoughts will be a good investment.

(It's so scandalous every time it happens to someone famous that I can't help but to think celebrities WANT this kind of attention. By now, if I were famous and it happened to one of my celebrity colleagues, the first thing I'd do is run home and delete any of the images I may have unfortunately and foolishly taken of myself.)

By the way, the other thing that my Grandma used to say to me when I was lamenting over not being like everyone else/doing what everyone else was doing was, "Don't be common."

Damn, I miss her.