So what’s worse… exhibiting pictures of a naked child in the very young-hip-and-urban Spitz Gallery in East London or printing one of those pictures (alongside one from a “genuine” child porn website) in a national newspaper? Or, to put it another way, does Rebekah Wade have any concept of social responsibility?
It’s a serious question (well the first, anyway… I think we already know that the answer to the second is “no”)… there’s always been a hazy line between art and titillation, but a civilised society can teach people to see the shades of grey and how context and intent can make all the difference. Whatever Betsy Schneider’s intention with the photographs of her daughter, Rebekah Wade’s decision to use one of them in the context of a sensationalist tabloid front page is so cheap and nasty, they may as well have been posted on a child porn website in the first place.