Nude photos of Melania Trump emerge
While Mrs. Donald Trump has been under fire of late thanks to inadvertently (or intentionally) plagiarizing current first lady Michelle Obama's speech from 2008, it seems Melania Trump is at the center of yet another scandal -- one that looks much more like a centerfold.
Long before Melania Trump was wife to the Donald, she posed nude for a now discontinued French magazine in 1996. At the time of the photoshoot, Melania was 25-years-old, with the photos themselves depicting the potential first lady completely nude, save for a pair of high heels.
To be fair, the photos themselves are not overly vulgar or sexualized, and they appear as if they could be taken right out of the pages of Playboy rather than Hustler, for example.
At the time of this writing, the exclusive story (with the leaked photos included) is the top-ranked, most popular story on the official New York Post website. While the pictures themselves have been strategically blurred in certain areas, there is very little left to the imagination.
EXCLUSIVE: Melania Trump like you’ve never seen her before https://t.co/GZwLuejORJ pic.twitter.com/ukdet3CJRY
— New York Post (@nypost) July 31, 2016
Timing and relevancy
The timing and relevancy of this leak is certainly suspicious, to say the least.
Currently, Donald Trump is at the center of yet another controversy, this time involving the Donald criticizing the mother of fallen war hero Humayun Khan after she appeared on stage with her husband as he spoke at the Democratic National Convention. Khan's father openly criticized Trump at the DNC, and in response, Donald Trump has generated considerable ire after he suggested that the mother (a follower of Islam) did not speak at the DNC because she was not "allowed" to.
Given the fact that the New York Post publicly endorsed Trump back in April, the timing of such a "leak" seems rather convenient -- just in time to change the narrative amid the current backlash Trump is facing. There is also the question of relevancy. How is something Melania did more than 20 years ago relevant to the person she is today?
How is it relevant to the current campaign?
Aside from being popular clickbait (and a distraction from current controversy), the general social media consensus among users seems to be that of genuine disgust. Not with Mrs. Trump, mind you, but with the fact that this is currently being passed off as news. Could the Donald have leaked the photographs himself in order to distract the public, or, is this just further proof that sex still sells?
