Woman Mass Soliciting “Dick Pics” on Twitter Had Good Intentions

WASHINGTON – Kelsey Bressler has attracted a lot of attention from soliciting as many pictures of male genitals as she can, albeit, with good intentions in mind; Bressler, 28, who is a student analyst and web developer, intends to build artificial intelligence software which will allow her to avoid future “dick pics” such as the one that arrived in her direct message box on Twitter earlier this month.

Bressler, from Seattle Washington, received hundreds of pictures to her account “showMeYourD” after posting the following message:

I'm soliciting dick pics at the handle @showyodiq .

This is not a joke.

I am testing a filter that is under development which will automatically detect dick pics in DMs and handle them on behalf of the user (delete, delete&block).

18+ , consensual, human dicks only please.

— K E L S E Y (@raeBress) September 5, 2019

According to BBC News who spoke with Kelsey, so many people volunteered their nude photos that she had to close the inbox. She believes social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter should, and could, be doing more to protect users.

“When you receive a photo unsolicited it feels disrespectful and violating,” Bressler told the BBC. “It’s the virtual equivalent of flashing someone in the street. You’re not giving them a chance to consent, you are forcing the image on them, and that is never OK.”

A second Twitter account “safeDM” which was used by her team received an influx of images and was later disabled from receiving messages.

Need MOAR dicks

— safeDM (@showYoDiq) September 5, 2019

I've shut my DMs for now so that we can evaluate results and make some tweaks to the filter. Will let you know when submissions reopen !

Thank you!

— safeDM (@showYoDiq) September 6, 2019

Due to the sharing of genital images often referred to as “dick pics” becoming a widespread phenomenon, a study was conducted in 2017 to explore men’s motivations for sending unsolicited images of their genitalia. A secondary purpose of the study, which was published in The Journal of Sex Research in 2019, was to investigate the personality and sexuality characteristics of men who send genital images compared to those who do not.

The study, which had 1,087 male participants, determined that men who send unsolicited dick pics demonstrated higher levels of narcissism and endorsed greater ambivalent and hostile sexism than their non-sending counterparts. The study also found that as many as 27% of millennial men have sent a dick pic at least once.

Bressler and her team are continuing to work on their new AI software which she told reporters”

“is capable of preventing over 95% of sexually explicit images from reaching her inbox.”

Kelsey Bressler, Technologist & Activist

At least one major social network has already shown interest in her technology and methods.