Susanna Gibson

The first thing I did when I saw the news about Susanna Gibson was look up Virginia’s revenge porn laws.

Let’s rewind for a second -- Susanna Gibson was running to represent the 57th District in the House of Delegates in the November 2023 election. On September 11, a little less than two months before this crucial election in Virginia, the Washington Post ran a story about Gibson performing sex acts with her husband for a live audience and encouraged viewers to pay tips for specific requests. Specifically, Gibson and her husband used a platform called Chaturbate, where “videos are streamed live on that site and are often archived on other publicly available sites,” according to the initial Post article. As noted by the Post, more than a dozen videos of the couple captured from the Chaturbate website were archived, the most recent archived on September 30, 2022. The videos were also on other non-password protected, publicly available sites. In October, the Republican Party of Virginia mailed out several thousand explicit political fliers containing censored quotes and screenshots from Gibson’s livestreams.

It should be noted that the source who provided the Washington Post with these videos was a Republican operative.

What happened to Susanna Gibson this past September raises a multitude of questions and concerns regarding ethics, campaign tactics, and online privacy. Although Virginia’s election is now over and we are heading into the 2024 election cycle, I can’t get Susanna Gibson out of my mind. This incident should raise the alarm for how women, especially women political candidates, are going to be treated in the 2024 election and beyond.

In February 2014, Virginia’s General Assembly passed a bill banning revenge porn, which is defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary as “sexually explicit images of a person posted online without that person’s consent especially as a form of revenge or harassment.” Section A of Virginia’s revenge porn law (codified at § 18.2-386.2, Unlawful dissemination or sale of images of another; penalty) states that “any person who, with the intent to coerce, harass, or intimidate, maliciously disseminates or sells any videographic or still image created by any means whatsoever that depicts another person who is totally nude, or in a state of undress so as to expose the genitals, pubic area, buttocks, or female breast, where such person knows or has reason to know that he is not licensed or authorized to disseminate or sell such videographic or still image is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.”

When I was first made aware of the Post article, I felt certain that the Republican operative had committed a crime by sharing this information to the news. To me, at least, it felt obvious that this unnamed operative was maliciously sharing this information to the Post as a way to harass Gibson and tarnish her reputation, probably with the hopes that this would cause her to drop out of the race.

However, Section B of the law goes on to state “if a person uses services of an Internet service provider, an electronic mail service provider, or any other information service, system, or access software provider that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server in committing acts prohibited under this section, such provider shall not be held responsible for violating this section for content provided by another person.”

After doing more research into this subject, it became clear to me that this did not neatly fall into Virginia’s definition of revenge porn as I had previously thought. Susanna Gibson maintains that she did not know that these livestreams were being recorded and archived, but that does not automatically mean that the revenge porn law had been violated. Chaturbate, as well as the websites used to archive the videos, are public and not password-protected. As a part of my research for this piece, I went on to Chaturbate to see their policies on the recording and archiving of material. When you go to create an account, you’re required to check boxes indicating that you’ve read and agree to the site’s terms and conditions as well as their privacy policy. After a few paragraphs, the privacy policy states that “[a]nything that you share through any of these means is deemed public information regardless of your use of a password or other function to restrict users’ ability to view. You should always be careful when deciding to disclose your personal information.” I think that this raises some good questions about online privacy -- one of the first things I learned in my Contracts Law class on my first day of law school is that people don’t usually read the fine print of terms and conditions or privacy policies. Upon looking at Chaterubate’s registration process and privacy policy, I think this could lead to a lot of people not realizing that videos and images that they think are private are actually not, which can lead to a lot of situations like this -- not just for political candidates like Gibson, but for anyone who uses the site.

Ultimately, because the Republican operative directed the Washington Post to publicly available videos, no crime was actually committed. But, at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter to me that the release of these videos do not fall under the provisions of Virginia’s revenge porn laws. Everything about this situation is still wrong. What other reason was there for this Republican operative to release this information to the press besides to harm Gibson’s political career and reputation? Just because the releasing of Gibson’s livestreams isn’t illegal doesn’t mean it’s acceptable, and this Republican operative engaged in a dirty tactic that took advantage of America’s aversion to sexual expression in an attempt to ruin Gibson’s campaign.

I can’t help but to note that many of the news articles published about this situation were always quick to note that Gibson is a nurse practitioner and mother before going on to discuss her use of Chaturbate. I doubt that this is done to commend her on her career and familial achievements. Rather, I think it’s done as a method to shame her. Following the September 11 Post article, people began to call Gibson’s educational and occupational achievements into question just because they disagreed with what Gibson did. Something that really infuriated me was an article published by the Washington Post on November 8, titled “GOP’s David Owen wins Virginia legislative race over Democratic opponent who livestreamed sex videos,” this is a disgusting title that strips Gibson of her name and defines her by something she did. And let’s be clear, Gibson didn’t do anything wrong -- she and her husband were engaging in consensual behavior on a legal website. She did not harm anyone by choosing to livestream sexually explicit acts. It’s okay that she did this, and it’s also okay that some don’t like that she did this and disagree with her actions -- what isn’t acceptable is the fact that the Republican Party used this in an attempt to discredit Gibson, cast her as a bad person, and attempt to get her to drop out of the race. As Samantha Willis pointed out in her brilliant commentary, “[m]aybe you or I wouldn’t do as Gibson did; that’s our preference, and that’s fine. We all have the right to think and believe differently, as long as we’re not harming others or infringing on their rights. Likewise, no one was harmed and no rights were violated by Gibson’s preference to film and broadcast her sexually explicit videos.”

I think that Willis is correct when she states that “[t]he pearl-clutching and head shaking that the revelation of Gibson’s videos were meant to prompt stem from a bedrock of American culture: patriarchal standards that dictate what morality means and how it is exemplified in our ideals and practices -- with a special laser focus on women’s behavior.” The Republican operative who alerted the Post to Gibson’s videos knew just what they were doing when they did this -- while Gibson didn’t do anything wrong, our society is uncomfortable when it comes to talking about sex. Our society as a whole, not just conservatives, have the tendency to shame people (especially women) for expressing their sexuality. Gibson reported facing harassment and even death threats as a result of the disclosure of these videos. I did a search for Gibson's name on Twitter, and as recently as December 16, a user stated “[w]e had a Dem Susanna Gibson shamelessly suggesting Americans should not be judgy on this tawdry behavior.” Another user said Gibson didn’t take responsibility for the acts she committed -- as if Gibson committed some sort of crime. One user called her filthy, while another called her deranged, and yet another one said she has no morals. On December 11, Gibson retweeted a post about prescription drug affordability, which got responses like “you are a disgusting pornographer jezebel” and “nothing says self-respect like broadcasting intimate sex acts for money!!” And that’s only two comments on one of her recent posts. Trust me, there are way more where that comes from. Even after the election, Gibson is still being shamed for her livestreams. This shows that we use women’s sexuality, which isn’t a bad thing, as a weapon against them.

Because of that, I think that expressions of sexuality, especially women’s sexuality, will continue to be used as a weapon for the foreseeable future. I’m not the only one who thinks that this Republican operative’s attack on Gibson and her campaign was used to distract voters from the real issues at stake in the November 2023 election. Following the September 11 article, Gibson’s campaign issued this statement: “David Owen and the Virginia GOP are trying to distract voters from their extreme agenda to ban abortion, defund schools, and allow violent criminals to access weapons of war. Voters are tired of these desperate attacks, and they will not be fooled by them.” Additionally, the House Democratic Caucus stated that “the MAGA Republicans can’t help themselves from showing their true colors. This is a desperate attempt to distract and deflect from how many of their candidates are on the record wanting to ban abortion.” This is not the first time Republicans have tried to distract voters, and it certainly won’t be the last. We have the presidential election coming up in 2024, and all 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 34 of the 100 seats in the Senate are also contested. On top of that, there are a number of state and local elections occurring. We are still facing the consequences of Trump’s disastrous presidency as well as the Dobbs decision on top of the multitude of other attacks Republicans have waged on all our rights -- so I don’t think I’m being dramatic when I say that each and every one of these elections are crucial to the survival of our democracy. I think Republicans will resort to brutal attacks against Democratic candidates, just like what was done to Gibson, to distract voters from the real issues in this upcoming election. With the stakes being so high, this makes me very nervous, and that is why it is crucial that we in State Fair work hard to spread information about the importance of state and local elections in order to combat these attacks.

Gibson ultimately lost her race, but only by less than 1,000 votes (a margin of two percentage points). I think this is remarkable, and Gibson does, too -- following the election she stated that this marginal loss is proof that voters don’t care about what she does online. Though I don’t know her personally, I am so proud of her. I’m proud of her for facing this challenge head-on and for not quitting or abandoning her campaign as the Republican Party was hoping she would. Following the election, she expressed a desire to find ways to support and encourage other women running for office, particularly those facing similar situations as she did. In a November 18 Associated Press interview, Gibson stated that she “isn’t ruling out another run for office someday.” I hope she runs again.

As Gibson’s campaign stated: “[v]oters are tired of these desperate attacks, and they will not be fooled by them.” I think this is true not just for Virginians, but for all Americans, and while I’m sure the Republican Party will attempt to throw as many attacks to distract from the real issues in 2024, I have hope that voters won’t fall for it. That is why the work we do with State Fair and The States Project is crucial. When they throw these attacks our way, we will respond with compassion, grace, and the truth. We helped to make a difference in Virginia this past November, and I know we can make a difference in 2024.