#raphael bradley

If you’ve ever been diagnosed with an STD, you know how traumatic that can be. Imagine if your name and records were revealed by a hospital employee and posted on a Facebook page, entitled “Team No Hoes.” This happened to a Cincinnati woman earlier this month.

Her ex-boyfriend, Raphael Bradley, wanted to know the reason for her hospital visit. She refused to share, so he contacted another woman he was involved with at the hospital The woman, Ryan Rawls, allegedly looked up the woman’s medical record and gave it to Bradley, who then posted it on a Facebook page about ‘promiscuous women,’ “Team No Hoes.”

A quick search of “Team No Hoes” on any social media platform will turn up a plethora of articulate statements such as “Hoes let’s just talk about hoes can we talk about hoesssss hoessss” and “GET MONEY BITCH NOT AIDS YOU NASTY ASS SLUT.”

“Facebook is usually good about taking material like this down when it comes to light,” said Emily Lindin of the UnSlut Project, “but the creators of these pages are usually one step ahead of the online administrators.”

These pages are a digital version of scrawlings on bathroom stalls, but much more dangerous. Social media posts reach across the world in a second, and are harder to remove. “This case demonstrates a few different aspects of sexual shaming,” said Lindin. “The first is the shame surrounding STIs. Being diagnosed with syphilis, in this woman’s case, was enough to get her labeled as sexually promiscuous.”

She says it also shows how social media can become a forum where woman are “publicly shamed, as if to warn others against interacting with them because they are ‘dirty’ or ‘immoral.’”

Women have always been dealing with the double standard when it comes to alleged sexual habits. While legal action is being taken, this woman, and others similarly affected, will deal with ramifications for years to come.