DP's creepy group chats

[SinkingFeelingInMyStomach]

DP has been very cagey with his phone for the past couple of months. Last night, I looked over while we were sitting on the sofa and saw him scrolling through nudes of various women on a Telegram chat group. This morning, I looked at his phone's notifications and saw lots of messages from said group. Googled and found a post talking about it. I'm pretty sure it's the same group — there are loads of others but this one uses the same phrasing as the title of the one he's in — and apparently to join and remain a member of the group you'd have to upload nudes of women from time to time!

Confronted DP and he said that almost everyone there just shares nudes they see on reddit (what he did) and you "only" have to share photos when you join but I am fucking scared he used ones of me. There are tens of thousands of people in this group and it's UK based ffs. He's left the group but I don't know if he's in others as there's so many similar ones with similar "rules" and it all makes me sick.

Is there a way I can make sure he deletes all my nudes, no backups, none saved in the cloud or something, before I break up with him? He thinks we're ok now and I don't want him to get suspicious.

OP, I didn't read any further than this "saw him scrolling through nudes of various women on a Telegram chat group." and can quite confidently say that you do not need this guy in your life.

Why are you shaming and blaming her? She's done nothing wrong, he is the one being a total creep. Get with the times and get on the right side

I'm so sorry you are dealing with this. Please make sure you send a lovely text to his mother telling her why you are breaking up. If its any consolation, I had an ex upload a "home video" as a form of revenge for breaking up with him. I was mortified and felt sick but when I tried to find it, it was lost in a sea of pornography online. Its horrible, but

I hit send by accident. Was going to say that there is so much competition online for nudes to get seen that yours (if he did do this) will get lost and become anonymous instantly. Don't worry too much about it and bare in mind that most people will see those posts as a reflection upon him and not you.

This! He's a creep, but you don't really care as long as it's not your nudes. Bizarre.

*He's given me his phone and I've deleted my pictures. His phone also has screenshots from the chats including the group name when he wanted to save the reddit links and I've confirmed and that I misread the situation by working myself up over googling and his was a reddit nsfw link sharing group, not a personal one.

Re boundaries, where exactly is the line? When I was in uni, guys scrolled through nudes casually during class like its Instagram, so many female classmates I know were on only fans, almost every "fun" social group on WhatsApp or telegram or discord were full of links to nudes on reddit etc. I have a line but reasonably every single guy I know crosses it so what's the fucking point*

My ds left uni 4 years ago. I showed him your post. He didn’t recognise any of it. Didn't know anyone who scrolled through phones for pictures in lectures. None of it.

And even if l think back to when l was st university. If men were doing that in lectures l would have seriously kicked off. It’s revolting, and it shouldn’t be allowed in a university. But do the powers that be even know? Why didn’t anyone complain. I bloody would have.

@SinkingFeelingInMyStomach I totally understand you needing to be sure your pics aren't on the phone. I do think you just need to have an honest think and a chat about this. Personally I would end it - , but I'm 60 and didn't grow up with this kind of behaviour as a norm or an expectation . If he's usually a decent guy and you don't want to split I would want to know in detail why this is going on- is it to be one of the lads, is it for a sexual buzz , where does he draw the line etc- is he prepared to 100% not be up to this shizzle? You know him - us mumsnetters don't- is he a bit of a sheep who would have just thought it a bit of a laugh? Personally I would lay it on the line that it has hugely upset you, makes you feel like shit and it's 1 strike and you are out next time. I don't know if you have an opinion on porn watching in general but if you don't want it- might be a good time to find out what the score is on that too.

It's not that I don't care. I just said that compared to what I was thinking and fretting about, the fact that it's a chat group with nudes of women they themselves uploaded on reddit, many of whom have links to only fans accounts in their profiles they themselves control, it was a relief for me as it wasn't a personal picture type of group.

Maybe I'm reading this thread wrong but what I got was...

The OP is (rightly) relieved that the pics are not of her (pics that she did not give permission to have posted).

The OP is relieved that the women in the pics are women who had already posted the pics themselves. Not women who are being posted nude without their knowledge.

The OP has continually stated that she is leaving him, but hasn't let him know as she wanted to make sure the pics were deleted before she gives him the news. Obviously she thinks what he is doing is gross even though she is relieved.

Am I wrong?

Think I have checked as thoroughly as anyone can. Thanks everyone and especially @PuddlesOnFire as I wouldn't have thought to check his reddit id (which was what solved the issue of what the group was actually about and gave me some sort of clarity) and instead decided to spend the afternoon working myself up into a frenzy about whether it was a personal picture group or not.

I am sad and angry but also so so so so so relived and will be leaving him as planned as after the events that transpired today there's no turning back for either of us.

I'm sorry for my language and how snippy I was especially to posters who were only trying to help or offer advice.

Thank goodness for your post I thought I was going crazy reading some of these replies. You are not wrong! Completely spot on.

Google is really not your friend when you are worried and cannot think straight as the top search results were all ones of groups with slightly more dubious consent requirements. Once again, I'm not happy or indifferent about the group, I'm just relieved that the pictures were not of me and at least appear to be of people who consent and have uploaded them themselves.

I don't know how these groups work, so no idea if this would work and it wouldn't get you into any cloud or google photo type storages, but you could try a reverse image search with google lens if you still have the photos you sent him.

You dont sound mad or stupid!
You were young and naive and basically coerced.
You've done the right thing by deleting. Please delete the "deleted" folder too.
You live and learn but creepy guys like this are not the norm, they are a very creepy subset. Stay away and tip off any girlfriends you know what they've been up to!
Much love 💕💕💕

OP, I assume you checked any email accounts he may have had on his phone? You've been a lot more thorough than I would have been and my job's IT. 😀

I'm glad I was able in some small way to help you as it's made me feel I've done something useful today (despite having flu!). I've been there, so can relate to an extent.

You sound like a switched on woman and I'm sure you'll find a nice guy who spends time with you and not with his phone.

Taking of which, I've spent way way way too long on my own phone today though, so that's enough of that. Time to read a book and carry on sweating and shivering out this bug.. Night all.

@SinkingFeelingInMyStomach - ah- I missed the bit where you said he was toast!! So ignore where I'm busy telling you what to say if you want to stay!! It would have been toast for me too - as a young woman without kids you have your life ahead and all to play for !!! Don't get serious with someone you know to have sleazy tendencies- most of us discover shit like this a long way down the line

I hope he understands that if he is a member of these groups and an image is shared of anyone who turns out to be under 18 he will be in a whole world of trouble. Him remaining in these groups is an unbelievably stupid thing to do and could end up ruining his whole life. I'm not exaggerating, there is legal precedent for this.

I have a line but reasonably every single guy I know crosses it so what's the fucking point.

OP I feel for you, and anyone growing up in these totally misogynist free-for-all times.
I don't really know what to suggest. It being normalised is a real problem. Hopefully a large proportion of men who are doing this as students will soon realise how grim it is - only by women keeping to their boundaries and not believing all the shit men throw at them about not being cool with it, discussing in mixed-sex groups.

Keep tabs on feminist websites/groups/even the MN boards. It feels like yesterday I was a student but thank God hardly anyone had camera phones let alone social media etc. It's really not normal to have nude pics of loads of 'real' women, let alone people you know! It's deliberately there to break women's boundaries.

Sorry if I'm not making much sense.

God help you. This arsehole youre with needs dumping.

This is fucking grim.

It's the normalising of behaviour like this within relationships that's a real issue. To me as an older woman it's made it that we feel we can't speak up if we find frequent porn/sexting/only Fans/slobbering over nudes/ totally unacceptable even in committed relationships for fear of being 'bores' - the fact that this young woman said it was de rigeur at Uni- everyone did it says a lot about how normalised it is and how women feel obliged to go along with it all

Totally agree.

I am so glad that there was no social media or camera phones when I was at school/uni. I can't believe the things that women are subjected to these days. I know that in terms of legal rights things have improved for women (although that does seem to be going backwards a bit) but relationship wise there seem to be some really horrible misogynistic attitudes around. It is also very worrying that a lot of young women feel they have to go along with it.

Is there more misogyny around or are men just not caring any more about hiding it?

Why are people surprised though? I mean, women are their own worst enemies, honestly.

Who on earth is sleeping with these men? And why? I wouldnt touch them with a barge pole.

@feellikeanalien it's always been there but if my ex H in the 80s had been putting in hardcore DVDs 5 times a week- I would have thought him a complete sleaze bag and divorced because of it- Men can hide it now to a large extent - and have far easier access to it and it seems far less taboo to talk about it amongst themselves and share. Far less women too seem to make a big deal of it , indeed some do this stuff themselves. I think plenty of women (not all) feel they need to just turn a blind eye as they need the blokes money coming in to get by too.

Oh my god. PLEASE girl get some critical thinking skills and some backbone. The types of men pressuring you for nudes are not the same as the ones you can form healthy respectful relationships with - surely you realise that??