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- #124. Send nudes
#124. Send nudes
Shem Opolot
June 06, 2025
Hi! Welcome to The Friday Fix! You’re reading this because you probably stumbled upon this post somewhere on the internet instead of where it should be—in your inbox. But no worries; we can fix that.
Who am I? I’m Shem Opolot, a health professional turned content creator, passionate about helping people be their best selves in life and work.
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I have over ten years of work experience in healthcare, program management, and data analytics on two continents. So, I know a little about helping you work smarter
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Hi! I'm Shem Opolot, and this is The Friday Fix, my weekly newsletter. If you've received it, you’re either subscribed or someone forwarded it to you. If you fit into the latter (yes, I’m the kind of person who uses words like “latter”) camp and want to subscribe, then click on the shiny button below:
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HAPPY FRIDAY 🎉 Several reports on AI trends and the impact of AI on jobs came out this past week, and people are in full headless chicken mode. But not you, though. You think you’re special. And you are, but just to be sure, here are 4 skills to get in this new age: 1) Emotional intelligence and empathetic leadership, 2) being AI literate, 3) working faster (by using AI), and 4)—arguably most important—creativity and taste (which comes from being yourself—if you’ve been in class).
Soon everything is going to look and feel the same, and people will crave novelty. This phenomenon is also part of the constant pendulum in the zeitgeist: when society seemingly moves in one direction, artists and creative people pull it in the opposite direction by creating contrarian pieces. For example, in the art and architecture of old, maximalism gave birth to minimalism. Think about what that means for you.
Me, I have a newsletter.
An ad.
James Barnor in his studio with a camera he inherited from his cousin, J.P. Dodoo. (Courtesy James Barnor)
I hate the phrase “social capital.” It feels like we only make friends so they can help us get ahead. And after a year living in the “What do you do?” headquarters—Washington, D.C.—my thoughts on social capital are more radical.
But I do have some really cool friends.
And one of them is Siima. If you asked me what Siima does for a living, I’d say she identifies remarkable things and remarkable people and shares them with you and me.
Recently, Siima interviewed James Barnor, Ghana's first newspaper photographer, who turns 96 today. Barnor opened Ghana's first color processing lab, shot for Drum magazine, and photographed everyone from Kwame Nkrumah to Muhammad Ali. At 96, Barnor—your favorite photographer’s favorite photographer—remains sharp, telling stories about a life spent documenting African history.
Their conversation is worth your time, especially if you're curious about what it takes to be first at anything.
Listen here and wish Mr. Barnor a happy birthday while you're at it.
LIFE.
Send nudes.
Michael Angelo’s very naked David. | Source
I helped a friend move into their new apartment last weekend, and I concluded that helping someone move is the closest thing to seeing them naked without seeing them naked.
And it’s important for people to see you naked.
Everything exposed like nerves on a virile forearm. All choices visible. Good and bad. The gadget they thought they’d use but never unboxed. Single-ply toilet paper. Store-brand kitchen supplies. Deflated pillows yellowed with age. The bones of the house riddled with bullet holes inflicted intentionally for the sake of art and memorialization.
It’s naked. It’s raw. It’s necessary. It’s a thousand tacit stories.
Let me tell you one story.
I remember the first time I watched pornography.
Five of us rendezvoused at a friend’s home. He had the whole house to himself, and, critically, the usually locked room that contained the DVD player was open. After emptying the jar of teenage boy gossip, there was a lull in conversation, and the host, feeling host pressure, I imagine, grasped at straws to entertain his guests.
“I have a movie to show you guys.”
We watched what felt like an hour-long explicit porn movie in silence. All of us. All boys. All shocked and awed. Afterward, we avoided eye contact, covered our crotches with clasped hands and untucked shirts, fabricated excuses, and headed to our respective homes in silence.
I had a long walk from city center to Bugolobi to process.
For a Christian boy who was raised to think picking my nose would place a down payment on my mansion in hell, pornography was complicated to contend with. It was exhilarating and embarrassing. And addictive. It made me feel unfamiliar feelings I couldn’t process, and because of the shame, I couldn’t tell anyone.
I couldn’t be naked before anyone.
As I battled alone, I went through the vicious cycle of thinking about porn, searching for it, consuming it, and feeling guilty for consuming it. Then rinsing and repeating when the next trigger trapped me.
Barbershops in Bugolobi doubled as video libraries, and therefore, haircuts were a trigger. You could get a haircut and leave with a movie, or 5—thanks to the magnificent invention of cramming several pirated films onto one disc.
One day, after getting a haircut, I lingered in the shop, browsing the movie collection and fanning the flame of my desire for the fix. It always began as a tiny spark. A salacious title. An attractive leading lady with bedroom eyes staring at you from her perch on the plastic case that housed that disc of dirty dreams.
I wanted to watch just one of the movies because it didn’t take much to get the job done, but I was 15. I didn’t have the money. So, naturally,… I gave up and went home I decided to steal. I waited for a moment when the barber wasn’t looking, hoping to liberate the leading lady from her plastic prison among other leading ladies on the shelf and into the exclusivity in my pocket.
When the moment came, my heart beating cartoonishly fast, I grabbed the plastic case and hid it in whatever fold my clothing formed.
“Borrowing that one costs 5K,” the barber said to me calmly.
This thing, which was going to give me momentary excitement, surely followed by embarrassment, was now leading with embarrassment.
Avoiding eye contact with him, I returned the leading lady to her throne on the shelf and left.
The barber and I never spoke about that moment. And since black men are more loyal to their barbers than their wives, that man still cuts my hair to this day.
The vicious porn cycle took many years to break.
Much later in life, my turning point came when a friend of mine asked to confide in me about a challenge he had. I expected him to ask me for money, and I was prepared to say I was 100,000 shillings away from being in the same situation as him; my mother just taught me to never look like my problems.
But instead, as we settled down, two bottles of water between us, he ranted for 20 uninterrupted minutes about how pornography was ruining his life. About how it progressed cancerously, touching his relationships, his work, and his self-esteem. I sympathized with him, but to connect, I made it about myself. I told him I, too, struggled with porn, but it was taking the pace of a lazy African startup in my life, rather than the aggressive Silicon Valley pace in his.
For many years, that friend and I remained accountability partners, sharing some of our most vulnerable vices. The “normal” challenges I faced, I shared freely with others, but when I was ashamed, I only told him.
We listened, and we didn’t judge.
But even in that trusted space, there were things I did or felt that I was too ashamed to share with him. And I imagine he did the same because with pornography as our baseline, it could only get worse. And ultimately, we all want to be perceived well. Especially by people we love and respect.
We could never be truly naked before each other.
While talking to one of my friends with a politically exposed parent, we agreed, regrettably, that when their parent passes, many people will celebrate. And we agreed that it’s complicated. For their parent, the only legacy they care about is that of their loved ones. For them, often at the expense of millions of others, they did what they thought was best—to survive. Millions may hate them, but their children love them, and that’ll have to be enough.
They can never truly be naked before anyone.
You are complex, and there are many parts of you that you hide from the world, and often, hiding is necessary. But I hope you can break those shameful parts up into little pieces and divide and conquer that shame by baring your bad bits before people you trust. Because, by doing this, you can purchase a little peace.
THINGS.
A quote.
Cruelty leaks. When you mock and insult others—even if they seem to deserve it—you become, to yourself, a person who mocks and insults others. This happens a lot with smart people who shame others for “being dumb.” They then live in chronic fear of being dumb themselves
A podcast episode
I loved the thought experiments in this episode of Trevor Noah’s podcast.
WORK.
Here’s a useful site
You know how you can collaborate on a Google Doc with multiple people? This tool lets you annotate a webpage with others in real time.
FUN.
The Friday Fix playlist
Shem’s picks
✅ How to make a salad that tastes like it was made in a [nice] restaurant
✅ How to age better
✅ A collection of useless websites
✅ How to get your kids to talk to you
✅ Can you stare at Van Gogh’s Starry Night for 10 minutes without reaching for your phone?
Have a great weekend,
— Shem
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