Facebook is notoriously nipple-shy.
Mummy blogs, mothers groups and individuals mums (as well as Mamamia) have all had “offensive” posts of breastfeeding removed from Facebook by the administrators.
But the social networking site inspired ire from another community entirely when they removed a post from the “Girl on Girl” documentary film Facebook fan page – a photo that encouraged people to be true to themselves.
This was the image in question:
The administrator of the page, which has 136k+ followers on Facebook, is Jodi Savitz. She wrote a piece for xojane detailing her disappointment over Facebook’s handling of the situation.
When Jodi was first informed that the image violated Facebook’s “community standards”, she thought there must have been some nipple or arse visible in the photo.
My contact-less eyes combed the photo for signs of a nipple or butt crack violation. No dice. Yet, the message I read from Facebook stated that it somehow violated their Community Standards on Nudity and Pornography. I clicked the hyperlink to read what was written:
Facebook has a strict policy against the sharing of pornographic content any explicitly sexual content where a minor is involved. We also impose limitation on the display of nudity…
Jodi wrote that, “For a moment, I was compelled to laugh. Their “strict policy” is nothing short of a joke; its imprecision borders on legal parody and its utility would be more convincingly demonstrated in the context of an SNL skit.”
When she woke up in the morning, she was able to make her grandmother an administrator of the page and logged into her grandma’s Facebook account – because her own had been banned from posting content.
She then created and shared this image and encouraged her followers to share the image too.
Top Comments
Twice this week I have woken up to multiple photos full on soft porn on my newsfeed, of naked photos of girls in bed with their arses in the air, or grabbing their boobs (with nipples still showing) etc. I reported them as being nudity/pornography - and have now received the notification that none of them (about 10) will be removed. They couldn't even publish those photos in zoo mag, but they're fine for FB (when breastfeeding isn't). Flat. out. sexism.
In all honesty, my first reaction to the above picture was not pleasant, I found it confronting and didn't like it at all. The second picture to me was one of those posed photo's a sleazy guy takes and I didn't find it as confronting because I don't think it's real, it's staged porn in my mind. Contemplating the issue, I think it is because we aren't used to seeing homosexuality in such a normal way (for want of a better word). I have gay friends. I've grown up around gay people even when it wasn't as acceptable as it is now, and I would have thought I was one of the most accepting people of homosexuality. I'm shocked that I did have such a strong reaction to the photo and wonder how many others will honestly state the same. We really do have a hell of a long way to go in society in accepting homosexuality. And I apologise to anyone I've offended with my honesty, especially any of my gay friends. I really am on your side but I don't think lip service and pretence has made it any easier. We really need to change values and attitudes so that a photo such as above is just another photo and not a photo of a lesbian couple.