Has Facebook Lost the Plot with Nudity?

Facebook’s guidelines on displaying images containing nudity continue to bamboozle me. We’ve had lots of images removed over the last few years as well as having one of our pages completely deleted in 2011. This week I had 2 images removed that were both posted months ago.

The pic above was posted in July last year so has been on our page for over 12 months. I was sent a notification last week that it did not conform to “FB’s Community Standards” so had been removed. Because this was my third image to be removed in the last month FB also banned me from posting for 7 days and requested that I send them a photo of some official ID so that I could prove that I am a “real” person. :/

Then yesterday I was sent another message to say that the picture below had been removed for not conforming…and they “unpublished” our Nudes Exposed Facebook page (again). This picture had been on our page for about 2 months.

Facebook’s Community Standards Guidelines on Nudity are as follows:

“We remove photographs of people displaying genitals or focusing in on fully exposed buttocks. We also restrict some images of female breasts if they include the nipple, but we always allow photos of women actively engaged in breastfeeding or showing breasts with post-mastectomy scarring. We also allow photographs of paintings, sculptures and other art that depicts nude figures. Restrictions on the display of both nudity and sexual activity also apply to digitally created content unless the content is posted for educational, humorous or satirical purposes. Explicit images of sexual intercourse are prohibited. Descriptions of sexual acts that go into vivid detail may also be removed.”

Neither of the above pictures contain nipples, buttocks or any genitals. I would also say that neither of them is particularly sexual (the second shot was actually posed with the hands over the nipples so that it would be Facebook friendly for god’s sake!) So why are our pictures being singled out when there is so much other content I see on FB that is so much stronger? And what is so wrong with women’s nipples anyway…why must they be covered at all times? You can post a picture of a topless woman with pasties on her nipples where you can see the whole of the rest of the breast and Facebook thinks this is just tickety-boo. They don’t look at the context of the picture, just what is on show.

This sexy glamour-type image is allowed on Facebook

This casual editorial image would be removed by Facebook.

Sadly it seems that someone is reporting our images to Facebook as being pornography. What makes someone want to report our images? I myself have reported posts involving racism and hate speech and Facebook have not removed the offensive material. So why is their knee-jerk reaction to any form of nudity, however subtle to just remove it and ban the person who posted it? If you don’t like a picture on FB then you can hide it, or even hide all posts from that page. If you don’t follow the page you will only see their posts if you actually take the time to visit the page. And whoever reported these 2 images took the time to trawl through months of other posts to reach the 2 that so offended them!

I’m fed up with the merest hint of sexuality or nakedness being demonised by Facebook while it sits back and allows posts promoting gun-worship, racism, and violence. I’m off to Twitter where nipples are allowed to be published in all their glory…

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