Nudity, Is It Sexist In This Forum?

[Losty]

You don't have to be in a tough situation Thump. As far as I can see the situation is smooth. I lost all respect for heatheness when she implied that I had succeeded at some sort of child pornography stunt to get her thread closed. It was a baseless and disgusting accusation and her non-apologies have been disingenuous at best. I have no interest in discussing this or anything else with her. I would never ask you to stop being friends with her over this issue. You choose your own friends and I love you just the same. Case closed.

[SteelCurtain]

I understand, and I apologize if I didn't make it clear that I don't agree with or associate myself with that charge. I don't, and won't. I post here at AF on the premise that the Staff are acting in good faith. Seeing some of the behavior in this thread is for me a bit disheartening, is all. I think her basic point is that satisfyng the law is understandable and necessary, but the resistance from staff on considering a higher standard than that seems a little odd to me. There's value to holding free-speech as the sine qua non of a freethinking forum. There's also value to considering how the forum's policies might well be furthering an attitude that no doubt we all -- except for a couple of chauvinists here -- find unpleasant.

But we did consider it. There is an entire thread in the Staff Area of the forum dedicated to this topic. We actually discussed it earnestly for a bit, as well. I will admit the immediate accusation of sexism on the part of the staff in the OP colored our attitude from the offset, but we did discuss it.

We decided that there is no real benefit here other than a weird sense of solidarity that isn't entirely genuine. The staff (pardon me for speaking for everyone) agrees that the definition of 'pornography' should change and should not include female breasts/nipples. That is the fight, and rather than restricting posts any more than we have to in order to protect the forum owner/servers from liability and protecting our ad revenue on the guest site, we decided that if individual members want to show their solidarity by not posting pictures of bare chested men, they could do that.

[Thumpalumpacus]

You don't have to be in a tough situation Thump. As far as I can see the situation is smooth. I lost all respect for heatheness when she implied that I had succeeded at some sort of child pornography stunt to get her thread closed. It was a baseless and disgusting accusation and her non-apologies have been disingenuous at best. I have no interest in discussing this or anything else with her. I would never ask you to stop being friends with her over this issue. You choose your own friends and I love you just the same. Case closed.

I know that, hon. Neither you nor her will ask me to choose this way or that, but that doesn't change my feeling of being netween Scylla and Charybdis. That's my own feeling, not anything either of you have imposed upon me.

I've said my piece both here and to her about what I think of the charge she laid, which is that it was clear in subtext and not fair in assertion.

I prefer friendships to kneeling at idols; I know that we all have flaws -- you, me, her, and Mother Earth. I don't, and won't, ask my own friends to befriend each other, but I do indeed hope that they try to understand one another. And in the meantime, I work to soothe roiled waters, find a happy middle ground.

The tough situation is of my own making, borne out of feelings, and those are my own.

[GrandizerII]

So regarding the OP topic, it all boils down to one of two administrative options that are both perfectly legal:

Option 1: keep things as they are now. Pros being that it's the more popular option, and doesn't demand any additional censoring on the part of members.

Option 2: ban/censor male nudity in every case where female nudity would've been banned. Pro being that it's the more egalitarian option.

Whatever the case, it's going to be a tricky case for the staff. I personally would've opted for 2, but that's not up to me.

[Jackalope]

@Thump


The issue here is that there is more in play here than just the inequity in standards of what is and is not considered pornographic with respect to gender differences.

No matter what we do, we are going to have to compromise on deeply held coconvictions or expose ourselves to liability. To me the ad revenue is much lesser concern - I'm not the one who pays the bills however.

It isn't and never has just been about just what is strictly legal - and in that regard, you have to consider that some overzealous prosecutor or busybody in the most conservative corner of this country could cause serious problems.

[Esquilax]

You're still avoiding the point, which is not that topless pics of women shoud be permitted, but that the guys here should be held to the same standard. As I've already said several times, I understand that the forum must comply with the law. I think her point is that the law should not be the limit of the rules, if it doesn't reflect the attitude of the Staff.

If the Staff is committed to equality, surely they are able to craft limitations beyond the bare minimum of the law, no?

We are committed to equality: that's why we have gender blind policies for hiring staff, treatment of users, and will generally consider sexist or misogynistic conduct to be flame-baiting. But we're also committed to freedom of expression insofar as we can get away with it: we like to inculcate an open and free environment for our users to inhabit, within certain legal and pragmatic bounds that we're forced to recognize. Female bodies are sexualized in the areas of the world that the majority of our membership comes from: this is not something we as staff particularly like, but it is, nevertheless, the reality we need to work around. Male bodies are not, and this is the same thing.

Now, you might argue that men should be held to the same standard, but I'm not so sure that the end-game of equality or feminism should be the reduction of freedoms that others enjoy in order to achieve parity. Frankly, that seems to be moving precisely in reverse of the stated goals here. We won't get past needless sexualization by doubling down on it for short term, largely rhetorical gain. Is that sexist? I won't deny we live in a culture of sexist double standards, but I won't countenance the idea that the staff are somehow participating in sexism by recognizing the counter-productive nature of this particular request. The change you want will not be achieved by doubling-down on the thing you're objecting to.

Now, to address the wider thread for a moment: I'm aware that this has become a shitshow but, to belay any accusations of bias on my part, I should perhaps point out that I was absent during the particularly contentious moments of this thread- I have a disabled wife and sometimes she comes first- and played no part in the decisions that Heatheness seems, somehow, intent on weaving into a wider conspiracy against her. I may be an admin, but I am not the shadowy hand of some secret cabal come here to destroy some unsuspecting user. At least, not this time: no, here I'm just a peep, giving their opinion on the situation as I see it.

[Tiberius]

For me the issue has two parts.

1) Our advertising platform generates significant revenue for the site which allows us to effectively host the site at no cost. The advertising platform has several restrictions which mean advertisements cannot appear on sites containing adult content, among other things. Given that we are a site that is 100% user generated content, we need to enforce certain rules in order to keep are account in good standing. Adverts are disabled in Area 69 (they are disabled for any logged in user), but they do appear on other pages. I've had several warnings regarding content in the past which violated the advertising platform policy, and when I've checked it out, it also violated our own rules (we just missed it at the time).

2) We do not have an age limit on the forum, and we are open to members who may be minors. Given this fact, it would be irresponsible not to prohibit certain adult themes, including sexual references, sexual jokes, etc.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I understand, and I apologize if I didn't make it clear that I don't agree with or associate myself with that charge. I don't, and won't. I post here at AF on the premise that the Staff are acting in good faith. Seeing  some of the behavior in this thread is for me a bit disheartening, is all. I think her basic point is that satisfyng the law is understandable and necessary, but the resistance from staff on considering a higher standard than that seems a little odd to me. There's value to holding free-speech as the sine qua non of a freethinking forum. There's also value to considering how the forum's policies might well be furthering an attitude that no doubt we all -- except for a couple of chauvinists here -- find unpleasant.

But we did consider it. There is an entire thread in the Staff Area of the forum dedicated to this topic. We actually discussed it earnestly for a bit, as well. I will admit the immediate accusation of sexism on the part of the staff in the OP colored our attitude from the offset, but we did discuss it.

We decided that there is no real benefit here other than a weird sense of solidarity that isn't entirely genuine. The staff (pardon me for speaking for everyone) agrees that the definition of 'pornography' should change and should not include female breasts/nipples. That is the fight, and rather than restricting posts any more than we have to in order to protect the forum owner/servers from liability and protecting our ad revenue on the guest site, we decided that if individual members want to show their solidarity by not posting pictures of bare chested men, they could do that.

I get that. I am responding, however, to the continual rebuttals here inside this thread (not the moderator's thread) which address only the legal dimension (understandable as it is) but ignore the larger point. I find it frustrating that people for whom I hold such high opinions wave the law around even as that point of contention has already been addressed.

If the Staff don't wish to make it an equal point, in order to represent a higher understanding than that provided by the law, great. But her point is that that also says something, and you cannot then say "I'm for equality" as you retreat into the trenches of a law which is inherently unequal. By standing pat on what the law says, and not working to go past it, what is the message the Staff is delivering?

If you're fine with the way the law reads and feel no need to be better than it, great. But own it -- own that buy-in that you're wielding in your own defense. If you want to be better than the law, you can be.

I'm thinking that is the point of this thread, to make us think about what we take for granted. It's making me rethink my positions on gender issues, and that isn't a bad thing. I was joking about not posting my own nips -- it's more a matter of not scarring the eyes of these youngsters with some old guy's flat tits -- but seriously, what sacrifice is being requested?

I really don't get the line-drawing and digging-in that's going on, outside of the context of emotions being bruised ... and that's not really a good way to moderate a forum, is it?

[Thumpalumpacus]

@Thump


The issue here is that there is more in play here than just the inequity in standards of what is and is not considered pornographic with respect to gender differences.

No matter what we do, we are going to have to compromise on deeply held coconvictions or expose ourselves to liability.  To me the ad revenue is much lesser concern - I'm not the one who pays the bills however.

It isn't and never has just been about just what is strictly legal - and in that regard, you have to consider that some overzealous prosecutor or busybody in the most conservative corner of this country could cause serious problems.

What liability might you have that is not legal? I'm not privy to information about ad revenue, but I'm also not sure how not posting male nipples mught affect that adversely.

Perhaps you could elucidate?

[Cyberman]

I may be an admin, but I am not the shadowy hand of some secret cabal come here to destroy some unsuspecting user. At least, not this time: no, here I'm just a peep, giving their opinion on the situation as I see it.

^^ This.

Bizarre as it may seem, those of us on the operations side are not in receipt of payment for the time we put in here. While we may appear to live in the forum we actually do have lives of our own, such as they are, complete with all the little dramas that entails, and choose to give of our time freely in the service of a community built of people we regard in the main as friends. We are members first and staff second; selected for a job which gives us deeper access into the forum than most, yes, which consequently depends entirely on the trust of the memberbase as a whole. It is for that reason that wholly unfounded and downright spiteful accusations which threaten to destroy that trust cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged. We have no need nor desire to resort to silly conspiracy games simply to undermine individual members. For my part, a person has to earn their place to the level where I consider them important enough to be worth my time in any such ways. Quite frankly, that certainly isn't the case here.