There's A Lot Of Meta Nudity Content Policy, What's A Free The Nipple Campaign?

What is Free the Nipple on Facebook and Instagram (photo: Unsplash)

JAKARTA - It has been more than a decade since the "Free the Nipple" campaign began, Meta has finally restored two different posts showing breastnipple from transgender and non-binary pairs, on the recommendation of its Supervisory Board.

More than that, Meta's independent Supervisory Board consisting of academics, rights experts, and lawyers also recommended that Meta change the Standards of the Adult nudity and Sexual Activity Community so that it is governed by clear criteria that respect international human rights standards.

Because according to them, Meta's nudity policy could hinder inclusiveness on the platform, especially for women, intersex, non-binary, and transgender.

The board said that the company's policies based on binary views on gender and differences between the bodies of men and women, which make rules about exhibiting nipples are "unclear" for those who do not identify themselves as women.

What is the Free the Nipple Campaign?

Free the Nipple is a campaign focused on implementing Meta's strict policies on depictions of women's nipples and even breastfeeding mothers historically censored content.

According to Euronews, this has caused a stir since 2012, when a film discussing the topic was released and sparked protests demanding women's right to be shirtless on social media if they wish.

Since then, exceptions have been introduced for breastfeeding, giving birth and moments after giving birth, health-related situations (for example, post-massemic, breast cancer awareness or gender confirmation surgery) or protests.

However, there is one thing that is often debated, namely when the platform often allows hate speech not to be censored, while female nipples are prohibited.

Then in 2018, CEO Mark Zuckerberg tried to justify this by explaining, "It's easier to build an AI system to detect nipples than hate speech."

In April of that year, Facebook released its first internal guidelines for content moderators, outlining how platform nudity standards rooted in user security and avoided exploitation.

Why is the Meta Change of MIND Supervisory Board?

The Meta Supervisory Board said in a decision that the company's adult nudity policy is based on a binary view of gender, so it's unclear how the rule applies to intersex, non-binary and transgender people.

"Such an approach makes it unclear how rules apply to intersex, non-binary and transgender people and require reviewers to make rapid and subjective assessments of gender and gender," the council said.

However, with a new announcement last Wednesday, it could mean artists can now freely share their works on Facebook.