Trine has drawn my attention to the SL Naturist Flickr page, having tried to export photos to another Flickr group’s page last week, only to discover that it couldn’t be done as her photos (below) were considered ‘moderate’ for a group categorised as ‘safe’.

If the other group had been rejecting the photos for this reason I would have had no issue with that. It’s their group, their rules.

I’ve tinkered with the settings and it transpires that the safety settings on our page have been set to ‘moderate’ by Flickr staff, with no option to re-set them to ‘safe’. Of course, many of the photos there do feature nude, pixel avatars. Others, however, do not. Some are of ‘scenery’ or of clothed avatars. But Flickr staff have seen fit to impose their values on our page. Once again, it’s their social media, and their rules, but I object to the blanket setting of ‘moderate’ being applied to all of our photography and no capacity to take ownership of the issue and re-set the ‘safety’ values one a photo by photo basis.

I’m not too pleased, either, that there was no prior warning that Flickr intended to do this, an explanation as to what and why they were imposing their values on us. I don’t share their values on the subject of nudity, particularly a pixel, non-sexual nudity. I don’t wish to comply with their ‘rules’ when those rules are so palpably wrong. A quick search for ‘dead elephant’ or ‘dead lion’ on Flickr turns up (historical) photos of hunters grinning with pride at their kill. The photos are marked ‘safe’. Personally, I find such photographs offensive. Is it right that children (the presumed ‘safe’ audience) can be subjected to photography of such pointless, mindless violence?

Consider this: a company originating somewhere in Asia decides to open an office in  New York. It requests that all female staff have their heads covered during office hours and ‘dress modestly’. What might the reaction of America be? The neocons, the feminists and the liberal left would all be queuing to tell us that the company’s values are not America’s values. Rightly so. So how should social media differ? America’s conservative, ‘Christian’ values, in respect of nudity, are not the world’s values, yet social media companies have a uniform approach to skin exposed. Why should we be expected to conform to their value system? Not all of the world, thankfully, shares these ‘values’.

Additionally, how can these social media organisations even dare to impose any sort of value system on anyone when, in their oppressed, fucked-up minds, breastfeeding is bad yet videos of beheadings are considered to be OK?

We will not take lectures or instruction from organisations with such a weird, pitiful morality. We will not be playing by their exceptionally odd and morally bankrupt rules.

Our Flickr page will be removed shortly.

I’ve replicated this message on there to outline our reasons for withdrawing from that social media outlet. That will stand until the end of October, at which point our page will disappear.

Howie