Editor’s note: Headline has been changed to reflect the article’s insight.
Social media platforms like Tumblr were never the same since they got stricter with NSFW content. Now, Twitter is joining them. The micro-blogging site updated its terms and conditions on the low this weekend. In their latest update, they stated that they will ban violence and nudity starting Jan. 1, 2020.
Read more: Pornhub study confirms what we all know: a lot of us are hella horny
Materials containing graphic violence like crimes, physical fights, serious physical harm, and bodily fluids will be removed from the site. Additionally, adult content such as nudity of any form and sexual acts will be taken down immediately. In other words, Filipino alter culture might end this 2019.
Read more: What is the Twitter Alterverse?
Just like Tumblr, Twitter believes banning content like these will prevent normalizing rape culture and sexual assaults. But they fail to acknowledge how sex workers and sexually expressive users will lose another safe platform.
Still, there might be a silver lining to this. Twitter plans to allow NSFW content under two conditions: “First, your content shouldn’t promote hate, terrorism, or target an individual. Secondly, you can still share produced adult-content as long as it’s consensual and your tweets are marked sensitive. If it isn’t marked sensitive, Twitter may take it down manually,” writes GadgetMatch.
Read more: Tumblr without pornography isn’t going to be the same
But who’s to say if the site would be meticulous on filtering content? Tumblr wasn’t so careful when this ban was implemented. After banning NSFW content, they filtered posts, even if it didn’t necessarily violate their terms and conditions. They had questionable metrics on what counts as NSFW, from “female representing nipples” to “GIFs showing real-life human genitals.”
We hope that Twitter will have its users’ interests at heart. But with it being another social media conglomerate, it’s best for us to think twice about what this could all mean.
We guess this marks another end of an era. To learn more about the updated policy, feel free to click here.