Belgian museums are uniting in protest against Facebook over artistic nudity ban

Belgian museums are banding together to take on Facebook over the social media giant’s rules on nudity, specifically of the artistic variety.

The Flemish Tourist Board is trying to convince Facebook to change its rules over how it treats artistic nudity from Flemish Masters such as Peter Paul Rubens. The tourist board, Visit Flanders, points out that its Facebook postings with images containing artistic nudity are often removed by the company when they try to promote them.

Basically, Facebook’s rules do allow for the paintings to be posted on its social network, but the issue arises once a Facebook page, such as the museum’s, wants to promote the post on Facebook advertising platform. Belgian museums are saying this is making it difficult for them to attract visitors to its locations.

More than a dozen top Belgian art officials signed onto a letter addressed to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. “The bare breasts and buttocks painted by our artist are considered by you to be inappropriate. We have noticed that Facebook consistently rejects works of art by our beloved Peter Paul Rubens,” the letter states.

In addition to the letter, Visit Flanders has uploaded a satirical video dragging Facebook for its anti-artistic nudity policies. In the video, “social media inspectors” -- complete with a uniform emblazoned with the letters “FBI” made up to mimic the Facebook logo -- approach visitors at the Rubens House museum. The inspectors inquire whether the visitor has a social media profile or not. If they say they don’t, they’re left alone. But if they say they do have an account on social media? The social media inspectors block their view of the paintings and escort them from the premises.

Facebook’s rules covering the area where these museum advertisements seem to run afoul is listed under Adult Content. As outlined on their public Advertising Policies page, Facebook says that “ads must not contain adult content. This includes nudity, depictions of people in explicit or suggestive positions, or activities that are overly suggestive or sexually provocative.” In one example of banned sexually suggestive content in its advertising, Facebook seems to allow for artistic nudity, but only in one very specific art form, “nudity or implied nudity, even if artistic or educational in nature, except for statues.”

Some of the art being removed from Facebook isn’t even provocative in nature. One of the promoted Facebook posts apparently removed contains an image of Peter Paul Rubens' painting, “The Descent from the Cross,” which portrays Jesus in a loincloth.

Facebook has agreed to meet with Belgian art officials to discuss Facebook policies on artistic nudity. But, this isn’t the first time this issue has arose for the company. Even as recently as March of this year, Facebook banned an advertisement on its platform containing an image of French artist Eugene Delacroix's painting, "Liberty Leading the People." The advertisement was later re-uploaded to Facebook by its creator, still including the painting which shows a woman’s bare-breasts, but with the addition of a “censored by Facebook” banner covering Delacroix's work. Facebook later apologized for the censorship of this post.

Facebook has come a long way since outright banning all artistic nudity from its platform, previously sometimes even banning users outright for posting it. Clearly though, the company still has plenty of work to do when it comes to these famous works of art. But, to be fair, the rest of the world seems to have plenty of work to do here too.