Changes to NSFW Category and Nudity on Krita-Artists.org

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I find this topic to be very interesting. Really, the notion of “balanc[ing] freedom of artistic expression with our goal of maintaining an environment that is welcoming to the widest audience“ is fascinating. I don’t have an ax to grind here. Pedants like me will create less work for the moderators if we can find clear ways of stating the policy. I’m new enough to this forum that I don’t understand all the terms people are using, so some of this is less clear to me than old-timers.

It sounds like the “forum rules” are the “Terms of Service” that can be found at Home>About>Terms of Service. Could we just use one of those terms, or am I off base here?

I think this thread is about a change to the Sensitive Content (NSFW) Policy section of the Terms of Service. The title of that section would need to change for sure. And some of the bullet points could actually be shortened or eliminated, maybe.

I think “spoiler tag” means a tag on a post like “nsfw” or “artistic-nudity”, which causes the site’s software to blur the image. Are there other “spoiler tags”? I think many users have an idea of what a spoiler tag is based on experiences with other sites that have them. I don’t.

The original post said to “assign a safe thumbnail” for the post. Is there an algorithm that picks the first image for a post and uses that for the thumbnail, or is there a way to explicitly assign a thumbnail? Or by “safe”, did @raghukamath just mean the blurred thumbnail that you get when you use the spoiler tag?

I wish I could make a suggestion for specific wording for the Sensitive Content Policy change, but I don’t understand the root problem that this Sensitive Content Policy is trying to solve. I also think it would take a lot of bandwidth to explicitly discover and state the root problem. I’m pretty sure I can follow a policy without understanding that.

I don’t know the history here (although I can tell it is sensitive), but one way to reduce work for the moderators would be for their decisions to be final. Moderators would still need to spend time making decisions, but not defending decisions. I like that the current policy acknowledges that the moderators decisions are subjective. The statement “We understand that these things are subjective, but final interpretation of these rules are up to our moderation team” exposes the moderators to some defending, I think. However, a statement like “We understand that these things are subjective, but the decisions of the moderators are final” wouldn’t.

If this is getting tiresome, please don’t bother to respond. I’m happy with whatever y’all decide.

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We agree with you. That’s why anatomical studies will be allowed.

If you choose to use one as a reference you could post the artwork here as an anatomical study as long as the genetalia are not displayed.

(edited for clarity)

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I think you’re making the right call in having the priority be keeping this space as accessible as possible. In fact, I’m all for just ruling out nudity completely. Because while I appreciate the redaction bars/blurred thumbnail approach, our 13 year old users would still be just a click or two away from nudity.

This isn’t really the space to debate what constitutes the difference between nudity and pornography – the line which separates them is quite amorphous and subjective. As I understand it, the mods are choosing to make this space SFW going forward, and that’s where I think ruling out nudity altogether would probably be the best (and easiest) course in the long run.

And besides, ruling out nudity wouldn’t prohibit figure studies. I’ve seen multiple art instructors teach anatomy and gesture drawing from models in their undergarments – not to mention ballet dancers, gymnasts, and ice skaters, to name a few. Even a fitness instructor in her yoga pants gives a very clear idea of figure.

With this line of thought, there is nothing to prevent an artist from doing a nude figure study privately – they just couldn’t post it here as such. The beauty of digital art is that it’s a simple matter to create an alternate version with underwear applied. It would only cost an extra layer and a little time, and it would relieve the mod team of having to make difficult calls. (As @Kremer noted, there are other sites to which the nude original could be posted.)

And even more than that, it would be respecting KA’s underage userbase. Having an “underwear required” policy would be pretty easy to understand and negate the need to “reinvent the wheel”. (It’s effectively the underwear department of a 13 year old’s local store or a summertime trip to the beach.)

Once again, I wholeheartedly support the mod team for going in this direction. For the reasons I’ve outlined above, I definitely encourage a “no nudes” policy if you decide to do that. Creating new rules over the course of time to preserve your vision of Krita Artists is perfectly fine and – as in the case of banning Generative AI artwork – something you’ve already had to do.

Let’s keep Krita Artists a safe forum for budding young artists to blossom.

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A post was split to a new topic: How do I start a drawing?

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Thank you all for your comments. We are still transitioning to this new policy and we will need everyone’s help to make it more clear and less confusing.

We still have to make changes to our content guidelines and terms of service pages to reflect this change, those still have older texts.

Now about the change, our (moderator team) main issue is where to draw the line during moderation. Based on our experience while engaging with artists we would need to explicitly mention every type of pose or sexual activity or body part not to show in the artwork to be super specific so that we can then point out the rule book.

We found ourselves quiet regularly in this dilemma when someone would say, hey why did you censor my artwork and point me the rule banning this in your list of rules, where does it say do not show this or that. We were accused of censorship etc.

For example when the character depicted will be clearly under age, and when we talk with the artist they say they are drawing a 300 year old female elf but they only look like a 12 year old. Sometime the artwork would be borderline porn but not completely porn and we would waste days debating about it. Sometimes the artist would say that the character is wearing really tight latex suit etc etc. Sometimes when we allowed one artwork it would be flagged by someone else again and they would debate with us how that is not okay and how an exposed cleavage is not good etc etc. And debating about whether the genitals are showing through the pubic hair is not what I would want to spend time on.

We only allowed nude studies behind a spoiler tag because we know nude studies are part of artistic journey. We also draw nude studies so we understand. Here by spoiler tag I mean the “blur spoiler” button you see in the post editor.

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So we thought of this spoiler tag as a compromise, but I think as pointed out by @ktf it doesn’t solve our main issue that is to reduce burden of moderation. We would still need to moderate those images hiding beneath the spoiler tags. Considering the confusion here in this thread I think it is better we do away with anything nude. This is the reason why we opened this thread to discussion with a one month buffer time instead of just fully implementing the change. And this is the reason for the line about this being a compromise -

Bear in mind this is just a compromise we did to allow the studies. If it seems difficult to moderate we might change the policy to not allow nude studies in future.

Also NSFW is not just about nudes and sexual activity, it can be gore or violence or suicide abuse etc. It is really tough and subjective space to moderate. We moderators and admin team collectively do not want to scrutinize the artwork in this subjective and stressful way so we made the decision to remove the nsfw category.

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Let me start off by saying I so far have been quite satisfied by the moderator decisions on this site, at least looking at the resulting artwork being published. I have not yet tried to submit any work relevant to this discussion here myself, so I could theoretically have missed if there was occasional over-moderation.

Like most artists ever planning to drawn people, I have done anatomy studies myself though, and I would be a bit sad it it was no longer possible to post them here and receive feedback from this amazing community. Just drawing clothing over every nude work or even study is not a realistic option in my opinion. Either it would be irrelevant (“see how I drew tape over the nipple”) or it would possibly hide the mistakes you want to have feedback on. (Also realistic clothing folds are pretty hard to draw for many.)

If we talk about protection of minors or sensitive persons, I personally agree that we do not need to allow gore, violence, abuse, suicide and obvious porn/sexual acts. Sexualisation of minors should probably also be avoided, even though some cultures are more open to it than others, but I think in many parts of the world this also means legal trouble. Avoiding over-sexualised depiction of women or poses focusing on genitals is also something I personally could live with.

Now as you mentioned, some parts, especially the later ones could possibly lead to discussions with the mod team. I my opinion though, this possibility can never be avoided, no matter where you draw the line. You want “no nudes”, only clothed people? Well, how much cleavage is the dress allowed to show, what will you do with skin-tight latex suit, how short is the skirt allowed to be? Shirtless male smith in historical painting banned already?

The solution in my opinion is not to avoid all nudes, but a no-discussion mod approach. Either that or give exactly one chance for counter argument. Submission → Mod deletes, gives 1-3 sentence reasoning → Artist sends undelete request (maybe limit text length)-> Mod says decision reverted or not, no further reasoning. (The 300 years old example for me is ridiculous and obviously just a bad attempt at avoiding limitations, not sure why it would even need to be discussed.)

I know it may be strange to switch to such a hard stance at first, but I think it is something you can get used to. Now if some mod really feels unsure, there could be as system to forward to other mods as a simple vote (to avoid wasting time), maybe to an odd number of voters even, to avoid ties.

In the end, “wrong” decisions probably never can be fully avoided, but the damage is very limited I’d say.

The reason I would allow more nudity in comparison to say gore/violence is, that nudity is something everyone of us has to deal with anyway. A blur spoiler tag (and maybe an account setting to hide posts with that spoiler if it is technically possible) should be enough to make things safe for work for the lucky people that may privately browse at work anyway.

Contrary to SirEric, I do not think parents will ever be able to limit their children or teenagers to this site and “be safe from nudity and anything bad”. You give your child a browser with internet access. It can use the search bar, it can get PMs. It can click links to sites like Youtube or Deviantart or Mastodon. You watch over your child 100% of the time or you cannot avoid it. This forum by definition is for 13+ only btw. An age where people probably actively search for nudes and at least in my western country send each other videos on their smartphones that go way beyond anything ever seen on this forum so far.

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I just wanted to say that generally, I agree with every single thing @TaleOfACat said here. Thank you for writing this reply – it drives home some of the points I was trying to make myself but I think you’ve made them in a clearer way :slightly_smiling_face:

100% agree. This is why I was hoping that simply self-censoring, at least for the first (thumbnail) image of a nude study, would be acceptable. I said this before, but: if a model in their underwear is SFW, then solid black bars should definitely be SFW! (This is good enough for YouTube and television and pretty much everywhere else, after all.)

I personally prefer the idea of posting a combo of a censored version (black bars, e.g.) and the spoiler-tag-blurred version in the same post. It’s a much better user experience than a whole separate forum for “NSFW” posts. (The previous system.)

One idea: if folks here did decide to disable nudes completely, perhaps a compromise could be posting a censored version here and linking to the uncensored image elsewhere? This is already a thing, albeit indirectly. For example, you simply have to click on my profile to see a link to my Pixelfed account, where the images are not censored… which any 13-year-old can already easily click on… (as if they need my crummy paintings when they have the whole internet at their fingertips if the goal is NSFW content, haha).

Anyway, I support whatever the mods decide, of course. But I would find it tragic for a site with “artists” in the title to prevent someone from posting, e.g., a master study of Michelangelo, Raphael, Rubens, Botticelli, or any other in the long, long, long history of epoch-making artworks that include human bodies :slightly_smiling_face:

I 100% agree with this as well. (I was a kid. I remember. There wasn’t a forum policy on earth that could keep me from seeing illicit content if I put my mind to it! :grinning_face:)

Or, to look at it from another angle: imagine if you didn’t let a kid visit any museum with nudes in it. Tragic, right?

Thank you for the reminder! It’s easy to forget that NSFW is more than just “nudes”. This distinction is important, I think.

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Been following this thread and I just want to say that I am 100% behind the moderators on this. I really appreciate the acknowledgement of the minors using this site.

Regarding whether 13 yr olds can still access NSFW out on the web, it’s absolutely true that they can.

But that’s not what this thread is about. The point is not about keeping the Internet safe for 13 yr olds. The point is what is and isn’t allowed on Krita-Artists.

I think it is very misleading to label the Terms of Service as “censorship”, for, in all truth, it is the same “censorship” that protects our users from dealing with racist and violent content.

Just because we can’t keep 13 yr olds from finding these things elsewhere, doesn’t have any bearing on what Krita Artists is going to provide 13 yr olds here. (Just because my kid can access porn behind my back, doesn’t mean I keep some “adult” magazines in the bathroom.)

And for the rest of us adults… As has been commented, there are plenty of sites allowing full nude out there. AI too for that matter. And violence and racism. The mods aren’t stopping any of us from pursuing anything we want out there. This thread is just what is going to be allowed here.

And that is what leads to the fundamental point of this discussion - lightening the load of the dedicated moderators tasked with keeping Krita-Artists running smoothly. And eliminating a stressful and time consuming topic would do that.

I think that spells it out completely. Everyone here has been quite respectful in sharing their thoughts, but just this small handful of viewers is able to come up with all the grey area questions, critiques, disagreements and opinions that precisely confirm how controversial and subjective the topic is.

Which is why I agree wholeheartedly, especially in consideration for the moderators, to simply “close” the subject of nudity and NSFW (in all its forms) on this site. I think the pros far outweigh the cons.

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I agree 100%!

Taking this opportunity to thank
the krita-artists team for providing artists of all skill-levels with a free platform to share and grow! :clap:

I totally support this new direction and hope we can go forward with as little stress and as much clarity as possible. :grinning_face:

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Hey KA moderators!! I really appreciate you doing this. I can understand and easily imagine the amount of time and pain it is to surf through and sort out the many different angles one can view this topic.

The examples @raghukamath cited I’m sure were from personal experience and I would find that beyond tedium.

I clearly see why you would want to make a firm, distinct line and hold to that. Users are not limited to KA to post their artworks. In full reality, you are not limiting anyone. So, if you don’t feel the desire to play ball every other post, that’s entirely your prerogative.

I am all in favor for removing NFSW and nudity. It’s seems a really direct and straightforward approach.

Again, really appreciate you bringing this topic to the community’s attention. I think it’s a great improvement to know clearly what to expect on the site and what not to. There’ll be much less confusion.

All of us knowing with certainty what the Terms of Service are and knowing they will be firmly applied - that’ll add a lot of stability to the growing community. I am totally behind that! :clap:

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Let’s keep in mind that nude means naked; not wearing any clothes from all the definitions I’ve been able to find. It doesn’t sound like a no-nudes policy would accomplish anything except excluding something that historically has had a big place in art. I’m afraid that someone will have to spell out what they want. Hats- gloves- or socks- only is not what you seem to be looking for, but it fits the definition of non-nude.

Maybe a guideline could be something like:

  • At least as modest as temple garments, or
  • At least as modest as niqab?
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Here is an example of someone else’s rules.

https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/obscene-indecent-and-profane-broadcasts

You could ban obscene content (their definition) and decide if you want to allow indecent content (with artistic merit?) being some tag and blurred thumbnail.

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I do too… though unfortunately I don’t believe that such a line exists :wink:

See @raghukamath’s post (which I quote below) to see a bit more about why that isn’t the case.

It seems to me that neither of these problems are solved by disallowing NSFW artworks. You haven’t drawn a clearer line, you’ve simply moved the line. Right?

Ultimately, of course I respect whatever decision the mods and the community at large make here… but I have a couple of questions that might be interesting to consider moving forward. Your goals as I understand them are twofold:

1. Foster an inclusive community, and…
2. Reduce moderator burden.

My question ultimately boils down to: it this new policy accomplishing either of those goals? If the answer is “yes”, then I say by all means charge forth! :grinning_face:

Question 1: What percentage of the active userbase of Krita Artists is in the 14-17 age group? Is this the most important group to serve? What if serving this specific age group requires concessions that negatively impact other demographics? Or excludes them entirely?

Question 2: Is there data on the number of required moderator interventions? And can you compare that data before and after the policy change to see if it’s accomplishing your goal? (My sense is that there will always be debate about what is and is not “acceptable” given any set of rules. This will not simply “close” the subject, as someone has suggested above.)

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Oh, one more quick suggestion: given the new rules, I wonder if we could start another linked thread (or even posts in this thread if that makes sense) to suggest alternative communities which are bit more inclusive to people who are studying figurative art, human anatomy, or who are interested in doing master studies.

There are certainly pay sites like Proko and NMA, but I wonder about other free resources, comparable to KA?

The Fediverse (Pixelfed, Mastodon, etc.) is good, but I’ve found that there’s not much engagement of other artists there… it’s not a good place to look for critical feedback. Reddit is basically just an AI training ground now, unfortunately. Does anyone know of other good options?

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Feel free to start a thread in the Off-topic category. That will prevent this thread from forking into a different (although worthy) topic.

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Based on our internal discussion of the moderator team, we have come to the conclusion that we won’t be allowing nude (naked) figures, sexualised images or any indecent posts on the website, not even inside spoiler tags. The moderators will have full discretion over what will be allowed. If a certain post is removed by the team, the user can message the moderators and the moderators can provide a reason but there won’t be any debate about the decision.

So from tomorrow the one month period starts. After one month the NSFW category will be completely archived and later all NSFW posts will be deleted from the website and also from the backup.

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Digital Collage Artist Using Krita
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The terms of service page has been edited to reflect the new policy.

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Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

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okay so what if my character got a lung infection and started coughing up blood and i drew that?

this is a genuine question btw, im not just trying to be a nuisance

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Then it will be not allowed because it is perceived as gore/vore.
See also: Terms of Service - Krita Artists

Michelist