Out <\/em>Magazine summed it up best<\/a>: \u201cThe update is specific to profile photos (excluding private albums and photos exchanged in messages) and applies to all styles of apparel in which the crotch or groin area is highlighted or outlined. Pictures that violate these guidelines will be automatically converted into private album images and users will be prompted to select another profile photo. The initial alert was sent out Wednesday as Scruff had been contacted by app store distributors earlier this month with a warning, Scruff CEO Eric Silverberg tells\u00a0Out\u00a0<\/em>in an email interview. Previously, certain photos in underwear and jockstraps were allowed.\u201d<\/p>\n Sex columnist Alexander Cheves told <\/a>Towleroad<\/a><\/em>, \u201cI predicted when Tumblr banned all adult content that hookup apps for queer men<\/a> would go soon. They wouldn\u2019t go immediately \u2014 first, they\u2019ll change their image guidelines so that no lawmaker can accuse them of fostering sex<\/a> trafficking.\u201d<\/p>\n READ OUR INTERVIEW WITH ALEXANDER CHEVES HERE<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n When asked why Cheves said, \u201cBecause prosecutors like Kamala Harris and countless other left-leaning and self-described feminist celebrities refuse to see sex<\/a> as something healthy and normal. If people are finding sex<\/a> on the internet, or on an app, it must be wrong, they reason, and someone must be getting exploited or trafficked \u2014 never mind the countless people who exploit themselves for their own profit, and the people like me who like getting exploited and objectified, and all the people who consensually and happily meet and play online.\u201d<\/p>\n Cheves thinks that, \u201clawmakers think all this is dangerous. And queer people, whose promiscuous sex<\/a> lives still terrify them and always will, are automatic targets. Scruff\u2019s new guidelines literally say \u201cno men<\/a> kissing\u201d \u2014 on a gay<\/a> app. I believe the intention for FOSTA\/SESTA was to curb sex<\/a> trafficking, but the lawmakers who passed it have no idea what sex<\/a> trafficking is or how it happens and they refuse to listen to those who do. They refuse to listen to victims and the people (sex<\/a> workers and service providers) who are put it harms way. Who cares if a bunch of fags lose their dating app?\u201d<\/p>\n For those who don\u2019t know, FOSTA-SESTA were bills President Trump signed into law<\/a>\u00a0that were\u00a0intended to make it easier to cut down on illegal sex<\/a> trafficking online. Both bills \u2014 the House bill known as FOSTA, the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act, and the Senate bill, SESTA, the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act \u2014 have been hailed by advocates as a victory for sex<\/a> trafficking victims. However the broad language of the bill was criticized for being inherently problematic. Among other things the bill is most famously well known as the law that ended Craigslist\u2019s hugely popular personals section. <\/p>\n Cheves was quick to add, \u201cI know this was not Scruff\u2019s choice. They would have gotten pulled from the App Store, and they exist solely as an app.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPorn bans are coming. It\u2019s time to protest,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n LA based psychiatrist Tim McCall told Towleroad<\/em> \u201cFOSTA\/SESTA needs to be repealed. It was a badly written law to begin with, impractical to implement, and has the general effect of stifling freedom of speech and of association, particularly impacting sexual minorities, but it\u2019s just generally a bad law. And it\u2019s not just the left. It was crafted as a perfect storm of fundamentalists on left and right\u2013like when the state mental hospitals were all shut down the 1970s and early 80s because the left felt that people with severe mental illnesses should be cared for in nicer, community-based organizations (that never materialized) and the right just wanted to stop paying for mental health services. FOSTA\/SESTA was created by right-wing activists who want to shut down sex<\/a> in general and LGBT sex<\/a> in particular, combining with left-wing activists who see most sex<\/a> as inherently exploitative; both cloaked the whole thing in \u201csave the children\u201d false colors and sold it to Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n Britton Pentakill\u00a0founder of the gay<\/a> social network WooHim dot com<\/a> said, \u201cHaving only gained approval for our WooHim app on iOS store last tonight, I can tell you that we went thru constant review rejections and had to moderate hundreds of thousands of photos to make sure underwear was not publicly visible. Android wasn\u2019t as brutal. The law still protects private pictures\u2026 so\u2026 unlock 4 unlock? and media shouts just to approved friends are still permitted.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis isn\u2019t lookin so good guys<\/a> \u2026\u201d Is the message Amp Somers, host of\u00a0Watts the Safeword<\/a>, wrote on Twitter said Out<\/em>: \u201chashtagged SESTA and FOSTA, legislation that legislators say was intended to crack down on internet sex<\/a> traffickers but that has spurred a\u00a0darkening \u201csex panic\u201d across the internet<\/a>\u00a0causing censorship and erasure of spaces once thought to be sex<\/a>-positive, queer sex<\/a> havens.\u201d<\/p>\n Craigslist. Backpage. Tumblr. Now even @scruffapp<\/a>, a gay<\/a> dating app you have to be of consenting age to use, is censoring how it\u2019s users can post photos? <\/p>\n This isn\u2019t lookin so good guys<\/a>\u2026 #sesta<\/a> #fosta<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/w8UjOUEjqX<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Amp (@Pup_Amp) January 24, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Ultimately Silverberg told users<\/a>, \u201cToday most software is distributed via app stores, and consequently app content policies are a direct extension of app store content policies. Simply put, all gay<\/a> and queer apps must enforce app store content policies or risk being removed from the app stores altogether, and this happened to SCRUFF earlier this year. Had this removal been permanent, it would have been devastating to our company and our community.\u201d<\/p>\n He continued, \u201cMoving forward, to comply with app store guidelines, the primary profile photo may not show jockstraps, underwear, or bikini-style swimwear. We have also clarified our policy by removing references to hugging and kissing \u2013 it is specifically sexually suggestive embraces that may not align with app store guidelines.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The post Are Scruff\u2019s New Photo Policies A Precursor To FOSTA\/SESTA Legalized Censorship of LGBT Content?<\/a> appeared first on Towleroad Gay News<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n