As some of you may have heard, the popular blogging site Tumblr is going to start banning pornographic content starting on December 17 after a close call with child pornography accusations. They are not just banning porn, they are banning all adult content that they consider to be porn. This includes "photos, videos, or GIFs that show real-life human genitals or female-presenting nipples and any content--including photos, videos, GIFs, and illustrations--that depicts sex acts" according to the blogging site itself.

Not only that banning porn altogether is already problematic enough as is when Tumblr has legitimately offensive content on their site, but Tumblr's description of what they believe is to be pornographic content is extremely misleading.

I would like to start with the fact that Tumblr has other content on their website that is more than worthy of being banned from the site altogether. Not only the site has several Nazi accounts including this one, but the website also has many images that glorify acts such as self-harm, suicide, eating disorders, and psychopathic behavior, all of which should not be glorified by any means. I am a massive advocate for mental health acceptance, so seeing these behaviors glorified while Tumblr does absolutely nothing about these posts makes me sick to my stomach.

The people who suffer from these issues need help, not this stigma that glorifies this behavior.

And now, to discuss the most baffling part of all of this, Tumblr's definition of "pornographic material". Their definition is not only limited to sexual acts portrayed in images, GIFs, videos, and illustrations, but it also includes nude shots that show genitals and female-presenting nipples. While the genitals part is not necessarily the big deal, including female-presenting nipples makes me realize that Tumblr does not understand that the female body is not meant to be pornographic whatsoever.

This has been an issue that has been prominent in the feminist world for several years at this point, but I still can't believe that this still needs to be said in 2018: breasts and female-presenting nipples were never meant to be sexual.

A woman's breasts were meant to feed newborn babies. The fact that one of the biggest and most popular websites in the world still does not understand this concept makes me lose faith in humanity a lot more than I already have.

Long story short, Tumblr banning porn from their website will not solve any issues or protect anyone from child porn, regardless of the website's definition of pornographic content. There are many things on Tumblr that should not be on there but you choose to ban porn of all things? This banning of pornographic material on one of the most popular websites of all time is a form of censorship and should not be happening in this first place, especially since the definition (according to Tumblr) is so loose and includes material that's not even pornographic in the first place.