Hide that nipple woman.

The day before Black Friday I decided to try, for the first time, to do some promotion with Instagram/Facebook. I always decide to do these things way too late at night and therefore, again, did not think things through completely when I chose my image, which you can see accompanying this post. Being French, nudity does not bother me. And nudity in art? Not even a relevant question. We are not talking about pornography here but of the representation of us, the human race, in the arts. Which is kind of basic in terms of art making as in of course we are going to represent ourselves, clothed or not.

To come back to my promotion, it was denied of course and that is fair. They are the rules of that platform and so be it. So I went to change the picture, no biggie. And before I did that I went to check the guidelines on naked bodies that was included with the promotion 's refusal. And that is when I got angry and I wish I had taken a screenshot of all these guidelines. But the short of it is that the mere suggestion of cleavage in a woman is not ok even in a sculpture. A man's penis on a statue? That's fine. Men's nipples showing through their shirt. Fine. Topless men? That's fine too. As we know. And all of these guidelines disappear when you are young and white, no matter if you are a man or a woman. I mean you just have to search social media to know that. 

Did you know that women painters used to be prohibited from studying anatomy because it was thought that they'd become too aroused... the poor men must have been worried for their safety I guess. 

Basically it always falls on the women: you can't inconvenience the men by either being seen, heard, talented or wanting to learn unless they have some use for you. 

(It reminds me that I wanted to do a blog post on the purpose of women in society: you can either be a mother, a saint or a prostitute. And I have a story about that but it'll be for another day. )

And that night was also the night that this blog was born. It is the beginning of what I want to accomplish which is to provide a community of like minded people with a place where the arbitrary rules of big corporations do not apply.

That and also, I hate Black Friday.

Have a great evening, 

Much love, 

Marie