The online marketplace Etsy, known for its unique crafts and vintage treasures, is set to implement stringent new rules on adult content, which will see the majority of sex toys banned from its platform. Effective July 29, the company’s freshly minted “Adult Nudity and Sexual Content” policy, revealed on June 27, outlines a crackdown on items \u201capplied to the genitalia\u201d or \u201cdesigned for genitals to be inserted into them.\u201d This ban covers an array of intimate products including dildos, vibrators, rings, and plugs.<\/p>\n
‘Etsy’s aversion to insertion’ appears to stem from a desire to sanitize its offerings. Items that are deemed “non-insertable and non-penetrable” will still make the cut, provided vendors comply with Etsy\u2019s rigid guidelines for \u201cmature\u201d content. These stipulations include tagging items as \u201cmature,\u201d ensuring they don\u2019t feature prominently on shop avatars or home pages, and making sure thumbnails are “appropriate for general audiences.\u201d Explicit depictions, whether of genitalia or the use of products, are vehemently banned.<\/p>\n
But Etsy’s policy doesn’t wholly eradicate adult content. In fact, it delineates a nuanced approach to “non-realistic content”\u2014like paintings, illustrations, sculptures, and line drawings\u2014allowing some level of nudity. According to the guidelines, “visible breasts and buttocks,” \u201cgenitalia or anuses without any additional sexual context,\u201d and \u201csex acts without visible genitalia or anuses,\u201d are still kosher. But any sexually explicit visuals featuring genitalia or anuses, especially in contexts involving \u201cvisible arousal, sexual stimulation, sexual body fluids, or sexually suggestive posing,\u201d are strictly off-limits.<\/p>\n
The platform has also erased a swath of fetishized items off its stock list, including worn underwear and content that zooms in on sexualized body parts, such as foot pics. Any representation of illegal sex acts ranging from bestiality and necrophilia to incest and non-consensual sex, too, faces the ax under Etsy’s new edicts.<\/p>\n
Even suggestive sexual language won\u2019t escape this purge. Phrases referencing \u201cfamilial relationships\u201d like \u201cDaddy\u2019s slut\u201d or \u201cChoke me Mommy\u201d are out of bounds. <\/p>\n
This sweeping purge follows a broader digital trend. Remember the infamous 2018 purge of adult content on Tumblr? Or OnlyFans’ ill-fated 2021 attempt to ax sexual content, which they later backflipped on? Indeed, this latest move by Etsy aligns with a larger wave of online sexual content censorship. Plus, let’s not gloss over the brewing legislative storm\u2014lawmakers from 19 states have rolled out proposals that would require identification to access adult content. Etsy\u2019s new policy signals yet another watershed moment in the evolving narrative around online sexual content.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The online marketplace Etsy, known for its unique crafts and vintage treasures, is set to implement stringent new rules on adult content, which will see the majority of sex toys banned from its platform. Effective July 29, the company’s freshly minted “Adult Nudity and Sexual Content” policy, revealed on June 27, outlines a crackdown on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39415,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[630],"tags":[66,5421],"class_list":["post-39414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-adult-retail","tag-censorship","tag-etsy"],"yoast_head":"\n