You'd have to be really fucking stupid for this to be difficult for you. I guess FB finally realized even their users are not all stupid enough to believe such a ridiculous statement.
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2007/09/27/the-origins-of-justice-s...
They messed up, received backlash, and changed their policy based on it.
Even with a general policy, they still have to review whether a picture falls within the boundaries of the general policy. And there is no debate that they need a general policy, the debate is over what that policy should look like.
It's exactly like that. They could not allow pictures at all, not censor at all, or close down the business, too. Every option is open to them.
"Shut facebook down" is a bit ridiculous. Congrats, you're technically correct that it's an option open to them.
It is absolutely not difficult to distinguish between a photo of burning children and a photo of a sex act. In fact, it's pretty ridiculous to characterize this photo as that "of a nude child."
Common sense tells me that the child's clothing was on fire, and she took those clothes off and ran away, and that's what we see a photo of. Fine.
But then... why is this photo described as a picture that contains flames? Not just here. That's always how it is described.
Here's a photo of her back: https://i.ytimg.com/vi/KZZvVl11PvU/maxresdefault.jpg. This is the life-long damage: http://img2.timeinc.net/people/i/2015/news/151109/napalm-gir....
The flame and smoke from the napalm attack that all the people in the picture are running from is pretty much the whole background of the picture, though the fact that its black and white and the cloud is fairly thick may make that less immediately recognizable.
> but I've been told (since junior high school) that it is a picture of a burning child.
Its not a picture of a child in flames [0], though its picture of a child experiencing burning as a result of the napalm drop (according to her, her recollection is that she was screaming "too hot, too hot" at the time the photo was taken), and the absence of visible flame isn't the same thing as the absence of continued burning.
[0] Well, not the child that's the central feature of the photograph. There are children burning in that sense as well in the picture, I suppose, if you consider the background and what is actually burning there.
Besides, burning does not require fire to be present. It only requires heat (or chemical reaction).
I'd take their policy over Twitter's. Know how many spam/porn accounts littering on Twitter? At least Facebook is not a home for spammers.
I agree with the suggestion, but can't help but laugh at how impractical it is. The people who would make the change are bay area progressives working in tech. And that means saying all the "right" things about sex positivity but stopping short of actually becoming sex positive.
I didn't see any napalm in the image. The girl had removed her burning clothes before the photograph was taken. The reason this particular image is considered acceptable is the historical context.
If I were to recreate the image by hiring actors, that would probably be considered child pornography.
Removing clothes after the napalm had burned through them (which was manifestly the case here) certainly may reduce the degree to which you are being burned by napalm, but does not mean you are no longer be burned by napalm.
> If I were to recreate the image by hiring actors, that would probably be considered child pornography.
Be considered by whom? Pornography requires more than simple nudity.
> Pornography requires more than simple nudity.
Perhaps, but I can understand Facebook removing that photograph, just in case a judge thinks differently. Child pornography does not appear to be something the FBI takes lightly.
What on earth are you talking about? Is there anything even vaguely sexual about this photograph? Did I miss something?
From that thought experiment, I'm deducing that it's the historical context which makes the original photograph acceptable to distribute, and not anything intrinsic to the image.