Queer eyes on how tumblr dies

(or perhaps not?)

The D-Day has come ... and still, the sun has risen. Bitch!

The tumbrl will start removing explicit content in wide range from kink, porn, sex, naturism, artistic nudity and anything with too much ochre color in it. I guess writing an elegy on the virtual den of porn with suicidal tendencies - may roll a few eyes upwards. First-world problems! Though, I never saw a solution in making the first world into a third world ...

So bare with couple of my (surely offensive) observations, please. Then dislike the post and unfriend me ;)

One of the possible arguments to suffer the presence of large profiteering corporations is their social-presence in the communities they interact with. From hypocrite ostentatious altruist foundations to occasional unwanted collateral good. In case of tumblr this was the open communication and kind of global-scale sexual education. In wider take: An exchange. A conversation. An insight into uncensored minds.

Education? Of course, most of the content was reblogged, template style, just flock-mentality monkey-copying of explicit sexual acts, scenes and usage of tools - from the others. "how it is supposed to be done" "what to wear" "what facial grimace to do" "what is sexy" "what is cool thing to show" Though, this inflated volume has facilitated also some fermentation processes – i.e. personal reflection, refining – or sometimes helped just by slowly exhausting the addictive nature of superficially grasped sexuality. However, now and then it produced unique and exceptional works, inspiring visual or written perspectives, cultivated better taste in what many consider a tasteless practical consumer good – a porn.

This may sound controversial (or preposterous for some), but it allowed engaging with one's (porn) addiction on slightly different level. The way how posts and reblogs were selected, arranged, accompanied by comments and sometimes even deeper sharings, the addiction may have turned into sort of raw creativity. Adding a bit of effort, thought and beauty to the sticky-fingers-and-paper-towels business.

I may have strong feelings about this – but it has both contributed to the more free sexuality (through the overlapping interests, exposing individuals to the playful way how others enjoy their kinks, showing example how to accept one's own harmless weirdness) and offered a strong alternative of free sex (yes, you don't have to pay for artificial-looking studio porn!). Amateurs for amateurs. Along the way, a cultivation of different (open-source) attitude: I enjoy others posting for me – so I won't play moralist prude and post something for them as well.

There's something in unpretentious quality of tumblr/amateur material – where company porn (and corporate products stylized as "amateur-looking") fail and will continue to fail: They are 99% not sexy! But if you pay for it, others watch it and if it is advertised as "sexy" -it must be sexy, right?! So many people have no genuine feelings about products - they feel what they are supposed to feel, just not to feel odd at the end. In the last decade I have rarely seen a studio porn product that would erect a hair on my arm. Tumblr magnetised me for the last hour of the day consistently. There was quite a lesson in that regard. A living counter-example of different kind of erotics, different from the calculated sterile studio products by so called "artists" locked in their own world with their own performance-measurement units.

So now, we will have less porn ... and more time to do useful things, ha? Something concerned about the addiction-aspect of tumblr in me feels almost relieved. No, the truth is there will be just one peculiar kind of porn suddenly missing. And we may lose more time digging the good one. :D

I remember in the 1980s and 1990s, the "sexandviolence" on TV used to be the moralist case. An act that makes two (or more) people happy – compared in one sentence with an act where a person hurts or kills someone else. This just proved total lack of any morals in those moralists - since a sane human being cannot put those two opposite qualities of interactions on a par! 20 years ago, my favourite cinema (!) magazine noted: "as far as MPAA rules go, an American teenager is free to watch beheadings, shootings, torture, gory accidents, with gallons of blood – but cannot spot the bare bust, as it would have negative influence on his development".

Now, it seems we have not moved so far from there. Tumblr has not done much to target the blogs of Nazis and paedophiles, it rather decided to dump "all The Evil" in one go. Wait... the Nazis, supremacist, homophobes, religious bigots, historical and contemporary weapon collectors, military fetishists, MMA fighters, horror and gore fans – those all will will remain. Tits and dicks were banned instead. Because sex hurts people, but fighting makes a healthy man... Don't make love, make war!

The really enraging detail for me was the excuse: We want to make tumblr more welcoming for everyone. To make those people who are scared away by the porn, sexuality, erotic art or just natural nudity - feel safe, welcome and ok. Family values once again. Whether you open a cupboard or laptop or box of cookies, family values jump out on you. Pretending that the largest and the most locust majority of this world – families – is in danger ... has become a universal political mantra. No one even winks at its sheer absurdity. Everything in this f***ing straight world is made for families!

In fact, the whole argument about creating more safe space, welcoming for everyone (just not those unashamed sexual creatures) reminds me a lot of some excesses of PC politics. Tiptoeing around religious and moral sensitivities. If everyone is quiet and repeats the same polite phrases, our Victorian perfect world will not offend anyone. Without needing to side with right-wing populists, this reality is undeniable: non-offensive culture bites back!

So I respond with my own favourite phrase: "Normal people have never come up with anything that helped mankind." Normal people who want to survive and protect and feed their families - no offence dear mostly-straight friends - do what they are biologically and socially programmed to do: survive and protect and feed their families. In their own truth and values and aspirations, it is all right. They just adapt to any regime to achieve the task: democratic, communist, fascist, theocratic, illiberal. (Not to forget that every utopian or dystopian regime caters to them: family and procreation is every supreme leader's sacred banner.) Those people who don't fit, do not conform, who doubt, question, dissent, rebel, provoke, have unusual hobbies and fascinations, those capable to harvest inter-disciplinary cross-inspirations – usually come up with some innovative ideas that move progress forward or at least make things better for everyone.

In terms of bloody (straight) history, gay community was always the litmus paper. Communists, fascists, inquisitors, mullahs, dictators - did not like us, quite consistently. (Because they are all macho ideas, but we, by mere being us, question this.) You can tell the rogue regime by the way it treats its sexual (and other) minorities. As some of the queer rights become slightly more mainstream and cheered from left and right, it is now the sexually active, explicit and kinky folk, who carry the torch that brings some healthy dirt into perfectly bright and sterile and un-offending cleanliness of the moralists. Remember, those who defeat the forces of darkness in the name of light were always the ones who brought up the dark ages at the end. In words of archetypal psychology: ambitious spirit aims for the victory of "forces of light", however the living soul dwells in and works with the darkness.

Making tumblr more friendly/conforming/unoffensive towards conservative markets – whether those be Russian, Chinese, Middle-Eastern, African - makes economical sense for the company, perhaps. However, the social fallout, a continuous economic trend that backlashes against more liberal regions of the world as well – is quite depressing for me. Here the maxim of "pursuing one's profit for the common good" somewhat fails. Externalities! In political terms, it may sound raw, but it is indeed "adapting to the stupidest". Wasn't it supposed to be the free trade (of ideas) that would slowly engage hesitant puritans of the word, expose them to different perspectives and slowly undermine their fundamentalism?

Contrary to popular belief, it is not the "moral decay" (in conservative sense), but rather silencing of the dissent, provocateurs, innovators - that destroys the empires! If liberal values kneel below conservative ones, both lose, within the prevailing dull uniformity and lack of self-reflection. In the opposite scenario, conservatives are always welcome to self-impose any fairy-tale restrictions they can come up with - under the liberal roof. With added value of being able to abandon those rules, see how well other people live according to different personal guidelines, or the fact of free exchange of uncensored perspectives that just generates more possibilities and potential solutions.

As a half-out kinkster, I can't forget to mention, that over years of "philosophing" - sexuality, fetish and BDSM proves to be the most inspiring source of allegories and insights into the way how this world works. Economics, politics, religion – you name it. Kink is a playful parable, satire, mirror, source of imagination. It allows to re-enact dominant/submissive relationships in healthy and controlled and safe and attractive and enjoyable way – and depending on personal capability also to reflect and learn, distil wisdom, get a perspective on power-imbalanced daily interactions that are less consensual, but often more life-impacting.

You see how much thought has the porn induced?! 😂