Facebook has taken prudishness to a whole new level, as it banned a picture of a sixteenth-century-statue for being too “sexually explicit”.
The bronze figure of the naked sea god Neptune, designed in 1563, stands in the Piazza del Nettuno in central Bologna, Italy.
Art historian Elisa Barbari decided to use a photograph of the famous landmark to illustrate her Facebook page, but was quickly told to remove it.
In an official statement, citing the social platform’s nudity policies, Facebook told Barbari: “It presents an image with content that is explicitly sexual and which shows to an excessive degree the body, concentrating unnecessarily on body parts.”
“The use of images or video of nude bodies or plunging necklines is not allowed, even if the use is for artistic or educational reasons.”
Barbari told The Telegraph: “I wanted to promote my page but it seems that for Facebook the statue is a sexually explicit image that shows off too much flesh. Really, Neptune? This is crazy!”
“Back in the 1950s, during celebrations for school children graduating, they used to cover up Neptune. Maybe Facebook would prefer the statue to be dressed again?”
This isn’t the first time that Mark Zuckerberg’s social network has been accused of being over sensitive.
In January 2016, Mette Gjerskov, an MP in Denmark’s Social Democrat party, tried to post a photograph of the iconic Little Mermaid status in Copenhagen.
The mermaid, from Hans Christian Andersen fairytale, apparently contained “too much bare skin or sexual undertones.”