LOS ANGELES—Amazon’s live streaming platform, Twitch, announced a new sexual content policy days after a popular "topless" streamer and adult creator was banned for violating the site’s rules.
Twitch now permits “artistic” depictions of sex and nudity as long streams are labeled properly.
“We want streamers to feel confident they understand our rules and viewers to feel confident they will get the experience they expect,” writes Angela Hession, Twitch’s chief customer trust officer, in a safety blog post published on December 13. “To be effective, policies need to be easy to understand so that a streamer knows what is allowed on the site and what is not allowed.”
Hession lays out the new policy accounting for new scenarios.
Types of sexual content that were previously prohibited are now permitted with labeling. For example, content with “‘deliberately highlighted breasts, buttocks or pelvic region,’ even when fully clothed” is also now permitted.
“Streamers found it difficult to determine what was prohibited and what was allowed, and often evaluating whether or not a stream violated this portion of the policy was subjective,” Hession explains, contending the former sexual content policy disproportionately targeted female creators.
Fictionalized nudity, like animation, is now permitted. This policy covers “fictionalized … fully exposed female-presenting breasts and/or genitals or buttocks regardless of gender.”
Body writing on breasts and buttocks with clothing meeting Twitch's attire policies, regardless of gender, is also now permitted, as are erotic dances that involve disrobing or gestures of disrobing, including a striptease.
These streams do require labels in accordance with the newly amended sexual content policy. Twerking, grinding and pole dancing, among other popular dances and dance styles, are now allowed with a label.
The policy change, as noted, comes after streamer, creator and Pornhub Awards winner Morgpie went viral for a “topless meta.”
On the Twitch platform, a “meta” is a trend for content creators.
According to the online database Know Your Meme, the “topless meta” or the “thot meta” is a trend on the site that “involves mostly female streamers broadcasting while they are seemingly naked, showing only a cropped frame above their breasts.”
This is done to circumvent Twitch’s terms and conditions while driving viewers and earnings. Topless metas were predated by "hot tub metas" that were popularized by other adult creators such as Amouranth.
In an interview with Dexerto, Morgpie explained that she wasn’t actually topless. Rather, she was wearing a low-cut bandeau top.
“I do read the terms of service anytime I try to incorporate anything new into my streams, just to make sure, because I don’t want to get banned,” Morgpie said in the interview. Morgpie got banned after a backlash across social media.
“I did get banned. But I think Twitch right now is definitely banning a lot of girls because of this new meta. They kind of want to put a lid on it right now,” she said.
In a later report, Morgpie said she was pleased with the policy changes announced after her controversial stream and ban.
Morgpie said the stream in question was to raise funds for Médecins Sans Frontières, or Doctors Without Borders in English.
Correction: Dexerto was incorrectly referred to as "Dextero."
