The “free the nipple” movement was
started as a protest against the censorship of women’s nipples on the internet
and women’s breasts in real life, challenging the double standard that men’s
nipples and breasts do not have to be covered. Before 1936 it was illegal for
men to be topless in public, but after a successful protest they won this
right, while women still have not (“What”). The free the nipple website states that their goals are
allowing women to be topless and breastfeed in public, fighting that it is
illegal for women to be topless in 35 states, some of which include
breastfeeding (“What”). The protest was sparked by the Free the Nipple film made in 2014, and
received support from celebrities such as Miley Cyrus and Cara Delevinge. I
consider this protest failed because it was a very highly trending topic in
2015, but the campaign has lost this social media interest and has achieved
none of its goals. The response by women to post pictures of their breasts
resulted not in a change of instagram’s guidelines, but instead in the pictures
being removed by instagram, and the censorship rules remaining the same. Although the free the nipple protest
was only started a few years ago it has failed because it is in its period of
consummation, a time where the majority of people have abandoned the protest (Griffin).
The free the nipple movement failed due to its stage of inception being catalyzed by the Free the Nipple film that provided an
unstable foundation for the protest that followed, which was dismantled due to
the protests perception on social media by the public.
The Free the Nipple film that sparked the
movement was a Sundance film production, and was released in 2014 (Free the Nipple). This film release was the
beginning of the inception period of this protest, or the major event that
began the conversation
of creating a protest (Griffin). The failure of this protest was due to the film being met with
intense critical backlash, and has a one and a half star rating on Netflix, and
a three point six star rating on the International Movie Database (“Free”). The film has been given
such poor ratings due to it claiming it expresses a “true story” (Free the Nipple) however it is not in
documentary style, but is a scripted fiction that shows little about a real
life protest that has taken place but more with character struggles. The part of this film that
has caused it to be met with so much distaste is the fact that in a majority of
the movie, the women’s breasts are either not shown, or are censored (Free the Nipple). A movie about a protest
against the censorship of nipples that censors nipples is a complete
contradiction, while also being extremely confusing. The creator of the film Lina Esco, commented that
her intent for the film
was “in a case of life imitating art—or more specifically, I like to think, art
catalyzing civil, civic action” (Zeilinger). Esco’s goal for the film was to use her film as
pathos, an appeal to emotion, catalyze a movement, which she accomplished,
however the catalyzer was not positive, but elicited a negative response
(Winet). [1]
The celebrity supporters is one aspect of
this protest that was seen as positive by the organizers, however is something
I feel ended up significantly hurting their campaign. In a social media age and
a social media based protest having celebrity supporters is crucial and
establishes ethos in the protests argument to the public. However the celebrities’
chosen seriously hindered the authenticity and ethos of the free the nipple
protest. Miley Cyrus was one of the most active supporters of this campaign, and
her involvement with this protest turned it into a joke. At this time Cyrus was
still recovering from the backlash of her wrecking ball song (in the music
video she was seen swinging naked on a wrecking ball) and her VMA performance
with Robin Thicke, which resulted in the infamous degradation of the foam
finger (Montgomery). She has an enormous social media following which
catapulted #freethenipple to the center of social media discussion, but
pictures of Miley topless turned the campaign from serious consideration about
women’s rights, to just another topless photo of Miley Cyrus. However Cyrus was
one of many celebrities involved including Willow Smith, whose involvement in
the movement concerned many people, considering Willow was just 14 at the time.
Willow did not post a picture of her exposed breasts but did wear a shirt that
had a picture of women’s breasts on it (one way to get around having the
picture removed by Instagram). However the idea of women under the age of 18
showing their nipples on the internet is something that was seen as
unacceptable and frightening for many people. In order to repair this the
campaign would have to have other spokeswomen on their side, however we are
incapable of knowing what celebrities would have shown their support, had it
not been already framed in a negative light.
In order to create a more successful
protest, the movement needed to have a different catalyst. In general, creating
a movie about a protest that has not happened in order to create a protest movement
is not the most logical thing to do. However if the movie was more successful I
believe the protest would have turned out differently. Movies have been shown
to have heavy influence over the public in recent history, for example after The Purge came out some viewers in
cities such as Louisville, Kentucky attempted to create a real life purge (“The PURGE”), which
thankfully never came to fruition, but this scale of influence is what they
were trying to accomplish through Free
the Nipple. If the film was exceptionally produced and met with praise from
critical acclaim, the protest may have begun on a positive footing, but this
film created a rocky foundation for the protest. It would have been infinitely
more successful simply by showing the women’s nipples, and portrayed in
documentary style. In order to have this protest achieve its goals of changing
censorship laws, it would have to change the portrayal of the movement on
social media, and then follow up with using legislation to achieve the censorship laws.
Figure a, Joshi
In order to make this protest a
success I would have used these changes I have mentioned before to the film and
the presence on social media, to create exposure and positive discussion in
order to change legislation and censorship policies. The censorship of womens
nipples on instagram and facebook were created by the companies, and are not
under official law (Heins). Marjorie Heins explains the implications of the
Communications Decency Act (230) “social media sites like Facebook and search
engines like Google do not have to censor anything. In fact,
one major aim of section 230 is to discourage private-industry censorship, so
that free speech can prevail on the Internet” (Heins). Due to the website
specific censorship of women’s nipples, there is major opportunity to change
these policies, the two most effective ways are through petition and boycott of
the sites. Both of these options hinder on the social media perception of the
protest, which under my revisions it would be much more plausible for these
things to happen. A petition to instagram, facebook, and other social media
sites that ban nipples would be the first step in showing the companies that
organizers are serious about changing the policy and establish their ethos.
However petitions are also notorious for accomplishing nothing, but one thing
all companies are motivated by is money. If users were to pick even a few hours
in which they ban the site to get their message across, they would be using logos
to motivate the company
to make a change. In a social media era this may seem like an impossible task,
however other social media sites such as twitter and tumblr allow the female
nipple to be shown on their sites, so protestors would not be cutting off
entirely, and would also give more attention to these sites. When instagram and
facebook see that the social media platforms they compete with are making more profits due to more
relaxed censorship policies, it would be much more likely they would change.
Works Cited
Free the
Nipple. Dir. Lina Esco.
2014. Netflix.
"Free the
Nipple (2014)." IMDb. IMDb, n.d. Web. 05 May 2016.
Griffin, Leland M. "The Rhetoric of
Historical Movements." Theoretical Foundations and New Directions,
10-14. Strata Publishing. D2L.
Heins, Marjorie. "The Brave New
World of Social Media Censorship." The Brave New World of Social
Media Censorship Comments. Harvard Law Review Forum, 20 June 2014.
Joshi, Priya. "Cara Delevingne Posts
Provocative Images on Instagram in Support of 'Free the Nipple'
Campaign." International Business Times. 14 July 2014. Instagram. Cara Delevingne. Figure a.
Montgomery, James. "Exclusive: Miley
Cyrus Breaks Silence Over VMA Performance." News. Viacom, 03
Sept. 2013.
"The PURGE In Real Life – Alarming
Report From Kentucky: Louisville Police Respond to ‘Purge’
Threats…." The Last Refuge. Sundance, 15 Aug. 2014.
"What Is Free
The Nipple?" FREE THE NIPPLE- HOW FAR WILL YOU GO FOR EQUALITY? FREE
THE NIPPLE.
Winet, Kristen, Brad Jacobson, and
Madelyn Tucker. A Student’s Guide to First Year Writing. 35th ed.
Plymouth: Hayden McNeil Publishing, 2014.
Zeilinger, Julie. "Here's What the
Free the Nipple Movement Has Really Accomplished." Mic. N.p.,
21 Aug. 2015. Web. 05 May 2016.
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