Tag: nudity

Korean Women Conduct Topless Protest Against Facebook Policies

I don’t think these protesters are going to find too many objections from men in regards to their demands towards Facebook:

A group of female protesters went topless in a rally against Facebook, Saturday, protesting its “discrimination,” based on a policy that bans posts showing women’s breasts but allows men’s naked torsos. Ten women wearing masks and sunglasses carried signs that read, “Why do you delete posts in which I willingly showed my breasts?” and “Set me free from what is virtually a modern corset,” near company headquarters in Gangnam, Seoul.

Soon after photographers and police arrived, the protesters lined up and took off their T-shirts to show a Korean character drawn on their chests to deliver the message “My body is not pornographic material.”

Police forcibly covered the women with blankets despite fierce protests, with some women shouting, “Why are police officers covering us? Why do they keep suppressing us?”

The highly “liberal” move came about a week after Facebook unilaterally deleted an account that posted a message with a photo of a topless woman, slapping the account holder with a one-month suspension. Facebook said the post violated company policy on uploading photos containing naked body parts and sexual acts. “Facebook is used by all age groups, which is why we need to create an environment where a majority of people feel safe,” the company was quoted as saying. “We understand the women’s group and where they are coming from. We must delete the topless photos for now.”  [Korea Times]

You can read and see more pictures at the link, but this is actually not the first time there has been a topless protest in Seoul.

Satirical Nude Painting of Park Geun-hye Leads to Clash In Yeouido

This seems to me to be pretty sexist because I cannot remember a male Korean president being depicted like this and celebrated by an opposition party:

Some people, presumed to be members of a conservative civic group, rush to the assembly building in Yeouido, western Seoul, on Tuesday to damage the painting “Dirty Sleep” by flinging it to the ground. [YONHAP]
After the display of a satirical painting depicting a nude President Park Geun-hye the main opposition Democratic Party on Tuesday decided to refer its lawmaker, Pyo Chang-won, to its ethics panel for hosting the exhibition.

About 20 people, presumed to be members of a conservative civic group, rushed on Tuesday to the lobby of the Lawmakers’ Office Building attached to the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul, where the painting was on display, to damage the painting titled “Dirty Sleep” by flinging it to the ground.

The artists participating in the exhibition, including Lee Guyeong, who made the painting, then gathered at the building to issue a statement demanding compensation for the damages and respect for freedom of expression.

The exhibition started on Friday and the painting quickly became the talk of the town.

The painting’s composition is generally based on the 19th-century French painter Edouard Manet’s famous “Olympia”(1863).

In it, Park is lying on a bed and her long-time friend, Choi Soon-sil, is offering up a bouquet of syringes while the Sewol ferry is seen out a window sinking into the sea.

The painting portrays the suspicion that Park was sleeping or receiving cosmetic treatment during the April 2014 Sewol ferry sinking. Park’s head is combined with a nude body from the painting “Sleeping Venus”(1510) by Italian Renaissance master Giorgione, which inspired Titian’s “Venus of Urbino” and later Manet’s “Olympia.” Unlike in “Olympia,” which is distinguished by the woman looking directly at the viewer, in the new work Park looks down, as if in shame.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.