Facebook Censors Danish MP’s Photograph Of Little Mermaid Sculpture

Copenhagen’s national symbol, the sculpture ‘The Little Mermaid’ has been banned by Facebook for indecency. The Danish Social Democrat MP Mette Gjerskov has accused Mark Zuckerberg’s social network of blocking out the image she uploaded to her blog. The 102-year-old bronze statue, which is situated on a rocky plinth on the Langelinie promenade, is one of Copenhagen’s best known tourist attractions and can be compared to the Statue Of Liberty. 

“The Little Mermaid is simply too naked for Facebook,” she lamented in a post  “I cannot advertise for my blog because TV2 chose the mermaid as the. I hadn’t seen it coming that our national treasure would be categorised on the same level as child pornography and that sort of abomination.” She added that Facebook later reversed the decision to block the image, however broadcaster TV2 decided to delete the image due to a potential copyright violation.“TV2 has removed the Little Mermaid from my blog because it risks a large bill due to the copyright,” wrote the politician.“Apparently one can’t publish photos of our national treasure without a substantial payment to the artist’s heirs. That’s what the law – approved by parliament.”

To avoid “confusion” Facebook restricts nudity because “some audiences within our global community may be sensitive to this type of content”.

The social network forbids images of female breasts and nipples are out unless they are “actively engaged in breastfeeding or showing breasts with post-mastectomy scarring”. Facebook says it does allow images of paintings or sculptures that depict nude figures.

This is not the first case of this sort of restrictions, in January 2015 a French Facebook user took the social media giant to court after his account was closed down after he posted an image of Courbet’s controversial painting ‘L’Origine du Monde’ 1866. According to Le Figaro, the world-famous oil-on-canvas was part of a promo for an art history video about the artwork, broadcast by the highbrow TV channel Arte. Now a Paris court ruled that it had jurisdiction to judge the case against the US social networking site.

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