Streaming platform Twitch has made headlines once again. Recently, it made some controversial changes to its sexual content policies, allowing some forms of fictionalized nudity—such as digital characters, sculptures, or drawings—as long as it was properly labeled. But now, just a few days later, it’s rolling back these changes and has apologized to the community. The controversy began when a new Twitch trend kicked off a firestorm of discourse and angry men yelling about women. Some women were streaming themselves using certain camera angles to appear topless. This new “topless meta” created a lot of buzz and backlash. In response, Twitch updated its sexual content policies to address the issue, but the changes were short-lived.
In a post on December 15, Twitch’s CEO, Dan Clancy, admitted that its new policy changes allowing fictional nudity had led to a small uptick in people making content that broke the rules and that the community response was not completely positive. Consequently, Twitch has decided to roll back these changes and has issued an apology for the confusion caused. While Twitch is rolling back the artistic nudity guidelines, the company did clarify that the other changes involving exotic dancing, body painting, or content focused on certain clothed parts of the body weren’t being reverted. It seems that Twitch believes it went “too far” with the altered nudity policy. In making the announcement, Clancy said, “While I wish we would have predicted this outcome, part of our job is to make adjustments that serve the community. I apologize for the confusion that this update has caused.”
