The Secret of How to use NSFW and When

[abbastudios]

NSFW is not censorship,nor is it a rating. It definitely is not a political statement.

NSFW stands for Not Safe For Work. Which means you should not open this up when you are at work, because a nude image may pop up at an inappropriate time. An employee or your boss may walk behind you and see it or another image that may not be appropriate for work. And any video which may contain nudity, pornography or profanity.

NSFW is internet slang that went viral on it’s own, like IMHO, LOL, WTF, etc. There are unconfirmed reports it started on Usenet groups in the late 1990s. It seems that NSFW caught on in late 2001 and early 2002. The first definition appeared in 2003 in the Urban Dictionary.

The first generation iPhone was released on June 29, 2007. So NSFW couldn’t possibly have anything to do with apps or Apple policy since they weren’t around in 2003.

Laws against sexual harassment in the workplace are getting strict. A male may have a female co-worker that sits across from him with an open view of his monitor. She may feel harassed by the constant parade of nudity on his monitor and feel it is being done to make her feel uncomfortable, thereby creating a hostile work environment. However right or wrong her conclusion or the judgement of the stray passerby, it is meant to protect the viewer from getting in a sticky situation. A situation that may get them written up or fired. NSFW is meant to protect the viewer by giving them notice that nudity may pop up on the screen that is inappropriate for a workplace environment.

“How do I know if I should mark my work NSFW?”

Ask yourself would viewers (and myself) making personal use of the Internet in a public or formal setting such as in a workplace, school, church, temple or synagogue be violating policies prohibiting (even inadvertent) access to sexually provocative content. Would this put someone’s job in jeopardy?

That is it. It applies to visual content only.

Don't make it something it is not. No high horse or soapbox needed. No revolution or grand diatrbe. Just be courteous to your reader and let them know, "Hey, you might want to check this out at home in private.” Give them information to make their own decision.

Using the NSFW tag is a simple courtesy to your viewer, NOT a requirement.

Also, the term Safe For Work sometimes abbreviated to SFW is used to label material that may have a questionable title or include subjects that could potentially be NSFW but are not.

[ghostnxs]

If my content is even questionable I mark it as NSFW just because I'd rather not have my content removed.

[Agentzap]

I don't know why I thought NSFW meant not safe for women /offtopic

[UzukiCheverie]

Heh.

(that made me smile <<< adding this because 20 character limit >//>)

[Makutaleone]

I alway feel like I'm making my work sound more dangerous when I tag it NSFW, because I only use the F word. I honestly don't know whether or not to just go old school and use symbols or what.

[yartzanaserenade]

Well I don't think a boss would like to find employees reading comics at work anyways :C

[futureboundentertain]

My advice.

Dont, an Never.

If you have to result to vulgarity to make your point, it probably is not a point worth making.

flashes back to grandma beating me with a broomstick

[yartzanaserenade]

my grandma is the one cursing all the time, I'm trying not to get the bad habit

[apocryphagraphics]

What if your story has a character who is vulgar? Or a character who does Vulgar things? Many of us are not writing comics for children. People who write novels don't sit around and worry about whether curse words are vulgar or whether nudity/ sexuality is something others might find offensive. Certainly sexual activity is not only a part of life but extremely important part of life and it can be hard to tell a real story without some element of it. The same is true for violence. We certainly live in a world where horrific violence is a very real part of some people's lives. Any of these things could easily be considered NSFW and still have been written in a profound and classy way. Surely you aren't suggesting that as writers and artists these are things we should completely avoid or water down in our work? Is a realistic portrayal of the world too vulgar for comics? Doesn't that play directly into the widespread misconception that comic books are just for children?

[futureboundentertain]

Not writing for children, is not an excuse to not write intelligently.

Just because you are writing something for adults, does not mean it needs to be filled with sex, violence, and swearing.

And no, exual activity is not extremely important, it is barely regular level important., IT is people who write it to be the most important thing in the universe that give people the stupid impression that they need it or they will die. The over vzluiazation of sexx in society has gotten out of hand, you wont explode without sex, your
life will not end. Your existence still amounts to something if you havent poked something with your genitalia.

And just because violence exist, doesnt mean it needs to be gratuitous... Violence for its own sake serves no purpose in fiction.

Dont use "realism" as a shield, that is the same shield that people who write violent rape scenes use to rationalize their idiotic works. And when you put yourself on their level you are not making yourself look good.

[apocryphagraphics]

@futureboundentertain, Just because sex isn't very important to you doesn't mean that it isn't important to many of the rest of us. Without sex I wouldn't have my two children so that's about as important as something can be in my life. the world can be a very violent place and sometimes to tell a story about violence you have to write it or draw it in a way that the visceral horror of that violent action is moving and terrifying to the audience. You talk about writing intelligently and yet if every author in the world wrote according to the rules you believe in we would lose in an enormous number of some of the greatest works of fiction ever created in any medium.

[UzukiCheverie]

You can mark your series as NSFW when you make it. So in this case, do that, then mark your pages as NSFW.

How do you think comics like MeRanCoRi and Homo Sexience survived here when they were popular? Those comics were nothing but sexual innuendos and topics. But they didn't use their content as excuses to get away with not marking stuff NSFW. Everything that was vulgar, sexual, or elsewise offensive to certain parties was marked NSFW. They still followed the rules (not just Tapastic rules, but the rules of most countries that have laws in place to protect people in these sorts of situations).

You can still have comics oriented for adults, but you need to mark those series NSFW as well as their pages. This should be common sense at this point (plus as someone has already pointed out, just because your comic is more oriented for adults, doesn't mean you need to be slapping sexual shit on it and making them swear every other second. That doesn't make an adult comic, unless you're going for an adult comic, in which case, all you're doing is drawing hentai.)

And remember, NSFW isn't about sex and swearing and all those overkill things. It's about what you can or can't look at while at work, or what might get you in trouble while you're at work. That's why it's called Not Safe for Work. These could also be suggestive and sensitive topics, like comics about Nazi's in WWII or strong backlashes against the concept of religion - things that could offend or set people off in a work environment if seen.

[futureboundentertain]

You can have sex/sexuality without it being important - _ -

[apocryphagraphics]

No I can't. We're not all just like you and we're not all writing for you.

[epiale]

It's nice to see someone point out what NSFW actually means. The number of times I've had people accuse me of being sexist for marking pictures of bare-chested women NSFW is astounding., lmao.

Also just gonna throw it out there that sex is the reason we as a species exist. Without it our entire race would die out and cease to be, so, yeah, it is a fairly important and major part of life, and while I do wish it was handled a lot better in fiction, you can't negate its importance in life, and, as a result, the fiction we write in reflection of our own reality.

[Vikiro_Hop]

I've been mostly taking NSFW on this site to mean "adult oriented" and that includes colorful language. IRL I've been told the way I casually cuss at times makes me seem like an idiot. (I'm at peace with this, because I like to keep expectations low.) At the same time adults should be able to talk to each other how they deem appropriate at the time. If I make a comic where my character thinks a duck is part of a conspiracy to make his life hell, then said character will have some very colorful words for that duck. And it will be very appropriate for that situation. It can be very arbitrary at times.
Essentially, I think sex, cussing and violence all have a right time and place.

[abbastudios]

From the comments, it seems I did not make clear NSFW applies only to visuals/Images, not words.

[ErithEl]

@abbastudios Thank you for the clarification, here (even though it started to get a little off topic at one point...). I feel like you may have had to sit through the same three-hour sexual harassment test –with videos included! – that I do every year at work...

For my comic I have characters who swear and I never marked it NSFW because, to be honest, once you get out of high school most people swear no matter if they are at work or not. It's not as big a deal in the grand scheme of things as we're made to believe while growing up.

@apocryphagraphics I wholeheartedly believe in making stories as real as possibly and not watering things down to appease everyone (because that's never going to happen), so I totally agree with your posts. Sex is a very important part of my comic, mainly because I believe more of us need to realize that it's not always a vulgar act.

[UzukiCheverie]

You're making it all about him.

Sex doesn't need to be "important". Depending on the context, your characters could be having sexual relations for any of the following reasons:

1.) Procreation
2.) Recreation
3.) Make-up
4.) Revenge (in some cases, this can be dangerous water to tread, as it enters sexual harassment/rape territory depending on how you do it; on the other end, it could be someone having a one-night stand to get back at their SO).
5.) Anger
6.) Just for plain fun. Because besides all the risks of disease and pregnancy, sex is fun. No one can deny that lol And if anyone does, you're probably doing it wrong xD

You, as a creator, are the writer. You include sex scenes where you want, just make sure they make sense for the storyline and characters and aren't just thrown in there because "adult comic hurhur". That's the only point he's trying to make and you're the one trying to make it a personal problem from his end.

However, whether it's for procreation or simply recreation, NSFW is required. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. I don't care how sacred of an act you consider it, at the end of the day, it's still content that's inappropriate for minors, as well as content you wouldn't want to be caught seeing at work, especially with all the tight and strict sexual harassment laws that are in place these days.

It's not a message telling people not to read it. It's a "watch out, make sure you're in a place where you can read and you're okay with reading it!" nudge in the side. People who call it otherwise are just getting subjectively emotional over it for no reason and taking it as a personal jab to their work and personal views.

This isn't just Tapastic, this is everywhere.

Either way, just a heads up, I'm gonna be keeping a close eye on this discussion over the next few days just because it seems to be getting a little heated again, and we shouldn't be trying to or intentionally hurting someone or jabbing at their views over something as static and trivial as the NSFW filter. At the end of the day, the rules are there because those are the laws in most countries, and there are still kindness rules here that we should be trying our best to mind. Let's just keep it from turning into a circlejerk, okay?

[apocryphagraphics]

@abbastudios thanks for clearing that up about the words. I feel it would be unfortunate to have to throw the NSFW on a page or series for just the occasional "shit" or "damn". I think you've done a lot here to clear up NSFW for those of us who read your post but I'm afraid that a lot of people out there on the web still see it and assume there's porn behind that link. For that reason I'm loathe to use it but I don't want anyone getting in trouble at work because they read my comic and of course I agreed to play by Tapastic's rules when I signed up.
@ErithEl I'm with you. If you're writing about people in the real world you're writing about relationships and if you have enough adult relationships in a realistic story sex is going to be a part of it one way or another. Unless of course it is willfully ignored. It's cool if it's not a big deal to some people but to most of us in the adult world it's a pretty huge deal. And while all sexuality is not beauty and roses, even the ugly side of it is a part of life and something artists are free to explore. Same with violence. I hate exploitation in comics, but explicit sex and violence CAN be a part of fine art. Just look at Watchmen!
@UzukiCheverie I disagreed with @futureboundentertain's advice to just leave explicit Sex and violence or anything NSFW out of a series because it's inherently dumb and vulgar and poor art. " Never" he said. This is a forum and he stated an opinion and I disagreed. That's called a conversation. Passionate disagreements are often how intelligent people interact. While it may have strayed a bit from the original post it is certainly not totally off the NSFW subject. I would challenge you to go back through my posts and find a place where I was anything but civil and thoughtful in my disagreement. I found his responses to be a bit closer to insulting than mine. But I'm a big boy and I can take it!