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Image via charnsitr / Shutterstock.com

Instagram has made amendments to its strict nudity regulations after a three-month campaign by plus-size Black model Nyome Nicholas-Williams.

Back in August, Nicholas-Williams wasn’t pleased with Instagram taking down her images from a photoshoot as it apparently broke nudity rules on the platform. However, the model saw that there were images of slim, white women similarly unclothed on Instagram, so she called it out for its double standards.

“Millions of pictures of very naked, skinny white women can be found on Instagram every day,” Nicholas-Williams told The Observer. “But a fat Black woman celebrating her body is banned? It was shocking to me. I feel like I‘m being silenced.”

This led the model to launch a campaign with the hashtag, “#IWantToSeeNyome.”

Now, Instagram has altered its policies to allow women to post topless images of themselves covering their breasts with their hands à la Nicholas-Williams’ pictures, but there is a catch.



A representative of Instagram told Business Insider that the new update will allow photos of subjects hugging, cupping, or holding their breasts, but it will draw the line for images where individuals “squeeze their breasts in a grabbing motion with bent fingers” or depict “a clear change in the shape of the breasts.”

This new policy change will be applied to Instagram and Facebook.

Upon hearing about the update, Nicholas-Williams followed up with a post about her journey leading up to the adjustments. “We have put our hearts and souls into this campaign and to see it come to fruition is insane!” she rejoiced.

View this post on Instagram

WE FUCKING DID IT!! @ginamartin @alex_cameron and I...we changed an Instagram policy! Look what happens when three women set out to change the world! We have put our heart and souls into this campaign and to see it come to fruition is insane! The observer newspaper (which is out today) has covered the campaign from the beginning and have written another article which highlights the hard work Gina, Alex and I have done (although it states they launched the campaign) this is in fact not the case as Gina, Alex and myself strategised for three months to ensure a change would happen. Hang tight for the full details of the policy change, as I will be detailing more information soon. We worked very hard on this and managed to get Instagram and @mosseri attention and there's still a lot of work to be done, as black plus sized women continue to be censored in many ways; and white women STILL tried to hijack and make it their campaign. There is of course a huge racial imbalance in the algorithm that still exists as white bodies are promoted and don't have to worry about censorship of their posts but black bodies still have to justify presence on the platform, this has also been brought to Instagrams attention! But when we put our minds to it... we can achieve literally ANYTHING!! I’d like to thank the 16 amazing humans that put their names to our open letter and that helped us push our campaign forward! The Instagram policy changes on the 28th, it outlines the difference between 'breast holding' or 'cupping' which is a celebration of body and 'breast grabbing' which is deemed to be pornographic, these images are censored to protect underage users but this policy change should allow them to better differentiate self expression/ art from pornographic content. Hopefully this policy change will bring an end to the censorship of fat black bodies. The last three have been absolutely wild to say the least but we move and move things we did! 🙌🏽💫

A post shared by Nyome Nicholas - Williams (@curvynyome) on Oct 25, 2020 at 5:00am PDT

View this post on Instagram

Them:”Why do you always have to post pictures nude? Me: “slim white bodies are praised for being nude and appreciating they’re form on this platform all the time and never have images taken down or asked as to why they are posting them” Them: “why does anyone have to be naked”!? Firstly that response is from someone who doesn’t want to address their inner internalised biases and dislike of bigger bodies. We all have bodies, and we can choose to celebrate them in anyway we wish. Renaissance paintings were mostly based around the nude body, I love art so I know!! How have we become so scared to share our art and celebrate our bodies without us being sexualised or being judged by others.🤷🏾‍♀️ This is art, I am art! Thank you for always getting it @alex_cameron your work is unmatched 💥

A post shared by Nyome Nicholas - Williams (@curvynyome) on Oct 16, 2020 at 1:24am PDT

[via Business Insider, cover image via charnsitr / Shutterstock.com]

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