Just a Face and a Caption: The Pornomancer

Without any familiarity of the context of the scene the current picture is from, it just looks like a guy talking to a pair of scantily-clad women, which in and of itself does not really illustrate the trope's definition of "they don't find sex; sex finds them". The trope's discussion page clarifies to me that the people in the picture are probably an example of this trope (apparently the man somehow got the women to take their clothes off?), but I honestly never would have guessed that if I didn't bother to read.

Given the tougher stance we're moving toward to keep Google off our backs, this one probably needs to go. I've gone ahead and pulled it just to be safe.

I feel like as far as communication it is weak but okay, one of the girls is pulling his tie. If it's uncool for other reasons, sure, though.

I'll agree with the pull; it's showing way too provocatively.

I dunno... I always feel that preemptive pulling isn't the way to do it. I always feel it should at the very least come down to someone flagging and articulating that s/he specifically has a problem with it at which point, it opens up the debate. Otherwise, it beckons a slippery slope by moving the goal posts.

For instance, Image A gets taken down because it's deemed "borderline". Then, somewhere down the line, Image B gets taken down "on the cautious side" because it was nearly as bad as Image A, which got pulled. Then, after that, Image C gets taken down "on the cautious side" because it was nearly as bad as Image B, which got pulled... And the cycle goes on and on.

I don't really think it's that bad, in that manner of speaking.

But to me it just looks like a guy asking some questions, with no particular interest in them as women, and they don't seem to show any interest in him besides answering those, so I think it's pull-worthy for not being illustrative.

I don't see anything "too provocative" in it. The only thing even close is that one of the girls is in a standard bikini. Actually, it's pretty substantial as bikini bottoms go now.

Yeah. I think pulling on the grounds of "too provocative" is too far on the prudish side of No Lewdness No Prudishness.

Not that it's a great example, but it does look more like the beautiful women in bikinis are coming onto him than he's coming onto them so I definitely don't think it's worth pulling without a replacement.

edited 28th May '14 11:33:52 AM by Larkmarn

This is kind of a hard one to find non-provocative images for. This here◊ is about the only image I've found that might be an acceptable candidate, but I'm not overly fond of it. There's almost certainly something better out there.

^^ There's that, too. There's no indication he's hitting on them; rather, it looks like he's trying to talk to them about something completely non-sexual. They're hitting on him without any visible encouragement.

edited 28th May '14 1:10:56 PM by Madrugada

Aye, not that good an illustration.

Also, I ought to revise my concern about the pulled image; it's the extreme showing of skin with the strategical covering of certain parts (which is mentioned here) that preoccupies me.

Question... what's the difference between The Pornomancer and Chick Magnet? Because from their descriptions I'm really having trouble finding a distinction.

The Pornomancer is a sexual version, Chick Magnet more about romance and the like.

I believe Fast Eddie's specific wording is as below:

"Strategically covered nudity"

From my understanding of it, that's to avoid stuff like Censor Box or Scenery Censor over a nude body; none of which apply in the above image.

edited 28th May '14 1:52:22 PM by peasant

Yeah. Honestly, that's just two women in bikinis. If people in standard modern swimsuits or equivalent are banned, we need to pull a lot of images.

One argument against this one, though, is that it's from the same source as the trope heading quote. That's a practice that I believe is usually deprecated.

Movie Tony Stark can't be the only illustration option, though. How about one of the classic Conan the Barbarian pics with his feet covered in slave girls?

Though one.

The reason why some people are worried about the nudity in the old image is because we've had complaints from advertisers about certain images. Problem is, the guidelines from advertisers (like the one I linked earlier) are not terribly clear - I just did a Google search to see if other people had had problems with Google over images and from what I can tell the old image here is right on edge - some people did get into hot water for having similar images while others didn't and it also comes down to the judgment of whoever is evaluating the appropriateness of the images.

But it isn't nudity.

Actually it's less exposed flesh or implied sexuality than we could probably get by putting the standard poster images on the pages for a lot of mainstream Hollywood movies. Let alone comparisons to any random newspaper's celeb gossip section. If we start trying to anticipate the lunacies of Google advertisers, we probably need to scrub thirty percent of the site images.

edited 29th May '14 1:45:01 AM by Spindriver

Google's indicators for what isn't permitted are distressingly vague. The pic seemed to loosely qualify for 3 or 4; I was taking a "better safe than sorry" route. If the majority votes to return the pic to the page, or if Eddie restores it on his own, it's not going to hurt my feelings.

edited 29th May '14 4:27:25 AM by Willbyr

Keep Until Better Image Suggested.

Seriously, I think it's taking it way too far to censor this image as "inappropriate". It's standard beachwear and not particularly provocative.

Okay, seeing Google's requests... definitely keep. I mean, it's "strategically covered nudity" in the same way that wearing clothes is "strategically covered nudity"... they're not nude, plain and simple. And the most suggestive part of the pose is that she's holding his tie. And it's hardly a closeup when it's zoomed out enough to have full body shots of three people.

Can we restore the image yet? If this is the only reason it was pulled, that is not a good pull.

It is a good pull if it avoids complaints. It's one thing to say that the image doesn't violate these guidelines but quite another to say that they don't matter.

What complaints? If anything, pulling it has led to more complaints as it's a fairly illustrative picture, it's not lewd, and removing it is comically far on the prude side of No Lewdness, No Prudishness.

You must have been unaware about the latest complaints we've received from Google, also concerning images.

^^ I agree. I doubt any grandmothers are scandalized by a woman wearing bikini bottoms, unless they were grandmothers already in the first half of the 20th century. Nobody is going to complain about that and hopefully Google would laugh at them if they do.

That is absolutely not "strategically covered nudity". I understand being careful in the face of vague guidelines but that is ridiculous, and a terrible precedent to set.

I, for one, vote to restore it.

edited 5th Jul '14 9:26:33 PM by rodneyAnonymous