I wonder how many writers on this platform have grappled with Substack’s content moderation policy as it relates to their work?
I have🖐
Whatever you think about this week’s conversations—the ones about speech and the ones that aren’t—I’d ask that you just hang with me for a few minutes while I share my personal experience with Substack’s content moderation policy. I hope this will be helpful!
I joined Substack three years ago. At the time, Substack was just an email platform and website. Notes didn’t exist.
For my first two years on Substack, there wasn’t any need for me to grapple with the platform’s content moderation policies. I write stories about my life, and they’re mostly funny (I hope), so my work isn’t typically anywhere near the lines drawn by content moderation policies.
But last January, I had to dig a little deeper into what free speech means on Substack. I wrote a story called “Porn conventions are decadent and depraved (and also very mainstream).” I was motivated to write that piece for a few reasons:
Early in my career, I was a reporter at one of the leading adult entertainment industry trade publications (think: Daily Variety, but for Porn Valley). In that way, the porn convention piece fit my editorial vision of writing about my life experiences.
I had written a novel that was loosely based on my experience as a reporter in Porn Valley. I hoped that by writing about the world of adult entertainment, I might entice my readers to purchase a copy of my novel.
Before I wrote my piece, I studied Substack’s content moderation policy. This is a good idea for anyone using any platform, but I checked that policy first for two reasons.
As a former adult entertainment reporter, I’ve had a front row seat to the way nearly all internet platforms, including adult entertainment platforms, moderate and even censor adult content. I think that experience makes me a little sensitive to content moderation, but it also makes me wary of anyone espousing a free speech absolutist position.
As a former lawyer (yes, I’ve had a weird career; no, I won’t give you legal advice), reading the TOS is one of my kinks.
What I found was that Substack restricts several types of speech, including adult content. Here’s the section that was relevant to the story I wanted to write:
We don’t allow porn or sexually exploitative content on Substack, including any visual depictions of sexual acts for the sole purpose of sexual gratification. We do allow depictions of nudity for artistic, journalistic, or related purposes, as well as erotic literature, however, we have a strict no nudity policy for profile images. We may hide or remove explicit content from Substack’s discovery features, including search and on Substack [dot-com].
That section gave me pause for a few reasons.
It’s a content restriction.
The restricted content is difficult to define, although as a jurist famously wrote, you know it when you see it.
I also took note of this sentence near the top of Substack’s TOS: “We have the exclusive right to interpret and enforce these guidelines, although we may consult outside experts, research, and industry best practices in doing so.”
That sentence really gave me pause. Substack, not me, and not a neutral third-party, would be the one to decide if I was on the right side of a speech line that the company had set. Getting it wrong felt risky. Because if I got it wrong, I could lose everything I’d spent two years building.
How you think about those risks—or if you have to think about them at all—is specific to every writer. But foremost in my mind were two types of people I used to write about.
There are the people in adult entertainment who lean into ambiguous speech policies, take risks, and sometimes pay for their risks with lost business and / or lost liberty.
There are the adult entertainment people who choose to modify their speech to conform to ambiguous laws and platform rules so that their businesses sit safely inside of a content moderation line.
I decided to play it safe and follow the lead of the second group. To do that, I made two changes to how I wrote my story.
I was planning to write something that probably would’ve felt more like content marketing (I’m selling a book, after all). Instead I chose a form of expression that would more clearly fit within the definition of journalism.
I chose not to use certain pictures from the convention that depicted nudity and some simulated sex acts.
This is important: I had a vision for how I wanted to express myself on Substack, but I modified that vision to conform to Substack’s speech restrictions.
I published my piece, or what The Dude might call the “compromised second draft.” There were no issues from my readers, and I didn’t hear from Substack about violating its TOS either.
But after I published, something unexpected and cool happened. Substack Reads promoted my piece! I got some new readers and, predictably, I got some hate mail too. I also noticed a lot of people in the comments of Substack Reads trashing Substack’s editorial decision to promote my work. That wasn’t surprising—writing about adult entertainment comes with controversy—but it was disappointing to see so many people who talk a big game about free speech attacking Substack’s editorial decisions. I mention that last part because, in my experience, most free speech absolutists aren’t as absolute as they like to believe—and that’s OK, you don’t have to be a free speech absolutist to value free expression or believe in a free society!
Why share this experience?
First, because I think there’s a big disconnect between Substack’s TOS and the way Substack’s founders and many Substackers talk about free speech on this platform. We have content moderation on the one hand, but on the other hand, we have the rhetoric of free speech absolutism. I’m not sure both of those things can be true, and it is important to speak the truth. Also, navigating that ambiguity hurts writers like me—both because there may or may not be a line that restricts free expression and because that line, if it exists, is so blurry that the risk of crossing it falls hard on the writer. I’d like to see a more honest conversation about speech on this platform—one that recognizes that Substack already moderates content, as opposed to one that promulgates a version of Substack that doesn’t actually exist in reality.
Second, I wrote this Note because I care deeply about Substack. This platform has been the best thing that’s ever happened to my writing career. But there’s the rub: a lot of what’s working here isn’t the result of free speech absolutism, it’s actually the thoughtful content restrictions, especially a ban on advertising, that Substack has used to create a place where writers like me work with dignity and get paid.
I’m not someone who believes in easy answers, and I don’t there’s a perfect answer here either. But thoughtless talking points will be the death of this thing that many of us love.
I hope we’ll grapple with what free speech means here. Because if we really grapple with it—and by we, I mean Substack’s writers, readers, and most of all, Substack leadership—I think we’ll build something great. I hope so.