YouTube announced new policies Tuesday surrounding how the platform will deal with eating disorder content.
While the company has long had policies against content that promotes eating disorders, the new rules focus on limiting content that is “imitative.”
“Moving forward, we’ll be updating our Community Guidelines to also prohibit content about eating disorders that feature imitable behavior, or behavior that we worked with experts to determine can lead at-risk viewers to imitate,” a statement from the company reads.
Videos that contain extreme calorie counting, purging after eating and “weight-based bullying” will no longer be allowed on YouTube.
However, since YouTube has a large community of content creators that focus on mental health and eating disorder awareness, videos that discuss or detail such “imitable behavior” in the context of recovery will be age-restricted for those 18 and older.
YouTube has not detailed how it will enforce the new policies, or how it will be able to tell the difference between a video that should be banned or simply age-restricted. According to the company, more details about the verification process are coming soon, with plans to use a review process that includes human and automated observation.
The new rules come while many social media platforms are facing increasing scrutiny over how they deal with mental health issues on their platforms. Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest and TikTok have all been called out by activists, politicians and their own users for the proliferation of extreme weight loss content on their platforms, content that is typically marketed to teens.
YouTube, since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, has implemented policies aimed at combating what it calls disinformation as well. When a video about vaccines or other hot topics is posted, a note at the bottom prompts viewers to further investigate the issue.
• Vaughn Cockayne can be reached at vcockayne@washingtontimes.com.
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