bawdy boating

Gay cruise line pleads with guests to stop making adult content on their ships

A sea of shirtless guests party on an Atlantis Events cruise.
Photo via Atlantis Events

In a day of endless OnlyFans stars, any sexual encounter is a chance to monetize. Passengers aboard Atlantis Events LGBTQ+ cruises seem to be acutely aware of this fact as they find themselves awash in a sea of half-naked gays.

Apparently, this prime content-creating opportunity is not what the cruise operators had in mind when setting sail. In an updated version of the guest handbook created jointly with Royal Caribbean, Atlantis outright prohibited making and distributing adult material onboard their cruises.

“While we want everyone to have fun, there are limits and so we ask that you be respectful of all guests and our cruise partners,” a section of the handbook reads. “Please do not post anything explicitly sexual on social media in a public forum or other online space.”

The prohibition comes along with the threat of being removed from the ship entirely.

“Any guest who posts or publishes an explicit and publicly visible photo or video will be asked to leave the ship with no refund,” it reads.

This policy comes after a number of explicit videos from previous events went viral on social media, largely in NSFW gay circles.

Searching “Atlantis cruise” on Twitter makes abundantly clear what the company is trying to avoid — if your safe-search is off, that is. The girls are flying in the face of these new guidelines with a very visible fervor.

It’s also seen on sites like OnlyFans and JustForFans, though neither the privacy nor the paywall makes content exempt from this policy.

The handbook emphasizes the Atlantis Events and Royal Caribbean “take this seriously and have a team of volunteers monitoring most sites.” One has to wonder who’s been tasked with sifting through all of these materials (as well as how much the job pays, whether they’re hiring, and how soon a new hire could start).

Atlantis Events CEO Rich Campbell assures that this wasn’t a matter of targeted discrimination, but protection on the cruise line’s part.

“The cruise lines have asked me to include that and that’s not such a strange request,” Campbell tells Buzzfeed News. “They don’t want their brand featured.”

“We’ve always taken a one-off approach to [adult content],” he continues. “If we see something like that then we contact the person who did it and say, ‘Hey, please take that down,’ and they usually do.

JustForFans founder Dominic Ford asserts that “every brand has a right to protect its image” and said policies like this were “fairly standard” at other major gay events.

“If models are careful and smart about filming, they should be fine,” he says.

“It’s a shame that sex work and pornography is still marginalized and stigmatized,” he continues. “But we need to find ways of working with our friends and allies to make sure everyone’s safe spaces are protected, not just ours.”

We offer a salute to the brave men fighting for our freedoms out on the open seas.

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