Thread by @fakedanshusband

So my account was disabled by @instagram.

It sucks. And as I think about it, and how it went down, it falls into a pattern of homophobia, sex-negativity, and discrimination on @Meta’s social platforms that has been happening for years.

If you are reading this, you’ve probably heard about it before.
Posts by straight artists and creators that would enjoy wide distribution — even promoted by @instagram itself — get LGBT people, porn performers, sex workers/educators suspended, shadow-banned, or banned for life.

I received more than 20 post removal notifications from Instagram since the new year. Twenty posts removed in less than a month, some of them years old.

The following are just four posts and stories from the last month that show the insanity of the way @instagram justifies removing LGBT posts, stories, and people from their platform.

The first picture is me holding a wine bottle.

Notice the reasons given for the post removal: Buying/selling recreational or pharmaceutical drugs. Trading guns, ammunition, explosives….

That’s a wine bottle, @instagram. It’s not a gun, it’s not a bag of Purdue's Oxycontin.

Next, a picture of me holding leather keychains, wearing underwear with goodly-eyes and a red nose.

Reason given for removal: explicit sexual activity, sexual intercourse, stimulation of genitals.

LOL. That is not what’s going on in that photo, @instagram, not by a long shot.

Here’s a photo of me in a CDLP swimsuit taken for @ToFStore. I’m literally wearing a swimsuit.

Reason given for deleting this photo; explicit sexual intercourse, visible genitals, stimulations of genitals, anus uncovered.

The photo is sexy, I’ll grant you, and maybe it stimulates the genitals of @instagram's closeted censors. But not one of those things is happening in this photo. It’s a picture of a swimsuit. On sale at a store. There are photos of men and women in swimsuits all over @instragram.

Here’s a story that was deleted. This one is a doozy. It was deleted for “Sexual Activity”, implied intercourse, stimulation of genitals, anus.

Here's what is particularly maddening about this one: This story was a repost of a photo that was two years old, a photo that was still up on Instagram. (It’s gone now because they deleted my entire account.)

The real crazy part though...

I only posted this photo to my story after getting a prompt from @instagram itself (under "Create Tab”) suggesting that I repost it to my story!

Hence the "2 years ago" at the top, and the border on the photo showing it was a post that was still up on my profile.

Those are all just to show you how silly, stupid and insipid @instagram's censors/algorithms are.

The part that really bites is the bottom of the photo where it claims “We use the same guidelines for everyone on @instagram.”

LO-fucking-L

I’m sure a brief tour through straight instagram will show you that this is not the case.

How many videos of straight white women dancing to WAP do you need to browse to see that this just isn’t true?

Ever checked out “Gun Instagram”?

How many memes of drunk/stoned bros doing something stupid for their iPhone camera?

I followed one account for anime fans that I pretty quickly unfollowed because every post devolved into deeply misogynistic and homophobic comments.

But a photo of a swimsuit? Underwear? A wine bottle? DANGEROUS.

It would be laughable if it wasn’t also dishonest, malicious, and insidious.

-->Short break for a personal story:<--

I was a very skinny slight kid in high school. I call that period my “bird body”. I was pretty obviously gay (even if I wasn’t out yet), and my life revolved around non-tough-guy things like violin and piano lessons, orchestra, and band. Enjoy these pics of my twig Twink arms.

One day after a particularly awful day of bullying in school I was on my way to a piano lesson. It was winter and there were frozen banks of plowed-up snow mixed with gravel along the road.

My bullies from school caught up to me, pushed me down, kicked and hit me, and pushed my face into the dirty snow bank. All while calling me “faggot,” “cocksucker,” and “bitch."

I got away and ran to my piano teacher’s house, she was appalled when she looked at me.

I was in tears, bleeding from my scratched up face. Gravel and sand ground under my skin on my palms and chin. My piano teacher helped me carefully wash and scrub out the grit from under my skin. It was painful. I was crying uncontrollably the whole time.

She called my mother who came, thanked my teacher for her help, and drove me home. Beat up, battered and bloody.

The next day my mother went into my high school to talk to my councilor, who happened to also be the vice principal in charge of discipline.

My mother wanted something done. She wanted someone held accountable. She wanted the daily bullying to STOP.

My councilor replied:

"If he acts that way, walks that way, talks that way, is that way, there’s nothing we can do."

Basically, If you act too gay, we can’t help you.

Jump forward 35 years or so…

Here I am discussing @instagram and their algorithm that targets and punishes the LGBT/sex positive communities in ways that seem like the same bullying.

@instagram and @Meta would like to play the part of community builders. They pretend they are a positive partner in our communities, and they show up at our pride parades and festivals.

But the facts show a very different and quite malicious @instagram.

Incredibly censoring, using it’s algorithms and hashtags not to help build communities, but to find those communities and disappear them, erasing things @instagram deems “unsavory.” We keep fighting it trying to stay one step ahead of the crazy lengths Instagram goes to erase us.

But just like the vice principal at my high school, Instagram has one message for us:

If you act that way, talk that way, walk that way, are that way, you aren’t welcome or safe here.

And we will blame you.