Tw: slurs and transphobia
An open letter to instagram (and affiliated sites):
Almost every day I am welcomed to instagram to this screen. No notice of which photo was removedā no way to protest, fight, or repeal the removal. Nowhere to even send a complaint. Itās a guessing game what part of my identity, anatomy, or life is offensive enough to warrant removal. Meanwhile I get death threats, slurs thrown at me, Iām called a faggot, a tranny, told iāll never be a man, that Iāll burn in hell, it goes on and on. Instagram never flags those comments, and even when I personally flag them theyāre often just hidden from my view not actually removed. Hell those accounts are left to operate and troll whoever they like.
And before you say itās just social media and just get off it: I share my journey so that young trans people know theyāre not alone. So that I can help some kid know there are people like them. So I can be a light in someoneās darkness, the way that some people online were for me. I also share my journey so I can see where Iāve come from. I donāt share my journey to be policed and told that trans menās nipples arenāt held to the same standards that cis menās are. I donāt share my journey so I can be treated like a picture of my body in boxers is more provocative than every teen idol in Calvin kleins. My body is not a bad body, my body is not overly sexual. Society has deemed and fetishized the bodies of trans individuals so much that we canāt even post censored progress photos without being told we are a violation.
There is something inherently wrong with a system/platform that takes over a week to take down a catfish using my photos (this has now happened about 5 times) but within an hour removes my pre-op photos because my trans body āviolates community guidelines.ā A platform that allows for cyber bullying and hate speech, but nipples are where we draw the line. Even if you censor what society deems unfit, you are still unfit to be as body positive as Justin Bieber, who can flaunt in his calvins all he wants, but a trans personā god forbid. Now, I understand that images are only removed when they are flagged by someone who deems them inappropriate, but the algorithm at the end of that flagging system should recognize that gender isnāt always inherently reflected in the size of ones nipples, and that if Zach galifinaks can go topless, why canāt I if Iām feeling particularly body positive. (Donāt worry though, I spent $6k to remove those socially offensive parts of my chest, and still received about 100+ violent comments on a video of my surgery reveal).
When you tell a person that their body, and in turn their identity, hell, their very existence is a violation to a community that allows white supremacist pages, porn pages, and catfishing like itās a sport to run rampant you are telling people that they are unfit to be within a community that has morals so low it makes the Trump Political team look progressive.
Instagram, or as we should call it Cistagram, perpetuates societyās idea that only cis passing bodies are valid (and we could go into depth about which cis passing bodies are actually allowed, because I have seen (among other things) plus sized womenās photos removed for violating these guidelines, which is 7 shades of fucked up) and that we should be ashamed of what we are and what we look like. Can you imagine after a lifetime of being told otherwise, finally being confident to be yourself and show the world, or hell, just the 25k people who happen to follow your page, just to open your page to see this message of violating community guidelines over and over again?
By keeping the community āsafeā you are endangering the lives of countless trans individuals. Letting other people (and some computer formula) dictate their worth. You are infringing on their right to express themselves, when they arenāt doing anything youād remove a cis personās photos for. You are emotionally harming people who have fought their entire lives to be seen, actually fucking seen, by keeping everyone else āsafe.ā
The next time I have a 12 year old come onto my page and tell me to burn in hell Iāll wonder who exactly we are keeping safe here. (Side note, why we allow minors to interact with adults is a problem in itself, thatās a real safety issue). The next time a mother tells me Iām a disgrace to my own parents Iāll wonder who is the problem here. The next time a 40 year old religious zealot tells me thereās only two genders Iāll wonder where my safety is then. The next time a young man with a confederate flag profile pic calls me a āfaggot tranny dykeā (wouldnāt be the first time) Iāll wonder how many comments theyāre allowed to make like that before they violate your supposed community guidelines and why their account remains unflagged (trust me, Iām reporting these people left and right yet theyāre still going strong and my photos drop like flies).
This isnāt just about selfies, This is about representation. When your app and other apps flag trans bodies as inappropriate we become more taboo than we already are. We canāt even see ourselves reflected on shitty free social media applications in any capacity. When you tag our queer posts as NSFW and mature content you are othering us, and more importantly telling us that we are nothing more than a porn movie fetish.
Your slogan is ācapture and share the worldās momentsā but youāre excluding a world that accurately represents those of us outside the binary. And youāre leaving me guessing as to what part of my world I shared violated and offended this time.
Sincerely,
My body is a good body and it doesnāt violate your community guidelines, trust me, Iāve read them more times than I can count.
#wedeservemorethancis
#downwithcistagram
#communityincludestrans
#fckyourguidelines
yousharknotpass
izzy806
discoholicmusic
