I just want to belabor this point for a moment.
These images are not explicit. These pictures show two adults, engaging in consensual kissing. That’s it. It isn’t violent, it isn’t pornographic. It’s literally just two adult humans sharing a kiss.
It’s ludicrous and insulting that – especially in 2018 – this is flagged, either by some sort of badly-designed algorithm, or by shitty homophobic people.
And to just restate something that I reblogged a little bit ago:
the reality is that for a lot of the LGTBQ+ community, particularly younger members still discovering themselves and members in extremely homophobic environments where most media sites were banned (but Tumblr wasn’t even considered important enough to be), this was a bastion of information and self-expression.
I am so lucky. I am so massively lucky and privileged. I’m rich, I’m white, I’m a CIS male in a heterosexual relationship. I can look just about anywhere in the world and see myself represented in art and media. My experience has been normalized to the exclusion and oppression of people who don’t share that experience.
That. Must. Change.
I can only imagine what it must feel like to fight every second of ever day just to exist in a world that is filled with people who share my demographic (but not my values) using their wealth and power and privilege to attack you, simply for being who you are, for existing. I can only imagine how terrible and suffocating and exhausting that must be.
According to marginalized and vulnerable people, this change in policy will directly hurt them, and that’s indefensible.
The ridiculousness of this policy change can be simply illustrated by the image here being flagged. Why was it flagged? Because homophobia is rampant and too many people who should stand up against it are cowards who don’t want to risk their own wealth and privilege in the service of people who can’t defend themselves.
I applaud and admire and respect the hell out of everyone in the LGBTQ community here who have formed networks and friendships and relationships and support structures for each other. You have worked so hard to create and maintain a safe space for each other, and I’m embarrassed, appalled, and furious that people who look like me are making your lives – hell, your very existence – so hard.
I’m just one person, and maybe it won’t matter or make a difference, but I stand with you, not just on this website, but in our entire universe. I see you. I love you. I value you.
So much this.
I am queer and I probably won’t be posting much on Tumblr anymore, certainly not directly – external images and cross posting from my artist blog yes, but otherwise my life drawings would be too risky. I have the same policy over at FB now after a ban over a benign comment about my OWN community (yes it’s doubleplusungood and hate speech for a queer to criticise other queers now, say the cis straight mainstream thought police!), I rarely directly post or share to my timeline, only from other sites. I use my twitter profiles for that now.
I don’t trust the new AI, it’s been flagging clothed people over at my very SFW Retire To The Parlour https://retiretotheparlour.tumblr.com – Holbein portraits – naked art/life drawings of men without genitalia – etchings of non-human greek mythological characters without even a human bottom half, let alone anything ‘porny’ from the British Museum.
All of this makes me not want to be a part of this platform anymore…if it’s going to be Russian Roulette over blokes kissing or a topless man, or even just a clothed victorian gent…then it’s not worth it.
After my FB 24 hour ban for basically saying some queens play games – I don’t want to fall foul of these Big Brother algorithms and opaque appeal systems. I don’t want to support platforms that claim to support minorities and diversity but then attack us in the next breath. I want to own my content, and not have to put it through some mercurial, homophobic and heterosexist gatekeeper. Hence the cross-posting. I know it’s not as ‘nice’ as direct postings and Tumblr galleries, but this is why we can’t have nice things.
I don’t trust FB and Tumblr anymore, basically. They have become part of the problem, big media and corporate. No wonder people are fleeing both platforms in droves.