Hello all 😀
I hope this week has been fabulous for you and that you have something nice to look forward to this weekend.
As you might have guessed this is going to be another rant about censorship, this time in response to Instagram’s recently announced plans to start demoting “inappropriate” content in the future. If this is the first you’re hearing about this then I recommend having a quick read through THIS article from Tech Crunch which sums it up very nicely.
Basically the changes they plan on implementing will start tagging content – which is perfectly within the guidelines – as inappropriate and that content will then be hidden from users, even if the user follows that content creator. They’re basically policing what people are allowed to enjoy and what people are allowed to create. I’m interested to see how this will affect fitness accounts, clothing/lingerie brands and of course big name celebrities.
Again you might be asking, “what’s the problem”, what does it matter if some “inappropriate” content gets suppressed?
This isn’t just about not getting as many likes on a post, it’s about real people losing out on income that keeps them afloat. Everyone knows I have a Patreon and OnlyFans – one of the main ways I advertise them is via my Instagram (and other socials). I’m not the only person that works like this. There are thousands of people that rely on social media platforms to grow their audience to then increase their subscribers/paying customers. So if you start suppressing their content and less people are seeing them then you’re directly impacting their ability to earn enough to survive.
So if Instagram is so bad why don’t you leave?
Because that does nothing to solve the ever increasing problem of censorship online. Yes we could all move to a different platform that won’t silence us but that only compounds the problem. If we don’t stand up and speak out against it then we’ll eventually just be pushed out of existence entirely. Not to mention that it’s not just Instagram. It’s every social media site. The world is moving ever closer towards some horrid dystopian regime where all things remotely sexual are silenced unless they are owned by the capitalist rulers. Individuals no longer have the right to express their sexuality for fear of punishment/social exclusion. Again women are taught their bodies are only to be profited from by someone else. Again we push those from the LGBTQA* community back into the shadows, unable to share their experiences with each other, unable to help each other and once again creating a fear of the unknown. Victims instead of being liberated by these regulations that were introduced supposedly to protect them find themselves even worse off.
It might not seem like a big deal right now but this is a storm that has been creeping ever closer and when it finally does break we will be the ones to suffer. We know this and so we reach out now, whilst there’s still time to to change things. Time to stop it. We protest, start petitions, join unions and continue to talk about it all over social media.
I know this has been a long rant and I appreciate you taking the time to read my posts. All I want to do is make you aware. I want to draw attention to the changes that are happening and what they really mean for us. The “inappropriate” content creators.
Stay safe and be happy x
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