16 Jul 2015

Instagram makes curvy a dirty word

It’s official. Curvy is offensive. If you’re an Instagram user you’ll know this.

I’m restricting myself to Facebook and Twitter at the moment, but I don’t think that’s the only reason I’m baffled by the photo-sharing site’s decision to block the hashtag #curvy on grounds of taste and decency.

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Apparently, the reasoning is that it was being used to share content which “violates” Instagram’s guidelines on nudity. There is a precedent here – Instagram also banned the aubergine emoji on the grounds that it was being used as a code to identify material posted in contravention of the photo-sharing network’s terms and conditions.

Innocent, you might think, until you think what part of male anatomy it might refer to.

Of course, notwithstanding the fact that searching using the hashtag “curvy” seems like rather a roundabout way of laying your hands on salacious pictures of naked women, there’s still an issue here. There are numerous other terms like #fatpig and #fatf**** used to post similar material and predominantly, let’s face it, to shame women – and that are still allowed through.

You can’t help but conclude that there’s a double standard at work here. Hashtags which shame and objectify women are in; those which celebrate womanhood, warts, wobbles and all are out.

Instagram unfortunately has form on this too.

A few months ago, they took down an image posted by the poet Rupi Kaur showing what happened when her period leaked onto her pyjama bottoms and sheets. It might have seemed a bit much to some – but for many others it was a pretty innocuous image, and more to the point, simply reflected a monthly fact of life for women. But twice Instagram judged that it violated their “community guidelines”, feeding the taboo that continues to surround menstruation.

Instagram said at the time: “We are very sorry for our mistake here. When removing reported content from the Instagram community, we do not always get it right and we wrongly removed this image. As soon as we were made aware of this error, we restored the content.”

As Kaur herself commented, the picture is of a “fully clothed” woman that is “nothing but acceptable”. She went on to ask why communities “shun this natural process,” judging that some are “more comfortable with the pornification of women. The sexualisation of women. The violence and degradation of women”.

I couldn’t have put it better myself. And Instagram to its credit reversed its decision and allowed the photo, though images of other natural facets of female life like breast feeding and stretch marks are still thought to be de trop.

But while the site continues to allow sexually-explicit terms, often used as verbal weapons against women, there’s a whole community of Instagram users who think it shouldn’t be banning words like “curvy,” which embrace a woman’s natural, healthy beauty.

So for their sake – let’s see if the network reverses the decision on their behalf. Failing that, I’m sure users sharing their photos will find all sorts of ways to reclaim the word, by appending it to others, to get round the censors.

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