Teta & Teta was born as a non-profit brand to support the Free the nipple movement , for the lifting of censorship and the desexualization of female nipples. But the project was growing and expanding, thanks in part to her Instagram account. "It is a community in which the different female bodies and breasts are made visible and attempts are made to eliminate stereotypes and complexes, it is shared and conversed," its creator, María Rufilanchas , told Verne by phone . From conversations on Instagram, for example, Lola's project emerged, the one-cup bra for women who do not want to wear a prosthesis after a mastectomy. On August 6, that community disappeared: Instagram has deleted the Teta & Teta account for a violation of community regulations.
Rufilanchas claims to be unaware of the specific reason for the removal of the page. Typically, when it is due to a specific post or image, the account administrator receives a message saying that the photo has violated community rules and has been removed. In the case of the Teta & Teta account, Rufilanchas maintains that this has not been the case: “When I tried to enter, Instagram warned me that the account had been disabled for violating nudity policies, but I don't know the cause or the specific message to which it is due ”, he says. Verne has contacted Instagram, although he has not yet received a response.
The last post published before the closure of the account on Instagram was a post about topless and peepers on the beaches. This post, however, is still visible on Teta & Teta's Facebook, where it was also published (and both social networks belong to the same company). The author affirms that she has already appealed to the company and that it has rejected the appeal, but that it does not give up: "I have sent another email talking about all the projects we carry out," she explains. "I do not intend to start a war against Instagram, that doesn't make sense: the rules of this social network are what they are. I try to focus it on the social work we do at Teta & Teta, thanks, in part, to Instagram, where many of our projects have been born and grown, "he says.
The Lola single-cup bra project, for example, arose after a follower wrote to her telling her that she could not find bras for one breast, as she explained in this interview in EL PAÍS. This bra was scheduled to launch next September, "and precisely now the account is disappearing," Rufilanchas laments.
In addition to Lola, Teta & Teta have launched other non-profit projects such as A las forgotten , which collects and sends books to women's prisons –and which has already expanded to other countries– or Breast Feeding Welcome Here , which geolocates spaces where be able to breastfeed safely from noises and judgmental comments. Other illustrators and designers have wanted to show their support through social networks. Flavita Banana has dedicated one of her cartoons published in EL PAÍS to him. Other artists such as Monstruo Espaguetti or the writer Elvira Sastre have also shown their support. "I have felt very sheltered and it is appreciated, especially because you see that people value what we do," says Rufilanchas.
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We are WITCHES, we are crazy, cursed, and they want us to be SILENT. A few years ago @tetayteta was born, a community that vindicates female freedom through boobs, creativity and activism. Essential initiative to make visible the reality of our breasts, those that have been objectified, exploited and marginalized, all at the same time. Two breasts better than one, big, perky, young and desirable, sexualized and always his. When we rule over our body, censorship arrives, we make us uncomfortable, the power they exert over us disappears. @tetayteta shows the diversity of our boobs, it helps us to know that regulations are not reality, and that there is beauty in differences. Normalizes breastfeeding in public, mastectomy and talks about breast cancer without sweetening or commercializing it. She has encouraged us to self-explore and how to do it in order to detect it as soon as possible. They had and continue to have projects such as @forgotten wings where they make visible the inmates of the prisons. Books dedicated by the people who are donated to them. Women represent only 7% of the prison population, as men are the majority, the prison system is designed for them. 85% have suffered episodes of sexist violence, 90% are mothers, they have more difficulty accessing work and workshops within prisons. Projects such as the creation of the Lola single cup bra for a single breast, because femininity has nothing to do with the volume of our breasts. Last week they did a survey to find out if we were topless and if not, what were the reasons. Too high a percentage responded that they did not do it because of the onlookers. The response turned out to be very offensive to the aforementioned who decided to denounce en masse until they finally managed to close the account. Incredible that @instagram does not penalize accounts where animal abuse is shown, or accounts that show us hypersexualized (yes, with covered nipples). It is clear that we live under a patriarchal system, and we demand that @instagram return @tetayteta to us. We would rather die at the stake than live in silence.
A post shared by María Hesse (@mariahesse) on Aug 12, 2020 at 5:30 PDT
The systematic censorship of female breasts on Instagram
Although María Rufilanchas does not know the exact reason why her account has been closed, she does know the Instagram rule that she has violated and that has led to the closure: the prohibition of publishing nudity or images of sexual activity.
The deletions of nude photos on Instagram, even if it is artistic photos or even works of art, are frequent. And, in the case of female nipples, these are directly prohibited by community regulations and there is systematic censorship. The Pompidou Museum has also been erased on these social networks, for publishing a painting by the painter Gerhard Richter in which female breasts appeared, and the film Embrace of the Serpent, whose trailer was removed because the buttocks of an indigenous person were shown. On Instagram, the presenter Nuria Roca published a photo of a shadow in which nipples could be sensed and it was also deleted.
In 2013, after the deletion of some photographs showing women who had lost a breast after a mastectomy, Facebook introduced a change in its rules to allow these types of images. Currently, female nipples remain prohibited "except in lactation, childbirth and postpartum contexts, in health-related situations (eg, postmastectomy, breast cancer awareness, or sex confirmation surgery) or as an act of protest" , according to community standards. From Teta & Teta, photos of women with only one breast had also recently been published and, according to Rufilanchas, they were removed from their stories, but not from the post published on their account.
Sometimes these deletions are due to the Artificial Intelligence of Instagram. Post control, as this Facebook press blog post explains, is "a combination of artificial intelligence and human-made reports to identify posts, photos, or other content that may violate our Community Guidelines." Sometimes, that artificial intelligence fails: in 2019, it mistakenly deleted the photo of a stew, considering that it violated its rules. Hours later, the social network apologized and re-enabled the images.
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