Reposted with permission. By: Gemma-Rose Turnbull

I previously posted about Facebook’s obvious hypocrisy regarding their policies and boobs. Gemma has been talking about the same thing as she is one of the people being targeted. But with this post of hers I have to wonder, does Facebook just hate women? What is going on, here?!

Hateful, threatening or obscene?

Are these terms you would usually associate with breasts? When I think of breasts I think of many words but those are not them. Breasts are soft, squishy, round, pointy, perky, plump, enticing, sexy, comforting, nurturing, useful (hello, breastfeeding!) but not to Facebook. This morning Facebook told me that my fan page dedicated to sharing information about a) my long term photographic project Show Us Ya Tits and b) about breasts, was those things. And I quote: “Among other things, pages that are hateful, threatening or obscene are not allowed”.

When they first took down my images from the fan page I thought it was a shame Facebook was buying into that boring rhetoric that any body that falls outside the accepted norm of youth and sexuality is not to be showed. The week progressed and my little status update spawned some sort of viral infamy, I had over 4,000 people log on a read my previous blog. I did interviews with three radio stations, and two newspapers, who between them managed to get me syndicated all over the world – the original ABC article was even translated into Indonesian. Over 200 new people joined my fan page. So yes, the people seemed to agree, Facebook was being hypocritical.

As the week progressed Facebook continued to take down my images, and whether it was because I kicked up a stink or not I was quite pleased that at least they were being evenhanded with their no nudity policy; taking down the sexy Sexpo Showgirls as well as my nan. I posted an image of Bebe (see below) as my profile because her nipples were covered and I thought that would fall in line with their no nudity policy, which incidentally I never set out to challenge. I actually think it is dangerous territory for them to have anything but a no nudity policy, because where do you draw the line? All I was arguing for was that they apply that policy fairly, and not remove an image of breastfeeding and leave one of sexy breasts.

But this morning Facebook has taken down my whole page because the content was hateful, threatening or obscene. Since when were breasts any of those things? What kind of message are we sending to girls when we decree that breasts are obscene? Or when we tell them that their bodies are hateful? Or that sharing information about normal, natural bodily functions is threatening? What we are telling young women who are developing, and women who have troubled relationships with their bodies is that they are not okay if they don’t fall in line with the images media feeds us on a daily basis. We are telling women, and for that matter men, that bodies have to be standardized to be accepted. What we are failing to tell when we censor diversity is that bodies come in the most delightful rainbow of shapes, sizes and colours. And more simply, what we are failing to do when we decree bodies obscene is that we are all different. Each and every one of us is different and that is a good thing.

I’m going to put myself on the line here and tell my story. Ironically given how much time I have invested into researching other people’s breasts over the last five years I have never told it to anyone. I still feel a bit saddened by it I guess, but anyway here goes; I developed early, BAM, breasts appeared on my chest overnight. It was a shock not only to me, my peers but also to my parents. Because, like it or not, when an 11-year-old has breasts all of a sudden, you have a child on your hands who is instantly sexualised. Scary.
To be honest it took me a while to realise my classmates weren’t going to catch up on my early development, that I hadn’t just grown them earlier than anyone else. It took me a while to realise that I was going to end up with bigger breasts than everyone else. And the way I realised? Well that’s the sad bit I guess. I realised when I went to the school toilets one day and someone had drawn some graffiti on the wall. I sat there as I did my wee and read it. There were two silhouettes drawn next to each other, side views of a girls body. One was fairly average, and the other had huge breasts. One had an arrow pointing to it and said ‘Normal’ and the other had an arrow pointing to it that said ‘Gemma’.

I was a fairly naive kid. I read it and it took a few moments to realise that the ‘Gemma’ was me. The hot flush of embarrassment covered my cheeks and I felt sick. It was mortifying. In an instant someone told me that I wasn’t normal at an age where all you want is to be the same as everyone else. Unfortunately it was something I believed for a very long time. Because that’s the thing; When we as a community tell someone that differences are not normal, are not okay, we are dictating how they feel about themselves and that is massive power to wield.

So I ended up with huge breasts, I’m a 12F, and for all of my high school life, and a good chunk of time after then I felt ashamed of them, and intimidated by them. Although I have strong muscly body and great coordination I never played sport because I didn’t want people looking at me. I spent a lot of time looking at the ground so I wouldn’t see people looking at my breasts, because I was just a kid and the sexuality that is bundled up with breasts was far to overwhelming for me to deal with. I grew pretty cynical of any male attention because of my ‘abnormally’ large breasts, believing that the gimmick value was the only thing attracting them.

My breasts, and that one little picture some silly kid drew on the toilet wall 17 years ago (yes 17 and I still remember it clearly), have shaped my experiences and identity for a very long time. I am fully aware of the power of media to manipulate and that is why I started photographing this project. Because if I have the power to stop one little girl from feeling as shit about her body as I did then I will. If I have the power to show women and men of all ages that bodies are amazing because of their vast differences then I will. What I will not do is let fucking Facebook tell me that having open dialogue about breasts is hateful, threatening or obscene. That is not only abhorrent but given how large an audience it reaches, really dangerous.