Kristina Shakht

NAME: Kristina Shakht
PLATFORM & USERNAME: Insta – – @kristinashakht
CENSORSHIP: Content Ban, Shadow ban

What reason was given for your ban?

I shoot fashion and fine art photography incorporating nudity. My work is about femmes bodies in a post-sexual context. Every time I get censored it’s always because of nipples, butts or sides of the boobs seen in the image. Sometimes I put a blur on them before posting and they’ll still be censored.

Why do you think your post(s) was censored?

It’s always because of nudity.

Were you able to appeal and what was the response?

I appeal every time it happens. Sometimes they post it back after reviewing it for the second time, sometimes they don’t and it says that my account will be deleted if I continue posting the same content. I’m sure I’m also shadow banned already.

What effect has your experience of censorship had on you?

I’m really sad every time it happens.

My content is not sexual at all and I specifically emphasize the conversation about the ‘female body in post-sexualized context’. I’m sure my socials are growing much much slower specifically because of topics that I choose to shoot about.

I specifically noticed that engagement on my profile dropped when my work began to be more centred around women and the female body and posts would get deleted.

I don’t know exactly when I got the shadowban (maybe I’m still in it) but engagement never returned to the “pre-nudity” phase of my Instagram.

What’s one thing you want people to know about this topic?

It feels so hypocritical, specifically with Instagram and Facebook – Facebook was originally made to specifically rate women by how appealing to men they are. So it feels weird that when I take that power in my hands and as a woman decide what to do with my body and have my own take on sexuality (in my case my subject’s body/sexuality) I’m censored.