#vaginal wash

tom-isaacs:

Anónimo 3 -  María Evelia Marmolejo

Joining a roster of politically active Latin American artists experimenting with performance art in the 1980s, Marmolejo’s works dealt largely with environmental issues, the role of women, and the concurrent political oppression in her native Colombia. Anónimo 3 (1982), for instance, was conceived as an atonement ritual in which she apologized to the Earth for years of pollution. The 15-minute performance in Valle del Cauca, Colombia, consisted of her covering her face with gauze and her body with surgical tape, then performing a vaginal wash over a toilet bowl in the center of a circular patch of earth. The fluids that fell to the ground were intended to re-fertilize the area.

This post was recently flagged as explicit. I requested a review and received an email within a matter of minutes to say the review had been performed and the ruling was upheld. There was no room for appeal. The post was taken off my tumblr. I decided to make a complaint through other channels. 

I sent a message to community support:

My post was incorrectly flagged as explicit. There is nothing sexual in this image and no nipples or genitals are showing.

I received the following response:

Adult content is not permitted on Tumblr.

If you feel that we have miscategorized your post, you can appeal this decision. Just open your account settings, select “Review flagged posts,” and you’ll see a timeline view of your posts that have been flagged on that blog.

Unsatisfied with this response I persisted:

Thanks [redacted],

But the person who reviewed the material has not followed your own guidelines. Furthermore, the review of my appeal took all of five minutes before it was denied so the claim that it was ‘carefully reviewed’ does not stand up to scrutiny.

I am very disappointed not only with the draconian turn that Tumblr has taken, but also the scattershot approach they’ve taken to upholding their own standards and rules.

Some time later I received the following email:

Hello,

We’ve reviewed your classification appeal and have determined the contents of your post is not adult per our Community Guidelines located here: https://www.tumblr.com/policy/en/community. Your post has now been restored. We apologize for the error. For more information about what is considered adult content, please see our FAQ support post or the Tumblr Help Center.

Thank you,
Tumblr Trust & Safety