On the 23rd, Xabier Vila-Coia received an email from YouTube informing him that his channel, which will turn fifteen in November, has been cancelled. Cause: “Serious or repeated violations” of community guidelines for nudity or sexual content. This is not the first case of an artist whose work has been censored online, and it won’t be the last. That’s why very few people resort to self-censorship to ensure their presence in the digital world.
“This was an unannounced retreat – explains political scientist, anthropologist and artist Vigo. He normally sends up to three warnings that a violation of his rules has been committed, but if he thinks the violation is ‘serious’ according to his parameters, he can remove the channel immediately, as he did to me”.
While Vila-Coia cites “La Purísima Concepción” as a possible cause, a three-and-a-half-minute video containing images of sexual intercourse and which was part of his practical work for her, the channel does not cite the specific content that motivated the shutdown. Subject Perspectives of Contemporary Aesthetics of the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM) Philosophy degree.
Vila-Coia, who unsuccessfully appealed the channel’s decision – the channel’s closure was repeated a few days later – doesn’t deny that the video’s content is strong and could spark controversy. In fact, it has already caused controversy between the author on the one hand and the teacher and students on the other, when he presented it in December 2021. However, he insists that this is an artistic video, not pornographic, so in no case does it violate the rules of the channel.
Specifically, according to YouTube guidelines, content that includes “representation of the genitals, breasts or buttocks (either implicit or explicit) to incite sexual pleasure”, as well as “pornography or sexual acts, genitals or sexual acts in any form (video, text, audio or image) fetishes to provoke pleasure.” The MACBA in Barcelona, the British Library and the National Library of France, among other institutions.
Vila-Coia describes the cancellation of his channel as “arbitrary, excessive and unfair”, which prevents him from accessing all content uploaded in these nearly fifteen years: nearly 300 videos with half a million views and 1,800+ subscribers. . “Not only the videos, but also the title I gave and the texts describing its content are works that I should have at least a copy of. As a citizen, I should have the right to get my work back, even if I can’t broadcast on this channel again.”
The artist doesn’t understand that it was the channel that turned motu proprio’s personal channel into an official artist channel, “she doesn’t know how to distinguish between strictly pornographic images and images with sexual content that has been taken out of context.”
He also understands that he is violating his right to freedom of expression. “You can’t put limits on artistic creation: If a creator accepts these conditions, we’re not talking about an artist, we’re talking about something very different, and both have to be named by another word,” he adds.
As for the video that may have motivated this closing, he explains that “it was designed and built with these creative parameters and it is impossible to understand without carefully reading the end credits (translating the Latin phrases)”. This isn’t the first time the artist from Vigo has seen a creation censored. In 2011, the Complutense University of Madrid, “21. a few days before its opening, he removed his exhibition “213 aphorisms for the 21st century” from an exhibition program.
Madrid-based Galician poet Antonino Nieto and Argentine director Fernando Menéndez Carbone expressed their solidarity with the Vigo artist before the closure of the channel.
In the hands of algorithms
Víctor Salgado, a lawyer specializing in ICT Law, warns that more and more people are seeing how a social network or platform’s content is profiled because it doesn’t comply with its policies. “Sometimes we are faced with a wave of cancellation or account blocking, which is not limited to the blocking of a personal profile, but also affects access to cloud content, which affects mail and one’s digital presence,” it says.
According to him, the criteria supporting these cancellations are arbitrary and based on foreign regulations that are unfamiliar to us. Also, in most cases these are algorithms, not even measures taken by a person. “There are cases of parents accused of child pornography completely taken out of context for taking pictures of their children and closing their accounts for using words like ‘pedophilia’ in messages criticizing this crime. Citizens are becoming more and more vulnerable to such algorithms. It’s a really worrisome issue that also threatens the right to freedom of expression,” he adds.
Salgado realizes that winning the battle against the platform is complicated, so to prevent a profile from being shut down, the user is increasingly resorting to self-censorship, something that doesn’t guarantee that he won’t be able to face his platform being shut down. profile in the future. , as algorithms have changed, and what may pass this censorship today may not do so tomorrow.
According to Salgado, the policies of the platforms on which these shutdowns are based are “vague and full of loopholes”, yet he acknowledges that it has been difficult and slow to reverse the situation. The first step is to go directly to the platform. Courts are the last option for the ordinary citizen as they have no purchasing power. “A trick that often bears fruit is to make a formal request for burofax from a law firm,” says the expert, who hopes European artificial intelligence law will provide the necessary tools to defend citizens against these platforms.