Mums’ outrage over Instagram’s birth photography ban

Angry mums have used social media to campaign for the reinstatement of a well-loved birth photographer’s Instagram account after it was disabled following complaints about her pictures.

Melisa Jean Wilbraham uses a unique style of photography to capture the true beauty of childbirth and breastfeeding.

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Photo credit: Melissa Jean Wilbraham

Wilbraham was notified on Saturday – ironically at the beginning of World Breastfeeding Week – that her account had been deleted because it violated Instagram’s terms of use.”

After keeping the information to herself for a day, the Sunshine Coast Hospital photographer who also runs her own business took to Facebook to share her plight.

“How ironic that the very day ‘World Breastfeeding Week’ began, my business was removed from Instagram. There will always be sad humans who report my images but I will NEVER let this stop me celebrating & normalizing the miracle of life #‎bringbackmelissajeanbabies‬ ‪#‎bringbackmelissajean‬,” Wilbraham posted to her Facebook page.

Outrage over the disabling of the account spread quickly with social media mums uniting to have the account reinstated.

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Photo credit: Melissa Jean Wilbraham

A spokeswoman for Instagram told The Sunshine Coast Daily that the deletion of Ms Wilbraham’s account was a “pure mistake”.

“They review millions of pieces of content daily and as much as we’d like to be free of mistakes, we do make them,” the spokeswoman said.

Since the revival of the account, Wilbraham has received an extra 5000 followers, taking her total to more than 20,000.

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Photo credit: Melissa Jean Wilbraham

To see more of her beautiful photography visit http://melissajean.com.au/

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