Chelsea Handler and Instagram have been feuding. But it looks like the whole thing is going pretty much the same way most people’s feuds with social media do: on again, off again; but nobody really breaks up.
Back in October — on Halloween, actually — Handler posted a photo to Instagram that was intended as a parody of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s famous shirtless horseback photo. In that photo, Handler herself was topless. It did not take long for Instagram to delete the photo.
Handler was angry about the deletion, seeing it as a sexist approach, drawing a distinction between male nipples and female nipples. She posted the photo again, this time with the caption:
“Taking this down is sexist. I have every right to show I have a better body than Putin.”
Apparently it was ok to post a picture of a man topless, but not a woman. Instagram took her photo down a second time. She posted it yet again, this time with the caption:
“If Instagram takes this down again, you’re saying Vladimir Putin Has more 1st amendment rights than…”
And again, Instagram took it down.
Finally, Handler posted a photo of the message she got from Instagram about her deleted photo:
Handler also responded with another photo, this one of her dogs, with the caption:
“You can now find my dogs and my breasts on Twitter only where my followers have the right to choose what they say. Bye bye instablock.”
But she didn’t leave Instagram. Instead, she occasionally posts pics that skirt the Instagram no-nudity rules. Some of these include her send-up of the Kim Kardashian “break the Internet” photo:
Others predate the big deletion battle of October, including a floral penis:
Some side boob:
Now it looks like Handler has gotten bold again. She recently posted a picture of herself on a ski slope, topless. Sure enough, Instagram deleted the photo. So Handler posted it to Twitter. The “chunk” she references is her dog.
Finding chunk. Instagram had him! pic.twitter.com/Dqle6zsevg
— Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) December 27, 2014
She posted a more Instagram-acceptable pic of herself on the ski slope, with her shirt on.