Gareth Thomas has hit out at Twitter after a video he shared of himself dancing with his husband was abruptly removed from his feed by the social media platform.
The 46-year-old Welsh rugby icon has been married to Stephen Williams-Thomas since 2016 – with his other half frequently featuring in his social media posts.
This week, Gareth took to Twitter to share a photograph of himself dancing together while they listened to some jaunty music.
However, the star was then shocked to find Twitter intervened to remove his post from his feed, and deleting it from view of his 298,100 followers.
Gareth followed up by taking to Twitter to express his disappointment and anger about his innocent video being banned – while negative and violent tweets are often free to exist unchallenged.
He wrote: “I find it bizarre that @Twitter suspended my account because I posted a happy video of me and my husband dancing happily to a song on the radio.
“Yet when people spew hate and discrimination then it’s very rarely even challenged.”
The rugby legend added an emoji of a hand shown a middle finger salute at the end of his message.
Gareth was supported by followers who sided with him immediately.
One fan gushed: “Sorry they did that to you. That video literally made my day when I saw it, it was light in a day of darkness.”
Twitter has strict rules when it comes to copyright, with music often tripping up users who shares video clips featuring songs by established artists – while taking a similar stance to photography and video that is technically owned by others too.
Their terms and conditions state: “Twitter responds to copyright complaints submitted under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”).
View this post on Instagram
“Section 512 of the DMCA outlines the statutory requirements necessary for formally reporting copyright infringement, as well as providing instructions on how an affected party can appeal a removal by submitting a compliant counter-notice.
“Twitter will respond to reports of alleged copyright infringement, such as allegations concerning the unauthorized use of a copyrighted image as a profile or header photo, allegations concerning the unauthorized use of a copyrighted video or image uploaded through our media hosting services, or Tweets containing links to allegedly infringing materials.
“Note that not all unauthorized uses of copyrighted materials are infringements.”
