Facebook has deleted a post by Russian LGBT rights activist Lena Klimova, where she published images of people who have sent her death threats, Russian opposition-minded online publication Meduza reported.
The full photo album had been first published on VKontakte (VK.com), Russia’s most popular social network, but Klimova also posted excerpts to her Facebook account. On April 21, after the US social network deleted her original post, Klimova posted another several images from her “Beautiful People” album, challenging Facebook to remove her content a second time.
Klimova is the founder of Children-404, an online support network for LGBT teens in Russia, similar to the “It Gets Better” campaign in the US. In November 2014, Russian authorities started targeting the group for spreading “gay propaganda among minors,” which is forbidden under a controversial Russian law. The group was blocked on VKontakte following a decision by a court in St. Petersburg.
Klimova’s photo album as such has not been blocked, however. It is still available on VKontakte, whose treatment of the matter appears to be more liberal than that of Facebook.
Among more than 180 VKontakte users featured in Klimova’s album, Maxim sent the LGBT activist the following message: “I’ll be one of the first to set fire to the stake you’re gonna burn on. You’ve even got the eyes of a druggie, you vomit-stained piece of shit.”
