NRL WAGs Taylor Winterstein, wife of Frank Winterstein, and Bryce Cartwright’s wife Shanelle Cartwright have restrictions placed on Instagram accounts
Prominent anti-vaxxers are being hit by new Facebook standards which ban using the social media giant to spread dangerous messaging against vaccination.
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Prominent anti-vaxxers are being hit by new Facebook standards which ban using the social media giant to spread dangerous messaging against vaccination.
NRL WAGs Taylor Winterstein, wife of Penrith Panther Frank Winterstein, and Shanelle Cartwright, married to Gold Coast Titan Bryce Cartwright, have had restrictions placed on their Instagram accounts, which they have used to promote anti-vax messages. The restrictions are a result of Facebook, which owns Instagram, last month introducing measures to prevent dangerous and misinformed anti-vaccination messages gaining traction.
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Ms Winterstein had been promoting her $200-a-ticket workshops in Australia, New Zealand and Samoa to her 17,000 Instagram followers and 10,000 Facebook followers. Ms Cartwright made headlines in February when she announced she would not be vaccinating her unborn baby, who is now a month old. Instagram has taken action against both women, ensuring they cannot post permanently, only on a temporary feed which disappears after 24 hours.
Ms Cartwright told her 9000 followers in a video she would not be posting any more anti-vax messages to her account because Instagram had “censored” it two weeks ago, and that Ms Winterstein had been “censored too”.
“A few of you have asked me to post more vaccine things,” she said on video as she breastfed her child. “I’m actually not going to because my page was censored for about a week a couple of weeks ago so I’m not going to.
“My friend Tay, her account has been censored. She can’t post at all on it, only on the stories so it’s a bit hard for her to keep posting.”
Ms Winterstein did not respond when contacted by The Daily Telegraph but forwarded the email to Ms Cartwright who launched into a foul-mouthed rant against a Telegraph journalist, posting 15 videos on Instagram and publishing the journalist’s mobile number, email address and Instagram account.
“Didn’t a terrorist just kill 50 people in a mosque in New Zealand? And even he gets a better headline than me,” she said.
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard praised Instagram’s restrictions on “vacuous” anti-vaxxers. “While I’m generally supportive of free speech, anything that removes the rather vacuous anti-vaxxer comments decreases the likelihood of people being duped into not keeping their children safe,” he said.
“Ten out of 10 to Facebook and Instagram. Social media is often seen as having the gospel truth by people who don’t understand that anybody and everybody can put up their craziest ideas on social media and that might be OK except for its putting our kids in danger.”
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