The Master and Margarita and Facebook
For the fourth time already, Facebook has removed an illustration of The Master and Margarita from the Facebook page of this website. In addition, your webmaster can not post nor share messages nor comments, nor can he publish photos on any page - not even on the personal profiles of his friends - up to and including Tuesday, October 11, 2016.
Why?
The regular visitors of this website know the section Adaptations, in which we present different kinds of adaptations of the masterpiece of Mikhail Bulgakov, like theatre plays and musical works, as well as many illustrations.
Some illustrations are not published on the website since we prefer to present complete sets of illustrations, covering the whole story of the novel. Loose photographs or drawings which illustrate only one part of the novel, we publish on our Facebook or Pinterest pages. On those pages, the illustrations are not presented by the author, but in thematically ordered albums: On Patriarch's Ponds, Azazello's Cream, Black Magic and its Exposure, and so on.
On November 5, 2015, we added a photo to our album Azazello's Cream on Facebook, which was created in 2013 by the Ukrainian photographer Igor Voloshin. For nearly a year, nobody found this picture offense. Which is not surprising, since the picture doesn't call for wrongful thoughts in the minds of normal people. But suddenly, on October 9, 2016, your webmaster could not log on to Facebook. Instead of his profile page, he got the message that a photograph he posted had been removed, and that he could not post nor share messages nor comments, nor publish photos on any page, and this until Tuesday, October 11, 2016. The use of Messenger - a chat feature where people exchange private messages - was also blocked.
Perhaps Facebook will allow an edited photo like this one
Facebook gives no explanation why exactly this photo - and not one of the other photos - was removed, and does not give any information on who has filed a complaint, nor does it allow any form of dialogue or discussion.
Moreover, Facebook has a weird morality. A breast with a nipple is removed, but in the meantime hate messages published in the name of religions are tolerated, just like people proudly posing with guns and the protected wildlife they have shot in Africa. If the first shocks you more than the second, you should definitely apply for a job on Facebook.