This week’s symposium left me fondly recalling the hundreds of hours I have spent of my life reading and re-reading the Harry Potter novels. I’ll resist the urge to make some cliched jokes or references to the magical world and cut to the chase – like the many aspects of this universe that I and my fellow Potter lovers accepted in blind faith and without question (there are some great ones here, but what I really want to know is wouldn’t Hermione get sick of Ron after about 5 minutes??), I realised that the whole idea of a “restricted section” in the library is actually a little bizarre in itself.

At Hogwarts, the idea that some magic is too powerful and dark that it would be dangerous for a young and inexperienced wizard to discover it makes enough sense. But is there an equivalent in the muggle-world?

Are there really schools that exist that ban sections of their library from young and inexperienced students, deeming that they are not mature or experienced enough to learn about certain things that exist within the world yet? I can imagine this happening in other countries, or in past dystopian or dictator-led societies that aimed to restrict freedom of thought.

This obviously leads to questions of censorship, the idea that how long we have been alive dictates whether we are legally allowed to read/see/hear certain pieces of media, or other pieces of information or media that the powers that be have decided are better off unseen.

One aspect of this that particularly frustrates me is the censorship of female bodies. Instagram accounts are constantly being reported and deleted for posting images that artistically express the human form, yet violate the platform’s bizarre nudity regulations.

One example that really gets me clenching my fists was when artist Petra Collins posted this image to Instagram:

The image got so many complaints that the social media platform not only took it down, they deleted Collin’s entire account. Something tells me that if it wasn’t for the presence of pubic hair in the shot, nobody would have had any problem with a picture of a young woman in a bikini.

On the other hand, if we search the hashtag #pubes, 24,173 images come up – and about 97% of those are dudes. Why are we supposed to be disgusted and protected from perfectly normal part of the human body on one sex, and turn a blind eye to it on the other?

I never realised the extent to which the media that we have free access to is censored or frowned upon in a society that is in other ways so forward thinking and open minded.

I dream of a world where we all have access to the Restricted Section, and those in control let us make our own minds up with what we choose to expose ourselves to.

Could have gone a lot harder on that feminist rant. #freethenipple