UPDATE: Reddit has now removed “all subreddits that focus on sexualization of children.” And it only took them six years to realize that maybe catering to peodophiles was not such a good idea.
Yet another Reddit pedophilia explosion, this time centering around r/preteen_girls, a subreddit which is evidently filled with sexualized photos of preteen girls. (You thought the banning of Reddit’s Jailbait subreddit solved the problem? Nope; Reddit still hosts numerous subreddits catering to pedos.)
The subreddit came under some criticism elsewhere on Reddit a couple of days ago, and countless creeps leapt to its defense.
I don’t have the stomach to dig into this one, but ShitRedditSays is on the case.
Here are screenshots of a bunch of comments defending the subreddit, the pictures, and creepiness itself, collected by SRS regular littletiger. They’re all pretty repugnant, but this one really takes repugnance to a new level:
Here’s an SRS thread discussing the screenshots and the controversy in general.
Many of the defenders of r/preteen_girls have responded to the criticism by angrily asserting that the pictures there aren’t nude or pornographic. Which is not, actually, true, as this SRS thread makes clear. Indeed, here is a screenshot of the incredibly creepy discussion that ensued in r/preteen_girls when one nude picture got posted. (Note: this screenshot shows a small censored thumbnail of the nude picture in question.)
Naturally, all this led to yet more highly upvoted pedophilia jokes, something Reddit already has quite a surplus of.
(Thanks to SRS once again for pointing me to this comment.)
Here’s a discussion of the original thread (in r/wtf) in which some questioned the propriety of Reddit hosting a forum devoted to suggestive and possibly pornographic pictures of children; and another SRS thread highlighting one of the creepier r/preteen_girls defenders. (And if you want more, here’s that guy’s highly disturbing comment history.)
For more on Reddit’s pedophilia problem, see my previous posts on the r/jailbait controversies.
Reddit used to be owned by Conde Nast. It is still owned by Conde Nast’s parent company Advance Publications. Why would this publishing giant, which owns dozens of media properties ranging from the New Yorker and Vanity Fair to the uber-wholesome Sunday newspaper supplement Parade, want to associate itself with a site that continue to host forums devoted to sexualized photos of underage girls?
NOTE: None of the links in this post go to r/preteengirls itself; they are all to discussions of it elsewhere. None of them link to any of the pictures in question, though one, as I noted, contains a censored thumbnail image of one picture posted there.
Ughhh…Reddit. Just ugh.
How about petitioning the ACLU to look into it, especially if a lawsuit is going to be necessary?
http://www.change.org/petitions/rpreteen-girls-remove-rpreteen-girls-from-redditcom#
Petition in Change.org to bring it down. Not sure if it will be useful, but it’s something…
That’s a petty good idea. I urge everyone on this site to make a signature.
Done. Although I’m thinking “Reddit: Kill it with fire, then salt the earth” would probably be a better petition at this point.
Um, yeah, I’d say it was. WTF?
I think the meat analogy is perfect. They are viewing these children as meat, hunted down, captured, and provided for their consumption.
I’d like to point out that there is a now a facebook group for ending child exploitation on reddit: http://www.facebook.com/nomoreredditchildporn
And there is this redditbomb: http://pastebin.com/ig1qcSXP for quickly telling others about the current situation on reddit.
From the SRS thread, another suggestion:
@belledame222:
I was responding to falconer’s question, “Why should we blame them and hold them culpable?”
And yeah, I definitely could have phrased myself better, since it’s probably hardly ever the case that the kids themselves that are posting the porn. -_- So no, in nearly every case they would not be blamed or held culpable.
Main reason I said that was because there was some satement in an AVFM thingy that said that they wanted the UN to ensure that “no laws designed to protect minors should be used to prosecute them.” I still have no idea what they were getting at with that…
Kirby, I think they are talking about the children who were charged with child porn for sexting pictures of themselves to each other.
Thank you for the petition link. It’s beyond the pale that people should even have to protest what a few sick bastards will post….gonna see if I can get an acquaintance to post this on his site…lotsa friends…especially the kind into social justice. Hopefully they will spread the news.
Here is my message to the FBI if anyone wants to use it to base their own message on it:
Dear FBI,
The website Reddit has hosted throughout its history numerous subreddits catering to pedophilia. One of those subreddits, /preteen_girls, the latest addition to this internet horror, has many posts of preteen girls in scanty clothing and in sexualized poses.
http://www.reddit.com/r/preteen_girls
This is clearly an aberrant exploitation of the bodies of girls. It is a violation of their body autonomy, the age of consent, their privacy, and of basic human decency. Have the r/preteen_girls subreddit, and all other subreddits catering to pedophilia, deleted. If they refuse to do this, have the entire Reddit website shut down.
Sincerely,
Boggi———-
Holy crap. In this blog there is pretty extreme stuff (as David warns), but this has been the only one capable of making me feel angry and sick.
The worst thing is that so many idiots are piling to defend it. I don’t know if being shielded in the anonimity of the Internet makes people assholes, and desensitivizes them of terrible stuff. Maybe they are this horrible in real life.
Fuck.
@Summer
I think it’s both. If there is one thing about the internet I “love” more than any other part it is how it reveals people’s true nature.
Yay! They banned r/preteengirls. About time stupid reddit.
r/preteengirls has been banned.
🙂
Have the other subreddits been banned? The redditbomb thing has 10+ more “jailbait” groups listed on it.
Also from the somethingawful thread anonymoose posted, somebody claims that:
O_O holy shit
Kladle: O_O
I kindof want to go and read that thread now…but I also really really don’t want to.
All of the preteen subreddits have been shut down, not just preteengirls.
Wow – that, like, gives me hope for humanity!
So am I just naive–I would have thought the “nothing illegal” might have stretched to cover no sexual imagery of children.
I just went over and read a bit at SRS where they talk about the change in policy and what they have done in the past. (post is here: http://www.reddit.com/r/blog/comments/pmj7f/a_necessary_change_in_policy/)
Here is a list of all the subreddits that have been shut down:
as reported by : http://www.reddit.com/user/muppethead
Good grief, I hate that kind of formatting with a bloody blazing passion (forums or whatever they call it over there–hate it hate it hate it. *flees back to Dreamwidth*
http://achrisfling.com/games/files/2011/01/Project64-2011-01-18-15-17-06-77.png
Let’s celebrate with some heroic music I found the other day! 😀
But, my fellow Manboobzers, the battle is not over yet.
I have a feeling that this isn’t the end of things, unfortunately. Given that Reddit’s moderation is pretty much non-existent I predict that a lot of the subreddits will pop up again under new names. I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t even get all of them this time around. /SRS, David, and everybody else who’s been on Reddit’s ass are going to have to be vigilant and make sure they keep their word about having this stuff on the site. At least now we have their policy to point to if it does reemerge.