Directory:The Wikipedia Point of View/Wikipaedophilia/Boy Scouts are for spanking

Boy Scouts are for spanking was a campaign launched by Wikipedia Review against Wikia, Inc. (and by extension, its affiliated non-profit projects, Wikimedia Commons and the Wikimedia Foundation) for hosting a pornographic 'spanking website' displaying images of naked children, of children being spanked or subjected to violent acts. The campaign provoked a storm of opposition from the wiki-based 'free culture' community, and led to one Wikipedia Review member being permanently banned from Wikipedia.

However, the campaign was ultimately successful, with the site being taken down from Wikia.com at the end of January 2008 and hosted elsewhere.

Original complaint by John Russ Finley

The original 'Boy Scouts are for spanking?' thread began on 22nd January 2008 when 'John Russ Finley', later banned, complained to Jimmy Wales on his talk page as follows:

I'm delighted to see that Wikipedia has a GFDL image of some boys involved in the Boy Scouts mission. I'm not so delighted to see that photo copied into a Wikia called "Spanking Art", to enhance an article about Boy Scouts that reads:

"While nowadays the Scouting movement prohibits the use of corporal punishment as part of its activities, this was not always so, and in spanking stories they often go hand in hand, especially with Beaver and Cub Scouts. There are also some spanking drawings that show young scouts, e.g. by Comixpank."

"Because of the connotations of discipline that comes with scouting, some adult spankophiles like to roleplay/ageplay a boy or girl scout (similar to playing schoolboys)."

Exactly what kind of perverts are Wikia and the Wikimedia Foundation enabling, by allowing them free and unfettered access to simple pictures of boys, that are then twisted and exploited on your for-profit company's website, so that they are interwoven into adult perversions and roleplay? [1]

Shortly after, Peter Damian opened one of the most watched threads on Wikipedia Review [2].

Contents of the Spanking Art Wiki

No trace of the 'spanking art wiki' remains on a Wikia server, as the site was closed down within days following the campaign on Wikipedia Review. However it moved to a different host ("Our mission is to create the world's most comprehensive and detailed database on spanking art.") and many (not all) of the images remain on the new site. It still features the work of artist 'Comixpank' whose speciality is depicting the corporal punishment of cubs (8-11 year old scouts). His work has been hosted on several sites (including Wikia) but all closed down. Some links below - none of these feature his more graphic work (which is almost certainly illegal).

• The famous image of cubs being spanked [3]
• Gallery of his 'artwork' [4]
• This one [5] is a graphic description of a headmaster caning a boy ("with his left hand, he grabbed the crotch of Ben's undies and pulled them up. This had the desired effect of showing all of Ben's firm round bottom ...").
• There is also some nice 'artwork' of little girls being spanked. [6] and material such as naked little girls being lined up for a medical examination [7]

The most disturbing material (since entirely removed) was the photographs of little girls taken from Flickr and put out of all context. Some of them were unclothed - entirely innocent but disturbing in this new setting. The parents of the children were contacted by Wikipedia Review, and the material eventually removed, though not without a great deal of protest from the wiki adminstrators.

A flavour of the more disturbing stuff can be gleaned from an incriminating collage made by Gregory Kohs here.

'You guys are arguing against freedom'

The complaints sparked the usual protests from the 'free culture' movement on Wales page [8].

"You're missing a detail here. Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia. When that photos was uploaded under free use, it became property of anyone and everyone. Uploading it as a free image says "I don't care who uses this and how they use this, as long as we're credited under the GFDL. So, every photo on Wikipedia can be "twisted and exploited" in the long run". Metros (talk) 03:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

You guys are arguing against freedom. Against free speech. Against free culture. Against the free reuse of media. Against WikiMedia and Wikipedia. Go sell your love of slavery elsewhere. User:WAS 4.250 22:24, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

"Freedom, censorship, pics of naked abused children" - "The history of the full frontal nude pic of this naked girl who has been badly burned at the top of this article about Phan Thị Kim Phúc might be relevant to your concerns on Jimbo's web page. WR is trying to stir up trouble by throwing mud everywhere and seeing what will stick. Frankly at some point the WikiMedia Foundation might have to sue some of these WR clowns for defamation. Greg in particular seems eager to defame Jimbo for financial profit. I thought he was smarter than that. Maybe he figures any publicity is good publicity, even a defamation lawsuit". WAS 4.250 11:52, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

"I don't understand how copyright and honoring the ethics of personal privacy, especially of pre-pubescent minors, are somehow antithetical to "freedom". People are also "free" to organize boycotts of Amazon.com (#1 investor in Wikia) and to organize boycotts of donating to Wikimedia Foundation. Let's take a poll -- which do you think would win out in the court of public opinion? The fight for copyleft freedom, or the fight against online sites that promote a pro-pedophilia and pro-child-abuse agenda? Choose your sides, people. This is going to be a quick, decisive battle. - Where I chillax (talk) 17:08, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

"Are you making threats?"EconomicsGuy (talk) 17:16, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

"Are you daft? Do you not know the difference between the words "moral" and "legal"? How could you possibly respond to what I wrote with what you wrote, unless you are utterly trying to deflect this discussion to some arcane aspect of the situation that you can "win"? I'm done with trying to engage in finding a solution here. Let the authorities and the lawyers figure it out. I'm sure that perverted individuals who are exploiting youngsters will win the day." Where I chillax (talk) 19:43, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

"At what point are we ready to say this thread constitutes a legal threat and deal with it accordingly?" EconomicsGuy 19:50, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

"Content is freely available to anyone and that includes people who would use the content for fetishistic and porn purposes. If you feel they are doing something wrong then take it up with them and their IP hosts. Benjiboi 02:06, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Removal of the wiki

On 25th January, the administrators of the spanking wiki started removing the disturbing material [9] At the same time, Wikipedia Review contacted NSPCC and Internet Watch foundation. [10]

On 26 January, Kohs made a PowerPoint presentation about the wiki, shared it with influential stakeholders in the advertising industry, and threatened to send it to advertisers such as Microsoft, Weight Watchers, Pizza Hut, and Verizon (whose advertisements appeared on the wiki) and Amazon. [11]

Immediately, Wikia closed down the spanking art wiki. See here [12] for a discussion.

On 7 February the wiki was relaunched on another site [13] (though with many of the grosser images deleted, as noted above). The new site even have their own version of the controversy, which agrees on nearly all points with the one given here, particularly regarding the image deletion.

"Our new hosts Stoner and Ai required an extension of the wiki's image use policies to be more or less the same as the current image use policies on Anime OTK: strictly no photos of any minors at all, and no nonphotographic images which are anywhere near to being considered indecent pseudo-photographs of a child. The exact wording of these policies was negotiated between Spankart and Ai, and about 100 more images were deleted before the official relaunch of the wiki. It was hoped that this action will be beneficial for the wiki in the long run, by deescalating the controversy and by demonstrating to everyone that this wiki is not only perfectly legal and law-abiding, but also willing to exercise a degree of self-censorship when such is deemed right". [14]