Thursday, October 20, 2005
Benefit of the Doubt?
I've been thinking a bit lately about where the line is between giving someone the benefit of the doubt versus being a bit paranoid and expecting the worst from people. It's a debate that's obviously relevant to the new terrorist legislation that is currently being discussed, but what triggered it more for me is an individual I encountered on the internet, on deviantART.
It started with me posting a collaboration picture that me and a friend of mine in the States, B., did. She took the photo and I did all the post work to pretty it up a bit.
Left: The picture in question - larger version can be found here.
deviantART has a system whereby people can "favourite" your individual pieces so that they appear randomly on their own user pages. A dA user calling himself "Stargate1" was one of those that favourited this piece. Normally when someone favourites one of my pieces I go to their page to leave a little message thanking them, and if I have time I check out thier galleries - it's a good way to find new artists who presumably have similar taste to you.
Now, Stargate1 doesn't actually have any art uploaded. That's not unusual in and of itself, but I noticed that his list of most recent favourites included not only my image but four others posted by B., of the same little girl, her kid sister.
That weirded me out just a bit, so I had a bit of a look at his favourites. What I found disturbed me more than a little. In and of itself each picture is inoffensive, but it builds a very creepy picture: either anime girls partly or fully nude, photos of young girls, or occasionally photos of older women who are either nude or dressed up to look like little girls.
I also looked through his activity log to see what sort of comments he's posted. They range from "She's cute" to asking what the little girl's name is to "nice panties any more picsjust with panties?" (sic) and "Looks like shes just got out the bath" (sic).
After thinking about it for friggin ages, I decided to report him to the help desk at dA. The thing is that technically he's not broken any of their rules, so I am not sure what they can do. The help desk person escalated it to the head of their Policy Violation team, who has escalated it to management of the site. I don't know what they're going to do about it, if anything. (I suggested maybe they could keep an eye on him, or maybe even report him to some sort of hotline in his home country, assuming that it has one.)
I noticed today that someone else had commented on his page accusing him of being a pedophile too...
Anyway, all of this got me to thinking. How do we draw the line between natural caution and giving people benefit of that whole "innocent until proven guilty" thing? Does anyone have any thoughts?
(PS If you have a dA login please don't flame the guy on his page. If I'd posted this stuff in my journal at dA I would've gotten banned for inciting abuse against another member, and I am not sure if they'd extend it to me posting stuff about him here.)
It started with me posting a collaboration picture that me and a friend of mine in the States, B., did. She took the photo and I did all the post work to pretty it up a bit.
Left: The picture in question - larger version can be found here.deviantART has a system whereby people can "favourite" your individual pieces so that they appear randomly on their own user pages. A dA user calling himself "Stargate1" was one of those that favourited this piece. Normally when someone favourites one of my pieces I go to their page to leave a little message thanking them, and if I have time I check out thier galleries - it's a good way to find new artists who presumably have similar taste to you.
Now, Stargate1 doesn't actually have any art uploaded. That's not unusual in and of itself, but I noticed that his list of most recent favourites included not only my image but four others posted by B., of the same little girl, her kid sister.
That weirded me out just a bit, so I had a bit of a look at his favourites. What I found disturbed me more than a little. In and of itself each picture is inoffensive, but it builds a very creepy picture: either anime girls partly or fully nude, photos of young girls, or occasionally photos of older women who are either nude or dressed up to look like little girls.
I also looked through his activity log to see what sort of comments he's posted. They range from "She's cute" to asking what the little girl's name is to "nice panties any more picsjust with panties?" (sic) and "Looks like shes just got out the bath" (sic).
After thinking about it for friggin ages, I decided to report him to the help desk at dA. The thing is that technically he's not broken any of their rules, so I am not sure what they can do. The help desk person escalated it to the head of their Policy Violation team, who has escalated it to management of the site. I don't know what they're going to do about it, if anything. (I suggested maybe they could keep an eye on him, or maybe even report him to some sort of hotline in his home country, assuming that it has one.)
I noticed today that someone else had commented on his page accusing him of being a pedophile too...
Anyway, all of this got me to thinking. How do we draw the line between natural caution and giving people benefit of that whole "innocent until proven guilty" thing? Does anyone have any thoughts?
(PS If you have a dA login please don't flame the guy on his page. If I'd posted this stuff in my journal at dA I would've gotten banned for inciting abuse against another member, and I am not sure if they'd extend it to me posting stuff about him here.)
// posted by Cass @ 10:55 AM 
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fxfpjI looked at your link to his 'favourites' page. I agree with you, the collection of images is disturbing- even though the individual images are not. It suggests a pattern of behaviour that I find unsavory. I think you did the right thing in reporting it. I would hate to think of anyone looking at my daughter in this kind of light- it makes me sick.
Yep. Had a look. Got to concur. That's some er fascinations with the young female form going on there.
If you're concerned about this guy, report him. There's a suitable form on the AFP site at: http://www.afp.gov.au/afp/page/Crime/E-Crime/OCSET.htm
The form itself is: http://www.afp.gov.au/afp/page/Crime/E-Crime/OCSETPublicReport.htm
He can't get tossed in jail unless he's convicted, and the cops don't decide that. But they do decide who they investigate, and they don't know to do that unless they get told.
Even if it doesn't lead to a conviction in itself, in the event that he is in the process of developing into a criminal offender, an existing report will support a future investigation and/or criminal case, if any.
The form itself is: http://www.afp.gov.au/afp/page/Crime/E-Crime/OCSETPublicReport.htm
He can't get tossed in jail unless he's convicted, and the cops don't decide that. But they do decide who they investigate, and they don't know to do that unless they get told.
Even if it doesn't lead to a conviction in itself, in the event that he is in the process of developing into a criminal offender, an existing report will support a future investigation and/or criminal case, if any.
Does that form work even if he is overseas? According to his page he's in England (though that may not be true).
That was my primary reason for reporting him to the site administration - they presumably can confirm what country he's in and then report him to the appropriate authorities there...?
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That was my primary reason for reporting him to the site administration - they presumably can confirm what country he's in and then report him to the appropriate authorities there...?
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