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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsUnmasking Reddit’s Violentacrez, The Biggest Troll on the Web (Creepshots, Porn, Gore, Misogyny)
Last Wednesday afternoon I called Michael Brutsch. He was at the office of the Texas financial services company where he works as a programmer and he was having a bad day. I had just told him, on Gchat, that I had uncovered his identity as the notorious internet troll Violentacrez (pronounced Violent-Acres).
"It's amazing how much you can sweat in a 60 degree office," he said with a nervous laugh.
Judging from his internet footprint, Brutsch, 49, has a lot to sweat over. If you are capable of being offended, Brutsch has almost certainly done something that would offend you, then did his best to rub your face in it. His speciality is distributing images of scantily-clad underage girls, but as Violentacrez he also issued an unending fountain of racism, porn, gore, misogyny, incest, and exotic abominations yet unnamed, all on the sprawling online community Reddit. At the time I called Brutsch, his latest project was moderating a new section of Reddit where users posted covert photos they had taken of women in public, usually close-ups of their asses or breasts, for a voyeuristic sexual thrill. It was called "Creepshots." Now Brutsch was the one feeling exposed and it didn't suit him very well.
But Michael Brutsch is more than a monster. Online, Violentacrez has been one of Reddit's most reviled characters but also one of its most beloved users. The self-described "creepy uncle of Reddit" has played a little-known but crucial role in Reddit's development into the online juggernaut it is today. In real life, Brutsch is a military father and cat-lover. He lives with his wife in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. There are many sides to Violentacrez, and now that I had Michael Brutsch on the phone I hoped to find out where the troll ended and the real person began.
***
I first became aware of Violentacrez last year, when controversy erupted over a section, called "Jailbait," that Violentacrez had created on Reddit dedicated to sexualized images of underaged girls. (Brutsch adapted the name from "Violent Acres," a popular anonymous blogger he was fond of in the mid-2000s.) Reddit, for the uninitiated, is essentially a social news site; with a free username, anyone can submit and vote on content and can do so anonymously. And anyone can start a forum on Reddit dedicated to their interests, known as a subreddit. Today, there are about 10,000 active subreddits out of nearly 100,000 total, spanning a dizzying array of topics from funny pictures, to Power Rangers, to pooping. If a post gets enough "upvotes," as they're called, it can be propelled to the front page of Reddit and a massive audience.
http://gawker.com/5950981/unmasking-reddits-violentacrez-the-biggest-troll-on-the-web
redqueen
(115,103 posts)and using "but it's not illegal" as a way to defend their hobby of copying pics from these underage people's facebook pages and posting them on reddit for perverts to slobber over / jerk off to...
anyone have a problem with this?
Or is the answer, here, too... well, I don't like it, but shut up, because freeedom?
morningfog
(18,115 posts)So much disturbing behavior seemingly becoming "normalized." Maybe it is the internet. Anonymity coupled with desensitization and less actual emotional connection. We seem to be less emotionally mature and closer to emotional and social disorder.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)very well said.
Brickbat
(19,339 posts)redqueen
(115,103 posts)I saw this posted at http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/predditors , and it includes this statement at the end: "There was a time when I thought the phrase rape culture might be overstating things a bit. That time is over."
Indeed.
I hope recent events have started enlightening some more folks about rape culture (cause apparently everything else wasn't enough already).
Odin2005
(53,521 posts)Defending their deranged behavior in the name of "freedom".
Spider Jerusalem
(21,786 posts)it specifically refers to persons who have a sexual attraction to prepubescents; sexualised images of underage, but pubescent, girls, are creepy, distasteful, and yet another facet of the sexualisation and objectification of women, but they are not paedophilia.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)I'm not so particular about discerning between the sick tastes of adults who prey on others.
justiceischeap
(14,040 posts)The place reminds me of a meeting place for lots of creepy uncles, brothers, cousins, fathers, etc.
PD Turk
(1,289 posts)It wouldn't bother me a bit.
jsr
(7,712 posts)Fuck him.
Pithlet
(25,089 posts)And he bragged about sexual relations with his stepdaughter. Exposing this troll to the daylight was a service for humanity.
DiverDave
(4,886 posts)I want to know so I can ask them to FIRE his ass.
If my kids or wife were put on that sit due to encouragement
by this pervert, I'd fly to Dallas and have a "chat" in person.
He SHOULD be worried about his job.
And according to a story at the Daily Mail http://tinyurl.com/8aeqw7k
One of the frequent posters is a HIGH SCHOOL TEACHER!
This is beyond sick and needs to STOP.
But in the name of web traffic (god, I weep for our society) they let this go on.
I really would like to know the company.
Oh, and I have never wasted time on reddit.
hoboken123
(251 posts)Not call the police, but get him fired?
Can't wait to see that extend to political views...
DiverDave
(4,886 posts)It's LEGAL so what would the police do?
Hit him in the wallet, from what I can see, thats the only way to make him suffer.
He begs (in the Mail piece) to not be outed as he was afraid of losing his job.
Oh, we could wait for him to come out and then have a 'chat' with him.
Then WE would be in jail...
redqueen
(115,103 posts)You must be new.
More to the point: Are you seriously comparing having liberal views with treating girls' and women's bodies like public property?
hoboken123
(251 posts)Postings on message boards, while legal, are getting people fired.
Why wouldn't this be applied to political posts? Someone gets outed for having a DU account and gets canned? Nice world.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)And he was probably fired more for just being on the web all day at work.
When it comes to punishments for posting pictures to perv on which the pervee did not share for that purpose, the question isn't where does it stop but when does it start.
Texasgal
(17,045 posts)Hello!
UnrepentantLiberal
(11,700 posts)He's in jeopardy of being fired for being one of the biggest assholes on the internet.
As always, the bully gets scared and begs for mercy when confronted.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)Several subreddits have already started trying to take over. One called creepsquad, and here's a list of more.
http://www.reddit.com/r/RedditBomb/comments/119qo9/updated_list_of_subreddits/
The problem isn't just this one guy. The problem is societal.
Zalatix
(8,994 posts)He's posting pedophile images, that should be a criminal issue.
Everything else is stalking.
Call the FBI and be done with it.
Odin2005
(53,521 posts)He should be banned from Reddit, to start with!
Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)Canuckistanian
(42,290 posts)Somebody better call the police and alert a womens' crisis center that they've got another customer coming.
Lone_Star_Dem
(28,158 posts)That's why I never go near sites that aren't decently moderated.
There's some real sick puppies trolling the web. Most of them have a following of other sick puppies like this one.
Glad I've never followed reddit.
Kindly Refrain
(423 posts)He even put the online award that reddit gave him on there:
Superior Performance Awards - VA - 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1994
VA stand for "Violentacrez" or Violent Acres
Indykatie
(3,696 posts)Dash87
(3,220 posts)A company that has products to track malicious internet usage.
Zalatix
(8,994 posts)tavernier
(12,388 posts)After reading this, I feel like I just walked through all the subways of New York, and then licked the bottom of my shoe.