The man who might have killed Taylor Behl was a member of deviantART.com. It's not the first time.
The body of 17-year-old Taylor Behl was found yesterday after a month-long search. In custody for 16 counts of child porn is a 38-year-old amateur photographer who may have killed her. I've been keeping up on this case, partly because one of the roads leads back to deviantART, a site I was involved with for 4 years, both as a volunteer and paid administrator before stepping down in protest over business practices and upper management conduct.…
Article comments
76 - mindofka
I liked very much your article, a good point on DA policy administration and a very big social problem in the world.
Everyday happens a case of this genre, there are millions of teens on DA. Isn't it just a normal probability they have an account on DA and are ILL? Think about that. I don't say it's an acceptable thing, but ill idiots can be find anywhere (and I call them that way because they're really ILL). So, first point, probability.
Other fact, I don't know if you're a person involved in art studies or criticism (i just don’t know you ;)), but I assure you that some Caravaggio paintings can be more psichologically shocking than some Hellwein Art, Bosch can make you have nightmares if you compare it to Giger. People have more defence on explicit violence than on subtile psichological hidden signs, I work in advertising, made 3 years of visual communication studies and I really know that very well. I think you made the point, and the fact is that there's a lot of young people that don't have a goal to reach, are alone and they seem not to find a way in this word.
Second point, visual communication and psicology.
Is this the same argument about parents complaining about violence in the cartoons, because they leave their children watch the TV for hours?
Is it Hanna-Barbera’s fault, or mom Julie’s that leaves her 13 year old child in front of the TV 12 hours a day? Is it suuzi9mm’s fault or mom Julie’s that leaves her child 12 hours a day in front a PC, doesn’t have a normal communication with the son/daughter, and doesn’t teach about normal behavior, knowledge, emotions, life? Children often are atracted by the censored, the not allowed things. If you teach your child that nude is bad, they’ll have problems in loving theirselves and their body, If you go naked around the home in front of your child they’ll understand there’s nothing bad in our poor orignal naked body, get the point? And they’ll not became obsessed and research the bad, prohibition, and sexual excitment about a poor lonely tit! I don’t why, but it seems in the USA young people is more ingenue, maybe because when you grow in Europe you go in the church and saw Medieval skeleton dances and walk on 1000 years old stone graves, and there are sacred reliquies alla round, or in other countries you have other problems, like surviving and trying to not walk on that dead corpse, than thinking how you’re poor and your life is terribile…well, generally speaking. In the western society death, sex, nude are considered still taboo, and most people don’t live this faces of life in a normal way, simple as it has to be, just faces of life.
Third point,so is it DA really the problem,? Or is a more general problem, in which happens that being DA a so large community, is obviously involved sometimes?
If I wake up tomorrow and kill my chief at work, will it be MY fault or DA? Let it be my fault, I’m a person, I have a mind, in this case ill because I’m a murder, but it’s still my fault. And most of pedo-maniacs don’t like skulls but cute furry bunnies.
I want to see all that people that decide to censor and burn all Bosch paintings because they lead to violence. I want to see all war reporters without their photography, because children drawned corpses after tsunami, and a father crying, are more psichologically violent than some syrings in the tongue, and it’s real life, not a photomanipulation.
This is also about censorchip in my way, and the lost and heavy part of art has to stay because of freedom of expression, as I explained before, this teens will do it with or without the bloody DD, I’m sure. Let’s focus more on their families, teachers, society. (And not on the fact they listen to Marylin Manson, watch Buffy, their problem is about life understanding in general and obsessions, not a MM or buffy director’s fault)
Thank you for making such a good point and making me think a lot of how, fear, prejudice and some standard psichology, can lead to art censorship. I know you didn’t want to say that, but it was very close.
I wish you all the best for the new year and keep it up with the great writing.
Ana
P.S.
(I’m not absolutely against what you wrote, but I liked to study better the question and share my opinion)
77 - Lily
I have read your article, and while I do agree with some of the things within it, I must state that there is a lot of things that are completely uncalled for.
I myself am a user on DeviantArt, and I do love the site. I spend a lot of time on the site, but does that mean that I do not have any morals? As with real life, the site really is a place where you can come across different people, but it can varry on what you choose to do, or to represent. I've come across some of this art that you have found, but not such a large amount. I'm sure that the type of people that you mentioned in the above article are many in number in DA. But what you are saying is the same as to what people are complaining about to the increase of anime art genre on the site. People are supposely starting to associate it with only anime artists. From what you are saying in the article, it seems like you are tyring to associate DA with murders/ill people in the same way. You seem to be forgetting the vast amount of people that aren't like that, but still reside in the community.
Many of the people I have met are kind, and are willing to help. These people have never met me, have no idea what I look like, but are still willing to talk to me and help me.
While as I don't agrue that there are some immature people on the site, the age factor really shouldn't be included. If I told you that I was 15, would you begin to slight this comment? Now, if I told you that I was 27 what would your reaction be? True, there are more immature people under the age of 18, but saying that is like saying all Americans are overweight, or that everyone who is suicidal is 'goth' or 'emo'(which, we know, is not true.) It is the majority, yes. But the immaturity can go both ways. There are people who act less mature then those who are under 18. Personally, I feel that age shouldn't be considered a factor. Judging on age isn't fair. One cannot judge properly.
I myself have been depressed/suicidal in the past, but it had nothing to do with DA. It was something within my mind, and from what I have gone through in life. DA had, in fact, helped me to get myself out of it. There were people that I could talk to. And, as odd as this might sound, it was nice to know that somebody appricated what I did as an artist and as a person, even though they have no idea who I am. What color my skin is, how old I am, what my past is like..
Choosing to commit suicide, or commit a murder doesn't have anything to do with the site. Yes, while the site's users may have done something, in the end it is the person themself who choose to do it. It was their heart feeling it, their mind telling them, and their hands picking up something.
Regardless, what you have said is, as I stated previously, some of it does hold some truth. I just believe that you took it way above what is needed, and what is nessecary.
-Lily
78 - RSM
There are freaks involved with everything. I've met many online in very innocent, clean places. There's not much you can do about them. If you're lucky you can catch onto them and ban them.
Let's not ruin places like DA with restrictions. The freaks win if you do that and it's no longer fun for us normal people.
79 - Truley-Unruly
Interesting article. I agree with much of what you replied. It comes down to the person I believe. I don't look at the images or movies and have this urge to murder etc. It's shocking at times for gore yes, but when you look at the message in most it's not so much about glorifying murder, violence it's about getting near the pysche as an author who wtires an autobiography of another. Sure in a community this large your gonna have your cases where it's not just art but soemthing real a desire. But as Moniquette said "If I live in a house with two neighbours, one on the left and one on the right, the possibilty to have a psycho among them is very low in comparison with the situation when I live in a building with 1000 apartments. Well, there will surely be psychos among them, but it's not the fault of the building's constructor or designer that the people living in it are ill."
We are a society now that makes excuses, and rather than have and or apply accountiblity where it should be (the very person who commits the acts) they blame or seek to find justifications as to why. There have been mental pyschos for ages, they didn't ahve all the media we do now and it was just as perverse and probably a more violent society back then. Read history and you see it. So who could they blame? They didn't have the internet yet history documents so many events that we as a society now try to put blame on media etc rather than just accepting...somepeople are just plain bad, doesn't matter the influence, will make money however they can (sex and money associations have been around forever, now you've jsut got another medium)
Predators, no matter how will always be out there, always have been. When it comes to communities not just DA and younger and older adults, people have to use their common sense and remember that. I do think DA could be more proactive in saying listen it's a community but we don't KNOW everyone, can't vouch for everyone, don't take candy from a stranger in the car type of thing.
As members of the community we should also be telling these kids hey be careful.
80 - felixxkatt
the fact of the matter is that in any community as large as DeviantArt, you get some weirdos. however, to say that Deviant Art directly contributed to anything is ridiculous and shortsighted. do you think that if DA didn't exist the weirdos would just vanish? can you possibly believe that if we didn't have videogames noone would shoot each other? give me a break, society has reached a point here where the violence is happening because of injustice, selfishness, poverty, and greed. everyone thinks they are entitled to things without working for them, parents are ignoring their kids and surprised when the kids go bannanas... forbidding graphic arts because SOME of it is innappropriate for kids is not the answer. and in all honesty, having been a member for over a year, and checking DA frequently, i have never encountered any of this bizzarre grotesque stuff everyone seems to think is going on. which leads me to believe you have to be actively searching for gross and debase things on DA to find them. if teens or any one else is ACTIVELY searching for sick imagery, they will find it somewhere, whether it's on DA or on Rotten.com or whether they have to make it themselves. there are already laws against murder, child porn, child endangerment, etc. people who break these laws must be punished, but to punish law abiding citizens - ARTISTS-- because they post artwork on the same site?
81 - Not Thing
how can you attack deviantart with so many fallacies, besides, deviantart isn't the reason people kill each other, this article is one big slanderous booger... theres more to DA than this... and unfortunatly anyone who's never heard of DA won't find out whats so great about it from this article.... I can't believe you were an admin....
82 - victoria
I they need to start a new deviantart for kids under 18 and inforce their age rules. I never see this gross stuff on DA, but that's because I don't go looking for it. As for "crap art", you can't really objectively define it and I think it's nice that everyone can show their work. However, separating the younger people would allow devart to focus more on censoring that site/part of the site. That's pretty much all they could do. Plus people probably wouldn't submit so much gross stuff or crap art if it wasn't always getting DD's.
83 - Cola
The problem exists with any large online community. MySpace and LiveJournal are also coming under fire. The problem is simply that the internet confers a degree of anonymity that most young people are not trained to be wary of. It isn't possible for a small number of people to regulate the actions of thousands of people. Real deviants tend not to draw serious attention to themselves until it's too late.
But what is it that all of you are getting at? Nowhere do I see any kinds of real, viable solutions posed. What -can- be done? It seems to me that our only real choices are requiring social security and credit card numbers to join and, in addition, making content invisible to non-members, which would drive away many individuals who use DA to showcase their art to the public, OR shutting down these communities entirely. But what about young people? How can we be so despotic as to deny them the ability to connect and communicate online?
The problem is difficult and people are quick to complain, but no one seems willing to propose a solution.
84 - ROSE
This site can be benign, but I've also seen that it can link up young people with others forming a "community" of what all believe to be a normal slice of the population. It is not. Relationships happen in the real world where people have to coexist with those of socioeconomic, racial, religious, age, and political-view differences. Being able to grow and learn as a individual to tolerate and happily coexist in real society is healthy. The fantasyworld of these online false communities draw kids in. Countless hours are wasted online instead of learning to form real relationships. Instead of preparing for their future, many young people can't get through high school or college successfully, because their priorities lie with these additive online "communities". What is the future going to be with a large population of dysfunctional uneducated people trying to manage in society? Will colleges and psychologists be overrun with 30-year olds trying to finally get their lives together after wasting so much time?
85 - David Aleman
I'm a memeber of DA since may 2004... i love the site, i find it quite a great place to see lots, thousands of types of art... yes has some great artists, but with sadness i must tell to other members we must admit one thing is true: is so easy for ANYONE to get access to any kind of mature stuff... as a young art student and novice photographer the first thing i noticed about the site is how easy is to get so see a nude photo in a not so "artistic" context... i never knew there where such involment between these crimes and DA... is just a terrible thing... but is not just about the admins or the site... is about all of us memebers... true, you don't like what you see, don't look at it, but if it represents some kind of motivation or simply a dangerous image for a teenager with psychological problems, well you can't let that pass by... as for me i'll do my part to make the site a better place, is such a great project and i don't want it to see it destroyed by such terrible events...
86 - artist
I use deviantART for selling my arts. Pitty that those incindents took place but there aren't only sick people on DA. I think it would be better to deny teenagers joining DA and forcing all members to type all their personal informations into the register form (for the DA stuff information only).
87 - artist2
Materials whith a mature content are submited to deviantART with Parental Advisory labels. Teenage memebers or their parents can block the access to the mature content on DA.
Also it's ver easy to reach the mature contents not only on DA. Look at erotic/porn sites - you don't have to prove you're 18 years old.
88 - member of DA
Don't blame the entire community with this article just because of few sick people. Sick people are EVERYWHERE, and not only in the Internet. Just go out to the street. Everyone is responsible for his or her own doings.
And also: the ART has got many faces. Erotic or gore art also exists. Not everyone who makes those art is sick.
89 - Arialith
Hey, author! It's rediculous to blame the entire community! Because with this article you insulted many many brilliant artists which submit their amazing works there!
Community can't be responsible for a single member! It's just like you may blame the entire city because of the one murderer!
90 - Mantisss
I'm a member of Deviant Art. Firstly, I must agree with the article with regards to the administration of the site, and with regards to the kind of content allowed. Secondly, in all fairness, I've come across some pretty screwed up people online, and they can be found anywhere online, really. No matter how hard any given site tries to seed our seedy characters :P it's still going to have a few slip through the cracks ... it's the Internet. I really think that younger kids would best be kept OFFLINE by their parents. It's the only way to be completely sure that they are safe from these sorts of things.
91 - Won't Someone Think of the Children!?
Totally reminds me of the Dungeons and Dragons paranoia of the 1980s (or Ozzy Osbourne paranoia, or Pac Man paranoia, or...). Hot air from a frustrated busybody, spiced up with a few lurid real-world examples to make the threat all the more, y'know, threatening.
Educating your own progeny as to the Ways of the World is probably the first step in ensuring that they don't wind up Moonies, Scientologists or Us Magazine subscribers.
Meanwhile, war rages in the Middle East and the polar caps melt like icecubes in a glass of Fanta.
92 - Zoey Parker
I'm truly appaled at this article, I go to a CHRISTIAN school and we use this as a forum for out art peices, i'm known as fantasticfailure. We use this to find ref pics, check work, and turn in our photography works. I've never come into contact with anyone like the people you have mentioned, its horrible that such a good site has such a bad rap
93 - Joseph Dunphy
A few comments:
1. Somebody tried to make an issue out of the fact that the author is speaking against DeviantArt after the end of his employment there. This would seem to me to be a very weak basis for criticism; how many people wish to volunteer to join the ranks of the unemployed? In real life, speaking out against the business one works for tends to be a great way of doing just that.
2. That much having been said, in the admittedly brief time I've been on DeviantArt, the full nastiness of the experience has been limited to the actions of one underhanded moderator in the DevArt forums and his pint sized fan club. DeviantArt has seemed to me, so far, to be one of the friendliest sites I've ever seen.
Having said that I am ready to be proved wrong, as I so often am, but so far, so good. For the most part.
3. More stuff, probably, but I want to get to bed. More later, maybe.
94 - Sarah
Sorry, but I have to say that this article sounds like it was completely based on a personal bias. I am a member of dA and I also look at the Macabre section, which includes horror/blood/gore etc. I don't want to go out and kill anyone.
I think parents need to actively protect their children. If the kids are under a certain age, don't let them go online without your consent or presence. There are maturity warnings that block the underage from seeing excessively "adult" things.
I don't think that it should be dA's responsibility to keep the unstable from looking at pictures on their site (and yes, that implies that I think that those who get the impulse to hurt or kill from these pictures had problems to start with). Some people like Macabre art and art that includes blood and gore. If you don't like it...don't look. Now that's not hard, now is it? Also, if you're older than 18, and the maturity warnings don't work for you, then don't go into sections where you will find Macabre art. And if you see a thumbnail, DON'T VIEW IT. Simple enough for you?
95 - Liz
Among the response posts to this article, I am willing to bet that there's a statistically significant correlation between "posters who disagree with the article" and "posters who do not have children of their own."
96 - Ed
Liz: you're probably right, although there could always be deviant exceptions (pun intended). I'm not willing to give dA a pass. It's ironic (and kind of depressing), though, how sanctimonious and prone to arguments-by-outrage morally-myopic people tend to be.
97 - Drake Von Starr
This article is extremely bias.
You are only focusing on the negative aspects of deviantart, and not looking at the much, much bigger picture. As an underaged user myself, how knows dozens of fellow underaged users on DevaintART, these supposed images you describe have never come up on my screen. I don't go searching for them and if you don't you won't find them. Just because a handful of underaged users happen to find this stuff, either on purpose or by accident doesn't mean that it's only DA that makes this happen. An unstable person could find graphic images quicker by searching in google.
The murder accusations are ridiculous! Just because a few murders are a member of DA doesn't mean that it's DA's fault, these members could also be logged on to a dozen of sites that OTHER murders use to. Just because they're murderer's doesn't mean DA drove them to doing it. The environment on DA isn't a murderous one, it's a communal one.
Let us put your accusation into perspective: ALL murders are human beings, therefore, using your logic, it means that most underaged people in society are mental unstable and have murderous tendencies. In any community, in any place on the planet, there will be those that have extreme views, there will be those that do unspeakable things, and those witness the same things. Does that mean that every person on the planet is going to do this: No.
Just because two murder cases happen to be linked through this vast online community, doesn't mean that deviantart is encouraging or somehow nurturing these murderous tendencies.
Art is art, and an art is the reason we are human beings, the reason why we are such advanced creatures. Deviantart is a website on the word wide web (which happens to allow many millions of people browse at once) that reminds us of this, and showcases people's talents. So what if people suck at art, it's their art and their feelings, on a page on the web. And just because I may see a macabre piece of work doesn't mean that I'm going to murder people. Some of the most famous pieces of art are macabre, it is, in itself, a category for art work.
Deviantart can't monitor every person's activities, and stop them from looking at possibly disturbing things, there is no power strong or weak on this planet that can stop that. Why criticise someone for not being able to do something NO ONE can do. It's ridiculous to even WANT to do that.
Deviantart is a wonderful place that nurtures people's abilities and talents, it's a place to expose yourself to a world otherwise unknown, a world of art and inspiration.
xoxo
D.V.S
98 - Dilys
Excuse me. My philosophy is that not only are you responsible for your life, but doing the best at this moment puts you in the best place for the next moment.
I am from Niger and also now am reading in English, give true I wrote the following sentence: "Rss feed the rss feed for airline tickets is at the following address."
:p Thanks in advance. Dilys.
99 - Concerned.
Leave it to good old Kit to take her disgruntledness and post an article marginally connecting two murders to deviantART based on their perpetrators' use of the website.
Having been involved in the same areas of the site with which the author was involved, and having been a member since 2001, I think that anyone reading this should do so with serious reservations. deviantART's current policies do not allow users under the age of 13 access to their site, at all. The site, as it stands, has about 15 million members, and since 2005 there have been no murders associated with its userbase, at least not that have been publicly tied to the site by the media. Two murderers out of 15 million members still makes this site have a lower incidence of violent crime resulting in death than the average population, by a great margin.
I've been involved with an organization monitoring the online activities of convicted and suspected pedophiles, and I can say, from my experience with that organization and with liaising information from that organization to deviantART, that dA has one of the best policies on the internet regarding their treatment of predation cases involving minors, and their deletion of child nudity and pornography from the site is one of their top priorities in etiquette administration. Contrast this with sites like Facebook, where cries fall on deaf ears - should we then assume that all facebook users will rape children?
The author of this article is known for putting very sensational spins on her words, and avoiding placing merit behind them unless it comes from the bible or the religious right. If you want to formulate an opinion about deviantART, join and look to the community, not to a disgruntled former employee.
100 - I-Rock-The-Skinnyz
I'm a member of deviant art and I have never been more horrified in my life.
101 - Heidi, Turning Winds
Whether the acts were connected to DA or not, it most definitely tell us one thing...the internet is not a safe place for kids, especially if parents are not aware of their activities online. Troubled teens become more troubled if they learn more negative stuff from the internet. It's really disturbing, to be honest.
102 - hunter devon
Your logic is presenting itself as flawed and biased. After reading your entire article, I have come to the conclusion that your logic is based on cause-and-effect such that if I look at an image of someone who has done gory movie make up art, I must be an ignorant rapist who has 98 gigabytes of child porn on my tablet. As a member of deviantart by the name of artismyaddiction ( who is also only fourteen) I can tell by experience 3 things
1: There is no connection between deviantART and these events.
2: You assume that because of the minority of such individuals is present, we all are as such.
3Your logic states that if I were a member of, say, tumblr, and I commited a crime, Tumblr MUST be in direct connection to said crime by hosting me as part of it's community. But that is the ONLY LOGICAL SULUTION. Right?
4: Since I am only forteen, and apperently older than you in maturity and logical reasoning, I can tell you that terminating devart would be punishing alot of aspiring and proffesional artists.
5:Perhaps instead of punishing so many good people to "stop the nonsense", a better way to help the world may be good. recycle, give to charity, volunteer for community projects. There you go.
103 - hunter devon
Meant five things but hit three. How proffesional. Oops...