Rape is exceedingly common in the BDSM scene. In fact, even the community’s own lobbying groups such as the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom—one of their board members doubled as FetLife’s community manager, by the way—admit to a 50% higher occurrence of consent violations among BDSM practitioners than the general populace. That’s nearly as bad as police officers, who statistically speaking are also twice as likely to be perpetrators of domestic violence. The BDSM scene has a self-delusional belief that they are “all about consent,” but in reality, they are at least as bad with sexual consent as everybody else, and likely a lot worse given their penchant for eroticizing abuse. Many women and Submissive-identified people within that community, including myself, had been saying this for a long time, but had been routinely ignored.
Even during the height of these national debates about “the BDSM community’s consent crisis,” the Consent Culture working groups were pitifully meek. They had collectively decided that “something must be done,” but what they chose to “do” was make a petition calling for the removal of the clause in FetLife’s Terms of Use that the site’s management was using as justification for censoring rape survivors. But as is often the case, when you must beg for something from a master, you find that they will not grant your request. Three years later, FetLife has still refused to change their policy and is still censoring rape survivors—unless those survivors use the Predator Alert Tool.
In October 2012, I realized that the root cause of the FetLife problem was simply that site management got to control what users saw when they browsed the site. But the Internet, which was made famous by mashups, allowed a unique opportunity to route around FetLife’s censorship in a way FetLife could not control. I wrote a simple mashup between a public Google Spreadsheet and FetLife that enabled anyone to report a negative experience with a FetLife member. With a mere 260 lines of JavaScript, that information could then be overlaid directly on FetLife.com.
With Predator Alert Tool for FetLife, the problem of FetLife’s censorship all but vanished: FetLife users could now warn other FetLife users about predatory behavior, and FetLife’s site management was powerless to stop it. Just a few weeks ago, we met a woman right here in Albuquerque who had used the tool to alert others about a local “Master” violating her consent.
Users of the tool then began asking for a similar capability on other sites, like OkCupid and Facebook. There are now seven variations of the Predator Alert Tool browser add-on, each designed to work with a particular social network or dating site. Importantly, none of these tools has been developed in collaboration with the social network in question. Most sites have refused to acknowledge the tool, despite inquiries from journalists and community members. Some sites are actively hostile, sending DMCA takedown notices and even threatening to ban Predator Alert Tool users. Meanwhile, the already overwhelming positive response from the user community continues to grow.
Predator Alert Tool arose directly from the needs of the community that it serves. It enabled the user community to do exactly what the authorities at FetLife didn’t want done, or what OkCupid and Facebook don’t want users thinking too critically about. And it accomplished this by just implementing that capability rather than waiting for permission to do so. Its impact was immediate and disruptive—on purpose. These characteristics are indicative of all direct action software development projects.
Today in 2015 the petition proposed by the “Consent Culture” working groups has still not achieved its goal of stopping FetLife from silencing rape survivors. Predator Alert Tool was able to accomplish that goal in one night of coding, with these 260 lines of code, three years ago.
Since Jeroen van der Klis of BizarreDesign and Bob Roos (not his real last name) of the RopeMarks brand have written about me on Facebook, I feel it’s time for me to write about my side of the story.
(Scroll down to read Jeroen & Bob’s texts about me and other additional information)
Jeroen I want to let you know that it isn’t personal that I’ve requested content removal. We always had friendly communication in the past. I’ve send you an email in which I’ve asked for all content depicting me to be removed from your websites and social media accounts, just like I have asked other people the same question. Me-Chiel, Kaskuyken and CarmineWorx have all removed the content immediately after I’ve asked them, they all worked with me to remove the content from their websites and social media accounts, without any problems.
After your first reply to my email you haven’t responded anymore, which ended the conversation about the content removal, even though I’ve asked you via email to remove the content again and again. Since you didn’t respond to my emails I’ve asked you to remove the content on Twitter by writing a comment under each tweet depicting me (Just like I have asked other accounts who share content depicting me to remove their tweets), which you have also ignored. That is why I started the process of reporting all tweets depicting me or referring to me. Which eventually led to Twitter blocking your account.
It’s important that you understand that there is not much else that I can do when an uploader refuses to remove the content. The only thing that is left for me to do is to report the content. Content that is online without my consent from the moment I first requested content removal by email or otherwise. After this request has been received and responded to, the uploader is aware that I have withdrawn my consent and therefore the content that is still on the internet is shared without my consent. The other option for me is to contact my lawyer which isn’t something that I want to do if I don’t think it is necessary.
Bob/RopeMarks, you write that there is a lot wrong with me, “more than I have let on to show”, you say that I am “too chicken” to confront my “collaborators” yet as you can see in my previous message to Jeroen is that I have contacted many people that I’ve “collaborated” with.
You say that there is a lot wrong with me, more than you thought at first, which shows that you were aware that I have had problems already when we first started collaborating. Before we made content together I have already been through some very harmfull events in my life and I was already in contact with people who have mislead me for years and who have turned out the be very harmfull to me during the time that we were “collaborating”. Results of these harmfull events were visible as seen in the scars on my body, they were visible to you and anyone else I’ve worked with and everyone who has seen the content that we have made. At the time I wasn’t aware of the way some of these people have negatively influenced me and I wasn’t aware of how far their abuse would go but I am fully aware of what has happened now.
All the signs of abuse were already there when we first started collaborating, yet you offered me a contract which basically stated that I give up my rights to you and to use the content for commerial purposes, without any financial compensation. During the time that we collaborated I believed that we were friends and we never spoke about the contract again. Making content for free for one or a few times doesn’t really strike me as odd but we have made a large amount of content, “as friends” content which you have been able to make money off for many years. The contract has many contradictons and doesn’t seem to be a legally binding document. I’ve also had contracts with some other producers who have removed the content depicting me after my request.
You were aware that I have wanted to build my own website from the beginning, in order to have more autonomity. I’ve come across a few people who have wanted to “help” me build my website but I sensed that they wanted to exploit me in some way. During the beginning of the covid era you offered to “help” me with my website as a friend and I accepted and trusted you. Just like I trusted you when making the extreme content that we did.
The result of this “help” was a website that, before anything else, had banners on it to all your websites. You made a website that was basically an extention of your RopeMarks websites. In the stories you have written about me on your websites and social media accounts you have refered to me as the RopeMarks house slave or other similar terms. As if Arienh was an extension of your brand. While my reason for having my own website was being able to do what I wanted with my stage name, you knew this. From the moment you started to “help” me you have made it seem like having a website was very difficult, you would help me with this, “as a friend”, the website would be on your server. You basically controlled the whole website instead of me. Yes you paid me a few hundred euros over the years when some content was sold but you never gave me full transparancy of the websites finances. You said you would “help” me but I have had no autonomy or control over www.arienh.com whatsoever.
My request to you, to remove the content we made, was different than the way I approached other people. This is because I’ve began with a request to you, to take down the website www.arienh.com on December the 20th, 2021. Which on January the 20th , 2022 you redirected to a page on Clipspool.com. (Now I know you have a clipspool account as well), then on 21st of January you redirected www.arienh.com to your website. Which I at first agreed to because I believed I had no other options. This all was way before I contacted anyone else about the removal of content depicting me. Since December the 20th, 2021 you have never once asked me, or anyone contacting you in my name, what had actually happened to me. You asked how I am doing but you haven’t asked why I left the scene or anything like that. You also wrote that I was “passive aggressive”, while I was being formal and straight to the point, which I had to be to get my point across.
In our whatsapp conversation at the time I can read that you have said that you can’t and won’t give me full transparancy of www.arienh.com ’s finances (you send me a few screenshots instead), you also wrote many reasons why you couldn’t transfer the domain yet. By then it was already May 2022. I’ve repeatedly said that it is possible to transfer a domain to someone else at any time, you said I had to wait for the domain to reach the end of the contract date, which as I could read on the internet wasn’t necessary and multiple real friends have adviced me on this matter as well. And it turned out that it wasn’t necessary at all when you finally transferred www.arienh.com to me on July the 10th, 2022, more than 7 months after my first message to you about www.arienh.com. I have downloaded our full whatsapp conversation, so I can read the exact dates.
Since I’ve gained control over my own website and with everything I had to do to gain control over my own domain in mind, I have created a website with the purpose of telling a bit of my story. Which I probably would not have done if I didn’t feel mistreated by some of the people that I have “collaborated” with. Nothing on my website relates directly to you or your brand, however it does now.
After the whatsapp conversation about www.arienh.com I’ve asked help from a lawyer to get the content depicting me removed from your websites and social media accounts, because I was sure you wouldn’t agree with removing the content if I requested this by myself. The situation concerning www.arienh.com has shown me that your main interest is making money off of the content and by doing so of off me and other women who have never asked you for any financial compensation in return.
I know you haven’t paid other models because you told me many times while “collaborating” that paying the models is not something that you do. I accepted this at the time believing we were friends. Knowing that a friend would remove anything refering to me from the internet if I’d ask them, I do not consider you my friend anymore nor do I see our previous relations as friendship. Seeing you as my friend so far has been a “misinterpretation of reality’’ indeed.
The only time when I have received some money from our collaboration, other than the few hundred euros I’ve earned from www.arienh.com over the years, was when we went to do a show at the tattoo convention in Germany, both of us received financial compensation for doing the show “@tattooconventionnewgeneration on Facebook”, October the 6th, 2019. During this show you hit me with a wooden cane while being completely suspended “for the show effect”, multiple times on the same spot and so hard that it left a permanent dent in my left upper leg. I’ve told you about this but you never once said that this was something you shouldn’t have done. In my opinion, hitting a dent is someone’s leg isn’t something you do just because you want to give a crowd something spectacular to see. I’m not saying that you did this on purpose but you never once said you might have made a mistake there, even though we were “friends”. I mentioned the dent in my leg to you once when Jeroen was present, we were at his atelier. I’ve send you the photos of the dent in my leg via Whatsapp as well and you acknowledged it was visible. I’d rather not have had the money, nor the dent in my leg.
My partner has requested “@tattooconventionnewgeneration on Facebook” to remove the photos they share from the show from Facebook. You haven’t removed the links to the redirection to these photos, that you shared from their Facebook account either. At first they were very understanding but somehow the photos are still online and there hasn’t been a response from the tattoo convention anymore.
My lawyer has contacted you about removing all content depicting me, as well as the stories you’ve made up about me. She contacted you on November the 15th, 2022. What you did was remove the content from your websites. Make your social media accounts private – the content depicting me is still online on these platforms, except Twitter.
You also didn’t contact SMRevenue/Shopmaker to end the affiliate programs with third parties who showed content depicting me that was shared from your websites. You even wrote to my lawyer that you don’t have control over what third parties are sharing on their websites. When I send an email to these websites to remove the content, they often say I have to contact you, Bob, if I want the content removed. Which I already have requested through my lawyer. However some websites actually do remove the content, when I ask them. I’ve been working on getting the content removed for the past year, something which you could’ve done in days. I’ve learned that it doesn’t take long for content to disappear from the internet, even though you have claimed in an email to my lawyer that it can take a long time for content to disappear because of my search engines cache. Which also isn’t true, because a removed image will change into an icon saying “this image has been removed”, or a variation of this, which will be gone in about a week after content has been removed.
You are aware that I have been raped, that I have been violated and that the videos of this experience have been shared all over the internet, yet you share my real name on social media, by doing so you are putting me in danger. Since you haven’t asked what has happened to me you aren’t aware what my concerns are based upon, nor if my behaviour is a healthy response to the situation I am in or not. At this time I am not at liberty to disclose the full extent of the situation but you are able to read enough about the matter on my website www.arienh.com just like anyone else, to understand that my behaviour of the last 1,5 years doesn’t spring out of nowhere. Since you are not a licensed psychiatrist I also advice you not to make assumptions about another person’s mental health. I also want you to know that I am the driving force behind all my interactions and those send in my name and that I have a large support system standing by me, privately and professionally.
I’ve preferred to have kept our communication private through my lawyer but since you’ve made claims about me so openly on Facebook I feel obligated to share my side of the story, which I have tried to avoid. It came to my attention that this isn’t the first dispute you have had with a former “model” that you have openly communicated about online. As you know, my lawyer has requested removal of all content depicting me as well as all other references to me, “Arienh”. Afterwards ending all communication. We can make this a slow process or just get it over with.
Kind regards,
Arienh Autumn
Emails with Jeroen and comment I wrote to Jeroen on Twitter.
“(Asked about his stance on pornography, in response to perceived endorsement of Hustler, who had tricked Chomsky into giving an interview for the magazine.)
Pornography is humiliation and degradation of women. It’s a disgraceful activity. I don’t want to be associated with it. Just take a look at the pictures. I mean, women are degraded as vulgar sex objects. That’s not what human beings are. I don’t even see anything to discuss.
(Interviewer: But didn’t performers choose to do the job and get paid?)
The fact that people agree to it and are paid, is about as convincing as the fact that we should be in favour of sweatshops in China, where women are locked into a factory and work fifteen hours a day, and then the factory burns down and they all die. Yeah, they were paid and they consented, but it doesn’t make me in favour of it, so that argument we can’t even talk about.
As for the fact that it’s some people’s erotica, well you know that’s their problem, doesn’t mean I have to contribute to it. If they get enjoyment out of humiliation of women, they have a problem, but it’s nothing I want to contribute to.
(Interviewer: How should we improve the production conditions of pornography?)
By eliminating degradation of women, that would improve it. Just like child abuse, you don’t want to make it better child abuse, you want to stop child abuse.
Suppose there’s a starving child in the slums, and you say “well, I’ll give you food if you’ll let me abuse you.” Suppose—well, there happen to be laws against child abuse, fortunately—but suppose someone were to give you an argument. Well, you know, after all a child’s starving otherwise, so you’re taking away their chance to get some food if you ban abuse. I mean, is that an argument?
The answer to that is stop the conditions in which the child is starving, and the same is true here. Eliminate the conditions in which women can’t get decent jobs, not permit abusive and destructive behaviour.”
