Free to say it not, not free from consequence: Reddit Troll Violentacrez Exposed by Gawker’s Adrien Chen
“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.
[…]And with Jailbait, Violentacrez decided to create a safe space for people sexually attracted to underage girls to share their photo stashes. I would call these people pedophiles; the Jailbait subreddit called them “ephebophiles.” Jailbait was the online equivalent of systematized street harassment. Users posted snapshots of tween and teenage girls, often in bikinis and skirts. Many of these were lifted from their Facebook accounts and thrown in front of Jailbait’s 20,000 horny subscribers.
[…]Some of the sections Violentacrez created or moderated were called:
- Chokeabitch
- Niggerjailbait
- Rapebait
- Hitler
- Jewmerica
- Misogyny
- Incest
You can look those up on Reddit and visit them if you’d like to ruin your day, but the content is self-explanatory.
[…]“My wife is disabled. I got a home and a mortgage, and if this hits the fan, I believe this will affect negatively on my employment,” he said. “I do my job, go home watch TV, and go on the internet. I just like riling people up in my spare time.”
source: Unmasking Reddit’s Violentacrez, The Biggest Troll on the Web.
He gains enjoyment and status by being a racist, sexist, lecherous creep. He was legend among redditors. Nothing illegal about that, but there is something wrong with him not expecting there to be any cost for it. This is why people say they have some begrudging respect for overt bigots. They are proud to face the people they hate and embrace the cultural fallout and isolation that comes with his stance. Although fouled by ignorance, there is a willingness to accept the consequences of their belief that people can appreciate. He had not even that courage.
Note: Just like racism, the whole family is complicit. It’s a micro-cultural thing. It’s not a “it’s just dad’s b.s. thing” it’s a “it’s dad and the whole family is fine with dad’s b.s.” thing.