Kickstarter Bans ‘Seduction Guides' After Pickup Artist Ruckus

LOS ANGELES—Kickstarter today apologized for not canceling a campaign by a pickup artist fellow named Ken Hoinsky who was raising funds to make a book of pickup advice titled “Above the Game,” based on his supposed skills. Pickup artistry is a boring if stubbornly eternal subject that in this case veered way off course when a blogger named Casey Malone posted a rather pointed critique of both Hoinsky and his methodology—“He’s writing a book about how to sexually assault women”—reposting sections from Reddit, where Hoinsky had apparently already posted much of his book. Suffice to say, after Malone’s rant, titled “This is not fucking harmless,” was posted two days ago, the shit hit the proverbial fan. Kickstarter was getting kicked in the nuts, and after more than a day of that decided enough was enough, and issued the apology. Only, the apology is not going over very well in some quarters. Coming after Hoinsky’s campaign had already ended, during which he raised more than $16,000, but well after the company had been informed of the insulting nature of many of Hoinsky’s methods, it came off as ineffectual and feeble. Wired, for one, accused Kickstarter of trying to smooth over an issue that will continue to rear its ugly until clear and concise guidelines are established. “If Kickstarter wants to acts as a defender of pure free speech, then it should stick by projects they approve, even if they are ‘abhorrent,’” wrote Aaron Colter for Wired. “If it want to define what it will and won’t allow, that’s the company’s prerogative as well. But the guidelines that prohibit ‘hate speech’ and ‘offensive material’ remain vague both in their definition and enforcement, and as it stands attention and outrage sometimes seem to determine whether a Kickstarter is deemed unacceptable (see also: Tentacle Bento) rather than the nature of content itself when the project is submitted.” That seems like sound advice on its face—though we really don’t have that much sympathy for a crowd-funding platform that eschews porn, which is our bailiwick, after all—but we do have to agree that Kickstarter still seems a tad clueless, even post-We Were Wrong apology. Yes, Kickstarter is donating $25,000 to an anti-domestic violence group called RAINN, but it also announced that as a result of this incident it is “prohibiting ‘seduction guides,’ or anything similar, effective immediately.” That seems extreme. There are seduction guides and there are seduction guides, and not all of them advise men to “force her to rebuff your advances” and to “pull out your cock and put her hand on it” without permission, the way Hoinsky did. At least we assume they don't. If men want to learn that sort of stuff, all they have to do is watch more porn! (That's a joke.)