Difference between revisions of “Kiwi Farms”

On June 27, 2021, Near,<ref group=note>Formerly known as byuu.</ref> the developer of the popular SNES emulator higan,<ref>(https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/The-Silicon-Valley-quest-to-preserve-Stephen-12759775.php The Silicon Valley quest to preserve Stephen Hawking’s voice), ”San Fransisco Chronicle”</ref> took their own life after a 3-year-long harassment campaign by the site.<ref name=”USATNear”>Alia E. Dastagir (July 23, 2021). (https://ghostarchive.org/archive/g0kve “‘The internet is not a game. … This stuff really hurts.’ Respected developer who was bullied online dies by suicide.”). ”USA Today”.</ref><ref name=near>(https://twitter.com/marcan42/status/1409176583433179137 A message about Near from a mutual friend.) (https://docs.google.com/document/d/12pOhaaFh998B0kyc5Sm4IhlhIp1c9t5gDNTVVPaiJgI Google Doc of the situation.)</ref><ref name=nearkotaku>(https://kotaku.com/the-brilliant-snes-emulator-creator-known-as-near-has-d-1847182851 The Brilliant SNES Emulator Author Known As Near Has Died), Kotaku</ref><ref>(https://twitter.com/near_koukai Near’s Twitter account)</ref> The forums responded largely with mockery<ref>(https://archive.ph/Hn4Vk Thread The Great Twitter Meltdown of 2021 page 4) ”Kiwi Farms” (archived from 27 June 2021).</ref> and outright denial of the suicide in the first place,<ref>(https://archive.ph/dJdcU Null response regarding Byuu / Near) ”Kiwi Farms” (archived from 29 June 2021).</ref> even as repeated evidence came forward that Near indeed committed suicide. In response, the site got DDOSed for the next couple of days<ref>(https://archive.is/qy7TT Someone is currently paying money to DoS attack the forum). Archived from Kiwi Farms, 28 June 2021.</ref> and lost Dreamhost as its domain registrar, which led the site to move to Cloudflare for its registrar and reverse proxy services.<ref>(https://archive.is/bd359 kiwifarms.net whois lookup), ”who.is”, Archived on 28 July 2021.</ref> Null said there wasn’t enough evidence to conclude Near was dead, and said Near was trying to extort him.<ref>(https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/near-byuu-suicide “Near / Byuu Suicide”). KnowYourMeme.</ref> Near’s employer as well as a friend attested to the death by suicide.<ref name=”USATNear”/><ref>Jody Macgregor (June 28, 2021). (https://www.pcgamer.com/near-creator-of-the-higan-and-bsnes-emulators-has-died/ “Near, creator of the higan and bsnes emulators, has died”). ”PC Gamer”.</ref> Years later, Null made another post featured site-wide on Kiwi Farms under a title conceding: “Emulator developer Byuu is probably dead.” This was based on results from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, however Null said he didn’t “have any way to confirm it”.<ref>Null (April 4, 2024). (https://archive.ph/aFGx7#selection-5409.45-5409.90 “Emulator developer Byuu is probably dead.”) Kiwi Farms, via archive.today.</ref>

On June 27, 2021, Near,<ref group=note>Formerly known as byuu.</ref> the developer of the popular SNES emulator higan,<ref>(https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/The-Silicon-Valley-quest-to-preserve-Stephen-12759775.php The Silicon Valley quest to preserve Stephen Hawking’s voice), ”San Fransisco Chronicle”</ref> took their own life after a 3-year-long harassment campaign by the site.<ref name=”USATNear”>Alia E. Dastagir (July 23, 2021). (https://ghostarchive.org/archive/g0kve “‘The internet is not a game. … This stuff really hurts.’ Respected developer who was bullied online dies by suicide.”). ”USA Today”.</ref><ref name=near>(https://twitter.com/marcan42/status/1409176583433179137 A message about Near from a mutual friend.) (https://docs.google.com/document/d/12pOhaaFh998B0kyc5Sm4IhlhIp1c9t5gDNTVVPaiJgI Google Doc of the situation.)</ref><ref name=nearkotaku>(https://kotaku.com/the-brilliant-snes-emulator-creator-known-as-near-has-d-1847182851 The Brilliant SNES Emulator Author Known As Near Has Died), Kotaku</ref><ref>(https://twitter.com/near_koukai Near’s Twitter account)</ref> The forums responded largely with mockery<ref>(https://archive.ph/Hn4Vk Thread The Great Twitter Meltdown of 2021 page 4) ”Kiwi Farms” (archived from 27 June 2021).</ref> and outright denial of the suicide in the first place,<ref>(https://archive.ph/dJdcU Null response regarding Byuu / Near) ”Kiwi Farms” (archived from 29 June 2021).</ref> even as repeated evidence came forward that Near indeed committed suicide. In response, the site got DDOSed for the next couple of days<ref>(https://archive.is/qy7TT Someone is currently paying money to DoS attack the forum). Archived from Kiwi Farms, 28 June 2021.</ref> and lost Dreamhost as its domain registrar, which led the site to move to Cloudflare for its registrar and reverse proxy services.<ref>(https://archive.is/bd359 kiwifarms.net whois lookup), ”who.is”, Archived on 28 July 2021.</ref> Null said there wasn’t enough evidence to conclude Near was dead, and said Near was trying to extort him.<ref>(https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/near-byuu-suicide “Near / Byuu Suicide”). KnowYourMeme.</ref> Near’s employer as well as a friend attested to the death by suicide.<ref name=”USATNear”/><ref>Jody Macgregor (June 28, 2021). (https://www.pcgamer.com/near-creator-of-the-higan-and-bsnes-emulators-has-died/ “Near, creator of the higan and bsnes emulators, has died”). ”PC Gamer”.</ref> Years later, Null made another post featured site-wide on Kiwi Farms under a title conceding: “Emulator developer Byuu is probably dead.” This was based on results from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, however Null said he didn’t “have any way to confirm it”.<ref>Null (April 4, 2024). (https://archive.ph/aFGx7#selection-5409.45-5409.90 “Emulator developer Byuu is probably dead.”) Kiwi Farms, via archive.today.</ref>

===Genesis of the name===

===Genesis of the name===

The bird sheds a massive, disemboweling tear (pun intended).

Frogs, clowns, and swastikas Alt-right

Chuds

Fuentes, Benjamin, and Baked Alaska Taylor, Molyneux, and Spencer Bannon, Southern, and Yiannopoulos SF, TDS, TRS, 8chan, and /pol/

Rebuilding the Reich, one meme at a time

Buzzwords and dogwhistles

Kiwi Farms is an immensely creepy stalking forum run by manchild Joshua Conner Moon out of his mom’s house.⁽³⁾ The people who are stalked are what are known as “lolcows” to the site’s userbase or “exceptional individuals”.^{(note 1)} Think some of the Internet’s worst assholes and coalition of criminals^{(note 2)} projecting their frustration onto minorities – and now that you’re picturing GamerGate, think creepier.

Due to difficulties with enforcing anti-harmful speech legislation on the internet, there hasn’t been much legal action taken on Kiwi Farms, despite them being responsible for harming many people (directly and indirectly), costing them jobs and partners, exaggerating and spinning rumors, or even mentally abusing their victims to the point of suicide. In fact, the owners maintain that there is nothing illegal about the site, citing technicalities (we don’t harass people; our users do!) and phonebooks also distributing personal information (because sharing the address of this person we find weird is totally the same as a printed 411!);⁽⁵⁾ or just simply denying, downplaying, or justifying the activities that have taken place. No services are buying their lies, however, as KiwiFarms is struggling to find any web service company willing to do business with them ranging from PayPal to Cloudflare (which famously dropped the site in September of 2022, rendering it briefly offline altogether) to even Russia-based DDOS-Guard. Not even 8chan wants anything to do with the site owner.

In May 2023, Kiwi Farms was only accessible through the Tor network and a spam-filled Telegram chatroom.⁽⁶⁾⁽⁷⁾ As of January 2024, Kiwi Farms is accessible through kiwifarms.hk.⁽⁸⁾

Ableism, transphobia, and general shittiness(edit)

Critics of Kiwi Farms point out that the “Lolcows” who end up on the website are digitally stalked, harassed (by having rumors and smears posted about them), and doxed (including full names, birthdays, workplaces, personal social media accounts, and even street addresses and phone numbers). They’ll often dox family members, dig deep for social media accounts, and on rare occasions their targets’ Social Security numbers.^(10)(11) Hell, even people who are ideologically aligned to them like Mister Metokur get doxed.⁽¹²⁾

The forum was originally dedicated to monitoring the activities of a controversial individual called Christine Weston Chandler, commonly known as “Chris-chan”. She is an autistic trans woman and a heavily-documented figure online best known as the creator of “Sonichu”, a crossover between Sonic the Hedgehog and Pikachu.⁽¹³⁾ She was later arrested for having sex with her mother using evidence that had been posted on Kiwi Farms,⁽¹⁴⁾ but was later released by court order.⁽¹⁵⁾

Many “Lolcows” on the forum are (or in most cases, are simply accused of being) autistic, and Kiwi Farms derogatorily labels these people as “spergs” (after Asperger’s syndrome). Transgender “Lolcows” are described as the pejorative “troons” or “trannies”, often end up in the “Rat Kings” or “Stinkditch” categories, and are often portrayed as either faking their dysphoria or being mentally unstable.⁽¹⁶⁾ Most “cows” are described as what are known as “exceptional individuals”, coined after a post filter was installed to replace the word “retards”. On its now-banned Twitter account, Kiwi Farms described its purpose as “gossip and exploitation of the mentally handicapped for amusement purposes”.⁽¹⁷⁾ Furthermore, the sign-up page for the site once came with a disclaimer saying “autistics will be laughed at. Trannies will be misgendered. People will try to find where you live.”⁽¹⁸⁾ Due to its offensive content, Kiwi Farms is arguably a hate speech website.

Kiwi Farms’ harassment goes beyond gender and neurological minorities. They target asexual people, despite them not being the most common target of abuse, having a thread on AVEN. The site’s members will also target people with medical blogs (primarily women) by accusing them of exaggerating or even faking their illnesses. They target beauty gurus, artists, and cosplayers, and regularly engage in fat shaming and looks discrimination. There is rarely a thread that doesn’t contain someone posting slurs.

Posters tend to lean right politically. Many posters are far-right, and some are involved with 4chan and Encyclopædia Dramatica. They also tend to be white males in their 20’s and 30’s, and much like their dear leader, they’re also antisemitic.⁽¹⁹⁾ Despite the site’s rampant transphobia, a sizable minority of its users are trans people who love to point out how any trans person they don’t like isn’t really trans. On the other end, the site is also popular with TERFs as a means of receiving personal information on their targets. Much the same, there’s a minority of people on the site who are Tankies or Nazbols.

According to Alexa, Kiwi Farms receives over a million monthly sessions.⁽²⁰⁾

Kiwi Farms was temporarily shut down on January 24, 2017 due to the owner’s family getting harassed.⁽²¹⁾ It was reopened three weeks later under the same management without fanfare, leading many to assume it was still down.

On August 5, 2022, a trans YouTuber named Keffals was swatted, and when she tried to take refuge in a hotel, she was soon doxed by users on Kiwi Farms who were able to cross-reference a picture of the hotel’s bedding with other hotels in the region. She was doxxed yet again after fleeing to the US by a member hacking into her Uber account. Sometime later, Marjorie Taylor Greene of all people was swatted by someone claiming to be from Kiwi Farms, and now even she wants the website shut down (but not without scapegoating Democrats in the process, blaming the situation on the perceived lawlessness the Dems want in the country).⁽²²⁾ While having been subject to intense public pressure especially after these events, Cloudflare felt the escalating violent threats in the site were too much for it to stomach (despite dawdling for years to do anything) and pulled the plug for support in September 2022.⁽²³⁾ KiwiFarms then tried to turn to Russian-based DDOS-Guard, but that too wasn’t willing to provide for such an intensely toxic asset, so it also terminated its services, in surprisingly much snappier time than CloudFlare.⁽²⁴⁾ Shortly after, they sought refuge with VanwaTech, a web hosting company known for willingly accepting far-right and extremist webshite content. VanwaTech founder Nicholas Lim defiantly stated, “We maintain a firm commitment to our role as a neutral provider of internet services and not an internet censor.”⁽²⁵⁾

In mid September 2022, Kiwi Farms was PWNED by hackers, with Moon posting a warning that emails may be leaked and passwords compromised.⁽²⁶⁾ Since the Keffals incident, Kiwi Farms was repeatedly kicked off various hosts,⁽²⁷⁾ suffered multiple DDOS attacks and ISP blacklistings,⁽²⁸⁾ and had their SSL certificate revoked.⁽²⁹⁾ In general, Moon had a tough time keeping the forum in operation, particularly on the clearnet. Of course, Moon didn’t blame his actions or the illegal harassment activity spawning from his forum for these troubles; instead he blamed “terroristic harassment” from “trannies”.^(6)(27)

On January 25, 2023, Youtuber TomDark had a debate with Moon & Destiny, where Moon said that he was going to appeal the court case. He also claimed that he had proof that Cloudflare is protecting multiple websites that are linked to ISIS and that those websites are spreading ISIS propaganda, as well as Cloudflare protecting sites that host animal torture.⁽³⁰⁾

On 13th December 2023, An individual named Alameen Karim Merali claimed responsibility for the suspension of the Kiwi Farms domain after reporting it to Epik. Following the suspension, Epik claimed that they were forced by a court order to put the domain on a client hold and that the site hosted Child Pornography after supposedly having blurred photos of Alameen posted on their Twitter. Epik later deleted their Tweets and retracted their statements regarding this and Kiwi Farms is still looking to sue Epik over this.

Suicides(edit)

At least three people have committed suicide after being featured on Kiwi Farms.⁽³¹⁾ Unsurprisingly, most of the site’s users proceeded to mock said suicides, and downplayed the site’s involvement.^{(9)(32)(21)(33)}

On June 27, 2021, Near,^{(note 3)} the developer of the popular SNES emulator higan,⁽³⁴⁾ took their own life after a 3-year-long harassment campaign by the site.^{(35)(36)(37)(38)} The forums responded largely with mockery⁽³⁹⁾ and outright denial of the suicide in the first place,⁽⁴⁰⁾ even as repeated evidence came forward that Near indeed committed suicide. In response, the site got DDOSed for the next couple of days⁽⁴¹⁾ and lost Dreamhost as its domain registrar, which led the site to move to Cloudflare for its registrar and reverse proxy services.⁽⁴²⁾ Null said there wasn’t enough evidence to conclude Near was dead, and said Near was trying to extort him.⁽⁴³⁾ Near’s employer as well as a friend attested to the death by suicide.^(35)(44) Years later, Null made another post featured site-wide on Kiwi Farms under a title conceding: “Emulator developer Byuu is probably dead.” This was based on results from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, however Null said he didn’t “have any way to confirm it”.⁽⁴⁵⁾

Links between prejudice and child sexual abuse(edit)

Kiwi Farms and its users may sometimes claim to be interested in child protection, which may bear out in some individual cases (maybe not others, such as when the site’s users allegedly got a 13-year old boy to pose as a 19-year old to sext an adult Chris-chan⁽⁹⁾). The downstream effects of discriminatory attitudes can be harmful to children in ways one may not expect. Those who study child protection draw links between discrimination and child sexual abuse, i.e. it can be a key factor for creating environments conducive to child sexual abuse. Devaluation of children with disabilities isolates them, leaving them more vulnerable to exploitation.⁽⁴⁶⁾ It’s similarly plausible that fostering attitudes of anti-LGBT prejudice makes child sexual abuse more likely because young people who are LGBT or are so-perceived will face relative isolation or family expulsion leading to homelessness, and may even become dependent on abusers as a result.^(47)(48) Given that Kiwi Farms also finds fat people to be lolcows, keep in mind people with a history of child abuse victimization are more inclined to disordered eating;⁽⁴⁹⁾ there is a direct relationship between childhood sexual abuse experiences, psychological distress, binge eating, and body shame.⁽⁵⁰⁾ Kiwi Farms may not themselves be anywhere near culpable for the scale of these problems overall, but neither does any snowflake in an avalanche ever feel responsible.

Genesis of the name(edit)

The name “Kiwi Farms” fortunately has nothing to do with kiwi birds, kiwifruit, or people from New Zealand, where it has been blocked since March 2019 for providing torrents of the Christchurch shooter’s uncensored livestream and manifesto.⁽⁵¹⁾ In fact, the forum was originally known as the “CWCki Forums”. (The CWCki, pronounced like ‘Quickie’, is a wiki dedicated to monitoring the aforementioned Christine Chandler. It was once hosted under Kiwi Farms, but broke away due to Kiwi Farms’s instability.) The site was christened “Kiwi Farms” to mock someone with a speech impediment saying the original name, struggling with its unintuitive pronunciation.⁽⁵²⁾

Joshua Conner Moon(edit)

Born on December 9, 1992,⁽⁵⁵⁾ Joshua Conner Moon is known as “Null” on the website and is its administrator.⁽⁵⁶⁾

Views(edit)

• He is loosely associated with the alt-right.
• Moon supports Trump, referred to Obama as “The Nigger in chief”,^(57)(58) and believes in the racist and rank white genocide conspiracy theory.^(59)(60)
• He thinks feminism ruins Western culture and says the word “cuck” a lot, probably because it rolls off the tongue well. And the company he keeps is overtly racist and spouts about “white genocide” and wanting to destroy feminism with fire.⁽⁶¹⁾
• He has posted that Muslims and refugees need to be killed.^(62)(63)
• He is also an anti-semite.^(64)(65)
• He’s pro-Julian Assange, saying he would rather be set on fire by ISIS than deal with the UK government in reference to Assange’s arrest.⁽⁶⁶⁾
• Moon has a strong anti-journalist sentiment. When contacted by a NBC investigator, his only response was “The press are scum”.⁽⁶⁷⁾

Runs in the family(edit)

His own mom was a Kiwi member^(68)(69) and has been in trouble with the police.⁽⁷⁰⁾ She also worked for Keller Williams as a realtor⁽⁷¹⁾ until she was fired when her activity on Kiwi Farms was seemingly exposed.⁽⁷²⁾

Banned(edit)

Pissed at us(edit)

Kiwi Farms has a thread “discussing” RationalWiki, which it describes as a “whiny hugbox for spergs and a clusterfuck of never ending drama on a rapidly declining website”. Cynical later helpfully labeled the statement as “sarcasm”, though it’s not clear what part of the statement is supposed to be “sarcastic”, especially since he continued to insult us.

Kiwi Farms explainers and free speech defenders(edit)

Jesse Singal(edit)

Podcaster Jesse Singal has long been known for his focus on transgender issues.⁽⁷⁷⁾ His behavior has been called “unprofessional, to say the least”,⁽⁷⁸⁾ and he has been accused of “activism against the trans rights movement.”⁽⁷⁹⁾

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Singal has expressed concern when he believes Kiwi Farms has been negatively misrepresented. In September 2023, he tweeted about a Washington Post article⁽¹⁰⁾ on Kiwi Farms:

There’s nothing wrong with pointing out how crazy Kiwi Farms can get, but this is so factually challenged and tilts so heavily toward a certain whitewashed activist account…⁽⁸⁰⁾

And a year earlier, Singal engaged in whataboutism on behalf of Kiwi Farms:

The reporting on Kiwifarms continues to be abysmal. I have no doubt the site harassed Fong-Jones, but to leave out the fact that Trans Lifeline’s old leadership IN FACT EMBEZZLED HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS FROM THE ORGANIZATION is inexcusable.⁽⁸¹⁾

Electronic Frontier Foundation(edit)

The Electronic Frontier Foundation protested actions taken against Kiwi Farms by the Tier 1 (Internet backbone) provider Hurricane, on the grounds that although Kiwi Farms enables doxxing, harassment, and abuse, it should be allowed to do so, after which perpetrators of any crimes related to the doxxing, harassment, and abuse should be prosecuted:

If the site in question were Reddit, or Planned Parenthood, or even EFF, the internet would be up in arms. It is not, and it’s not hard to see why. The affected site is an almost universally despised forum for hateful speech and planning vicious attacks on vulnerable people: Kiwi Farms. For many, the natural response is to declare good riddance to bad rubbish—and understandably so.

At EFF, our mission and history requires us to look at the bigger picture, and sound the alarm about the risks even when the facts are horrific.

That means we need to say it even if it’s not comfortable: Hurricane Electric is wrong here. It gives us no joy to call Hurricane on this, not least because many will perceive it as an implicit defense of the KF site. It is not. A site that provides a forum for gamifying abuse and doxxing, whose users have celebrated on its pages the IRL deaths of the targets of their harassment campaigns, deserves no sympathy. We fully support criminal and civil liability for those who abuse and harass others.⁽⁸²⁾

Transgender journalist Evan Urquhart responded to the free speech arguments, pointing out that a major effect of the harassment enabled by Kiwi Farms was to prevent others from engaging in free speech:

The debate over Kiwi Farms has centered on free speech, and that’s appropriate. All people deserve the right to express their views. This famously includes hateful views, but it also includes views like advocacy on behalf of trans or women’s rights, as well as “views” that consist of simply sharing one’s life and experiences as a trans, disabled, or autistic person. Kiwi Farms’ whole reason for being has been to suppress the freedom of those they disagree with. Their users didn’t merely express themselves in hateful ways, but took action, often criminal action, to silence others. That’s why these online hooligans should never be allowed to wrap themselves in the free speech mantle. Free speech can thrive as long as Kiwi Farms can’t.⁽⁸³⁾

Heterodorx(edit)

The most enthusiastic defenders of Kiwi Farms on the grounds of free speech is a podcast called Heterodorx hosted by Nina Paley and Corinna Cohn. They interviewed Joshua Moon for their podcast, and in their description of the episode lamented Kiwi Farms’ situation:

…who expected “the gossip site that makes fun of troons” to be the straw to break the Internet’s backbone? And why have the individuals and organizations who once stood against censorship lost their own.⁽⁸⁴⁾

Nina Paley and Gender Wars Playing Cards(edit)

Separately from Cohn, Paley has illustrated and published a collection of playing cards called “Gender Wars.”⁽⁸⁵⁾ The deck represents the “gender critical,” whom Paley considers allies, in the red suits. Paley’s opponents, called “transactivists,” are represented by the black suits, including “mass murderer Dana Rivers.” The red suit allies include Jesse Singal, J. K. Rowling, Matt Walsh, and Kiwi Farms. The description of the Kiwi Farms card on the Heterodorx website reads:

A holdout from the free, wild-west internet-forum era, Kiwi Farms is the most censored site in the world. Its users stalk/document the activities of lolcows, such as notorious trans cartoonist Chris-Chan. Denounced as a doxxing site, it might nonetheless be the last stand for free expression online.

It’s probably indicative of how little concern Paley has for Kiwi Farms’ targets, or the reality of Kiwi Farms’ impact, that she represents the “LOLCOW” on the card as stupidly grinning, rather than in anguish, with a noose around its neck. But perhaps that would not be as cute or funny as the fans of Gender Wars Cards would like.

Fans of Gender Wars Playing Cards include Pamela Paresky,⁽⁸⁶⁾ Carole Hooven,⁽⁸⁷⁾ Jordan Peterson,⁽⁸⁸⁾ Mumsnet,⁽⁸⁹⁾ and J. K. Rowling.⁽⁹⁰⁾

1776 Solutions LLC(edit)

Kiwi Farms is operated by a company “1776 Solutions” LLC owned by Joshua Moon.^(91)(92) The company is registered in Wyoming, US and its registrant agent is Northwest Registered Agent Service,⁽⁹³⁾ which has been investigated for facilitating shady business dealings.⁽⁹⁴⁾ Northwest Registered Agent Service are also the registered agent for Mankind Publishing House LLC (owned by Emil Kirkegaard) who publish the white supremacist journal Mankind Quarterly. Moon previously named his company “Final Solutions” based on the Nazi policy of exterminating Jews.⁽⁹⁵⁾

See also(edit)

External links(edit)

References(edit)