On which platform can you easily find videos in which monkeys are tortured? YouTube, Facebook or Telegram? The answer is simple: everywhere. Behind this is an international network of sadists and animal haters: the “Monkey Haters”.
Lucy Kapetanich had to learn that the hard way. Kapetanich, a former dancer and erotic model, liked to relax after work by watching animal videos – sometimes of cute baby monkeys. But the YouTube algorithm suddenly throws her into the world of tortured monkeys and animal abusers. The BBC reported extensively on her story.
Baths, dresses and diapers
The first videos that the then 55-year-old showed on YouTube are harmless compared to later videos. Monkeys dressed in baby clothes. Monkeys being bathed and scrubbed with maybe a little too much harshness. Cute baby monkeys wearing diapers that might be a little too tight. The mother of the (almost exclusively) cynomolgus monkeys is never seen.
What’s troubling about these movies isn’t necessarily the content, it’s the sheer size of it. Tons of «cute baby monkey xy» videos can be found on the platform. And they get a lot of clicks: many of them get around 10,000 views. Through advertising revenue, the creators (the videos almost exclusively feature female voices) earn more than $ 200 on a video – the monthly salary in Indonesia, where they usually come from, is around $ 800.
It doesn’t take long for the Kapetanich algorithm to show harder videos. A monkey is hit. Another splashed water in his face for no apparent reason. For the American, this is clearly animal cruelty, which would be against YouTube’s policy. She reports the videos, but nothing changes.
She soon sees the first torture video on YouTube and is horrified. She creates her own channel, “Mad Monkey Mayhem”, on which she wants to draw attention to the topic. With moderate success.
Telegram abyss
Kapetanich teams up with Yardfish YouTuber Dave Gooptar to look behind the monkey abuse system. Nearly two years ago, Gooptar posted YouTube videos about his research on the monkey torture ring in Indonesia. Kapetanich and Yardfish note that the YouTube videos often imply that you can find harder, nastier scenes on the Telegram messaging platform.
In January 2022, Kapetanich even received an email from someone active in the “Monkey Hater” scene on Telegram. The man with the pseudonym “Torture King” invites you to one of the biggest MH channels: “Ape Cage”. However, he does not want others to know about his hobby:
Apparently a normal person. Torture King’s real name is Mike McCartney and he lives in Virginia, USA. At home he hung flags with Nazi symbols. All of his teeth are missing from his heroin addiction years ago. For nearly two decades he was part of one of the largest biker gangs in the country and served time in prison.
What drives such a person to be an active member of the MH community? It was a YouTube video of the owner holding the bottle to the monkey and then pulling it away. “I had to smile a little.”
He too was soon invited to Telegram. He stayed there not only for fun, but also for financial reasons: he downloaded videos from YouTube (at the time, YouTube was not so strict with its guidelines and allowed animal cruelty more often) and then sold them in the chat group.
Bloody is the appropriate description. Kapetanich finds out how gory it is when she joins the “Ape Cage” channel. One of the most viewed videos is called “Monkey in a blender”. No further explanation is needed here.
From customers and VO
The video was commissioned by the user “Sadistic”. She is a then 46-year-old grandmother from Alabama. She lives in a trailer, real name is Stacey Storey and works at a gas station as a saleswoman. But where did she get the video?
As with all productions of this gruesome variety, someone is behind the camera who gets hold of the monkeys, tortures them and, in extreme cases (which is not uncommon), kills them. This is called VO, short for Video Operator. Unlike the YouTube creators, it is almost exclusively men who devote themselves to brutality.
A video of such a VO costs $200. Good money because all you have to do is abuse a baby Javanese monkey for five minutes and finally kill it. The hard part for clients is finding someone ruthless enough to do it. “Sadistic” search for such a VO was successful: the origin of the mixer video – and hundreds of no less bad.
However, this VO is careless. Upon closer inspection of his films, Kapetanich and Gooptar repeatedly uncover clues to the man’s location and identity. Eventually they discover a moped in the background, complete with license plate.
The two inform the BBC, which has been guiding them in their hunt for the animal abusers for some time, who informs an Indonesian animal protection organization, which in turn contacts the local police. The man in question is already known to the authorities: he is said to have sold protected species.
At night, the police strike on the island of Java: the man named Asep Yadi Nurul Hikmah is caught in a market and arrested. He’s carrying a box of baby monkeys. During a search of his home, authorities find the blender and a red drill used to do bad things in other videos.
However, Hikmah is just one of many VOs – albeit arguably the most brutal.
Similar to pedophile ring
After Kapetanich’s tip results in a successful arrest, the FBI contacts her. She gives the authority all the information she has collected so far. These end up on the desk of Special Agent Paul Wolpert.
At first he doesn’t quite understand: why should he, who otherwise picks up child abuse gangs, now have to deal with a network of animal abusers? But the deeper he reads, the more he notices the parallels:
Unlike child pornography, possession of animal cruelty videos is not necessarily illegal in the United States. However, you can get up to seven years in prison for distributing it. So Wolpert goes looking for clues.
It’s not hard for him though – the user “Sadistic” made the payments for the videos through Cashapp (the American equivalent of Twint). There she is registered with her real name. The other members of “Ape Cage” are disproportionately carefree.
When it’s not about monkeys, or “tree rats” as they’re called in the MH community, they talk openly about their lives, their kids, their jobs. “Torture King”, who is respected in the group for his actions and activity, once instilled in the group that you should trust each other and for this send real photos of yourself and your own name in the chat. And people did.
“Absolutely idiotic,” says Wolpert. When questioned by the FBI, the “Torture King” stated that he requested this information to learn more about the identities of MH members. It is not clear for what purpose he did this exactly. He claims he wanted to “destroy the group from within”, but those involved in the case doubt that. He now faces up to seven years in prison.
Outraged monkey haters
After the BBC report appeared on Monday (and the accompanying documentary, which lasted more than 50 minutes), the monkey haters also commented on it in their Telegram channels. Your criticism speaks for itself:
Another user is disturbed that the report chose the wrong monkeys – one should have taken his favorite “Gollum”, who was tortured much more blatantly. User “Maccy Macaque”, on the other hand, sees the problem not in the selected animal, but in humans:
What a boring thing.”
Telegram itself refuses to take action against such groups. You are committed to online anonymity and fundamental human rights such as freedom of expression. It is therefore not possible to proactively moderate chat channels.
“Monkey cage” no longer exists. Instead, more and more new groups like this are appearing; but also disappear. An interplay that will probably continue indefinitely.
And on YouTube? Torture is no more, but the “cute baby monkey xy” videos are still around. And the comments on it haven’t changed either:
Soource :Watson
I am Amelia James, a passionate journalist with a deep-rooted interest in current affairs. I have more than five years of experience in the media industry, working both as an author and editor for 24 Instant News. My main focus lies in international news, particularly regional conflicts and political issues around the world.
