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Man photographed as baby on 'Nevermind' cover sues Nirvana, alleging child pornography


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Seeing as how he happily did a recreation of the photo in 2016 and even offered to take off his clothes for it makes me feel like this guy is, uh, just swimming after a dollar... ha...

 

jcela_092116a_003.jpg?quality=90&strip=a
NYPOST.COM

The naked swimming baby from the cover of the groundbreaking Nirvana album “Nevermind” re-enacted the image for the record’s 25th anniversary — this time wearing clothes. Spencer...

 

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"Defendants intentionally commercially marketed Spencer's child pornography and leveraged the shocking nature of his image to promote themselves and their music at his expense," reads the lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court's central district of California and obtained by Variety. "Defendants used child pornography depicting Spencer as an essential element of a record promotion scheme commonly utilized in the music industry to get attention, wherein album covers posed children in a sexually provocative manner to gain notoriety, drive sales, and garner media attention, and critical reviews."

A commonly utilized scheme to sell records and get good reviews...kiddie porn...

 

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I can't remember who said this, but it was either a congressman or a SCOTUS judge... but they were reviewing some case of whether something was or wasn't determined to be 'pornography.' Anyway, the line they gave was something like "I can't define what it is, but I know it when I see it."

 

I feel like that applies to the Nevermind cover. A naked baby is not pornography. 

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5 minutes ago, CayceG said:

I can't remember who said this, but it was either a congressman or a SCOTUS judge... but they were reviewing some case of whether something was or wasn't determined to be 'pornography.' Anyway, the line they gave was something like "I can't define what it is, but I know it when I see it."

 

I feel like that applies to the Nevermind cover. A naked baby is not pornography. 

Justice Potter Stewart

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He's also suing literally ANYONE involved in Nirvana and/or Nevermind for $150k each if I'm reading this correctly. This includes their first drummer who did not play on Nevermind. Also the photographer who clearly made a deal with his parents and paid them $200. 

 

Yup, working sucks bro, most of us know this. 

 

 

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His reasoning is stupid but I can't really blame him for wanting a piece of the pie. DGC made a lot of money off of his image with T-shirts and other merchandise. Ideally he SHOULD be getting sort of royalties for it, but I understand that legally DGC doesn't owe him anything. Sounds like a shitty deal that he was made before he had any autonomy over his own image and body.

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1 hour ago, Komusha said:

His reasoning is stupid but I can't really blame him for wanting a piece of the pie. DGC made a lot of money off of his image with T-shirts and other merchandise. Ideally he SHOULD be getting sort of royalties for it, but I understand that legally DGC doesn't owe him anything. Sounds like a shitty deal that he was made before he had any autonomy over his own image and body.

 

This. But also: Nobody knew that album was going to blow up and make a few people extremely rich. At the time they could barely afford the $200 they paid him. His parents should have worked something into a contract.

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31 minutes ago, ThreePi said:

Largely unrelated, but looking at these pics makes me cringe in pain. I am incredibly bothered by getting any water in my eyes much less chlorinated pool water. I'm generally really careful to avoid any water streaming into my eyes while showering.

If you get a chance to swim in a saltwater pool do it. Just a hint of salt nothing nearly as bad as the ocean. So nice.

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4 hours ago, Komusha said:

His reasoning is stupid but I can't really blame him for wanting a piece of the pie. DGC made a lot of money off of his image with T-shirts and other merchandise. Ideally he SHOULD be getting sort of royalties for it, but I understand that legally DGC doesn't owe him anything. Sounds like a shitty deal that he was made before he had any autonomy over his own image and body.

 

I mean they never really made any money off his image. They made money off an image associated with a band/album that was hugely popular that happens to include this particular baby on it. It’s not like he did some amazing job or even looked special or anything, it’s just a picture of a fucking baby. Nothing would have changed if the image was of any other generic baby they could have used for this. 

 

I do appreciate how fucking weird he made this though!

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5 hours ago, Komusha said:

His reasoning is stupid but I can't really blame him for wanting a piece of the pie. DGC made a lot of money off of his image with T-shirts and other merchandise. Ideally he SHOULD be getting sort of royalties for it, but I understand that legally DGC doesn't owe him anything. Sounds like a shitty deal that he was made before he had any autonomy over his own image and body.

Good points and I agree. I still think he's an idiot. I feel like I need to repost his reasoning for the lawsuit in case anybody didn't read the article. 

"As a result, Elden "has been and will continue to suffer personal injury" and "permanent harm," including "extreme and permanent emotional distress with physical manifestations, interference with his normal development and educational progress, lifelong loss of income earning capacity, loss of past and future wages, past and future expenses for medical and psychological treatment, loss of enjoyment of life, and other losses," the suit stated."  

None of that is caused by a photograph of a baby. His parents should have stopped him years ago from obsessing over a photo and make something of his life. 

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8 hours ago, stepee said:

 

I mean they never really made any money off his image. They made money off an image associated with a band/album that was hugely popular that happens to include this particular baby on it. It’s not like he did some amazing job or even looked special or anything, it’s just a picture of a fucking baby. Nothing would have changed if the image was of any other generic baby they could have used for this. 

 

I do appreciate how fucking weird he made this though!

it's probably the most iconic album cover in the last 30 years, and is probably on more t-shirts than albums sold at this point. I don't care if the dude gets paid or not, but plenty of people made money off of his likeness. 

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2 hours ago, Iculus said:

it's probably the most iconic album cover in the last 30 years, and is probably on more t-shirts than albums sold at this point. I don't care if the dude gets paid or not, but plenty of people made money off of his likeness. 

 

But did they buy the t-shirt because the baby was on it or because they liked the album? I figure it's probably the latter.

It kind of goes with what @GeneticBlueprint said. Nirvana basically was considered an indie band before Nevermind came out, and paying $200 to get parents permission to take a picture of the baby was probably pretty generous for the band at the time. It's only after the popularity of the album exploded that one could claim they are making money off his image (but again most people are buying the album for the music not the baby) but if you didn't see the album becoming popular you probably should blame your parents for not cutting a lucrative deal in which case the band would probably say forget it and come up with another idea for an album cover.

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12 hours ago, DarkStar189 said:

Good points and I agree. I still think he's an idiot. I feel like I need to repost his reasoning for the lawsuit in case anybody didn't read the article. 

"As a result, Elden "has been and will continue to suffer personal injury" and "permanent harm," including "extreme and permanent emotional distress with physical manifestations, interference with his normal development and educational progress, lifelong loss of income earning capacity, loss of past and future wages, past and future expenses for medical and psychological treatment, loss of enjoyment of life, and other losses," the suit stated."  

None of that is caused by a photograph of a baby. His parents should have stopped him years ago from obsessing over a photo and make something of his life. 

Let me translate:

 

"Elden is a fuckup who thought being on a cover as a baby, one single time ever, would make him a rich artist. He is very disappointed life didn't go as planned. Nirvana must pay for using a random photograph pitched to them when they were a piss-poor nobody band."

 

An article on a similar situation minus the extreme delusion:

 

Led Zeppelin's Houses Of The Holy

 

 

 

 

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5 hours ago, Iculus said:

it's probably the most iconic album cover in the last 30 years, and is probably on more t-shirts than albums sold at this point. I don't care if the dude gets paid or not, but plenty of people made money off of his likeness. 

 

Yeah, like Keyser said, they made money off the t-shirts that represented the band/album, not the image of him as a baby. Nobody gives a fuck about how that baby looks. It could have been literally any other baby. It could have been a drawing of a baby, a cg baby, it could have been no baby whatsoever, the baby itself has no value here.

 

If the parents decided to be like, “you know what, keep your $200, we will make our own tshirts with a picture of our baby and sell them ourselves!” they would have ended up with significantly less than $200.

 

If anything it plays completely in the reverse in that being offered to be on the cover at all has provided an outsized return to the kid via being able to say he is the Nirvana baby and probably get laid and shit. Doing stunts like posing for the picture again probably helps promote his assumedly terrible art, and I’m sure he’s constantly mentioning it as a way to try to get noticed for whatever.

 

That is his total compensation for being on the cover and it’s not anyone’s fault besides his parents that he decided to use it as a crutch instead of as a dash of salt.

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15 hours ago, DarkStar189 said:

Good points and I agree. I still think he's an idiot. I feel like I need to repost his reasoning for the lawsuit in case anybody didn't read the article. 

"As a result, Elden "has been and will continue to suffer personal injury" and "permanent harm," including "extreme and permanent emotional distress with physical manifestations, interference with his normal development and educational progress, lifelong loss of income earning capacity, loss of past and future wages, past and future expenses for medical and psychological treatment, loss of enjoyment of life, and other losses," the suit stated."  

None of that is caused by a photograph of a baby. His parents should have stopped him years ago from obsessing over a photo and make something of his life. 


yeah, it’s not like he can’t get a normal

job because he’s that baby on the cover of a famous album. If he didn’t tell anyone, nobody would know. And I’d be many don’t even believe him when he tells them he’s that baby. 
 

he’s just pissed he’s not making millions in royalties, and he isn’t treated like a member of the band. 

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17 hours ago, stepee said:

 

I mean they never really made any money off his image. They made money off an image associated with a band/album that was hugely popular that happens to include this particular baby on it. It’s not like he did some amazing job or even looked special or anything, it’s just a picture of a fucking baby. Nothing would have changed if the image was of any other generic baby they could have used for this. 

 

I do appreciate how fucking weird he made this though!


All of that doesn’t really matter. It was still a picture of him that has appeared on merchandise. When an sign a deal to appear in a major movie they have to receive royalties for action figures made out of their characters, even if the action figure doesn’t look exactly like them. This cover contains an actual image of him. And he’s naked on top of all of that, and taken when he was too young to give consent.

 

Obviously the big difference here is that the actors signed a deal guaranteeing royalties but the parents didn’t. But because of that, a nude photo of him is no one one of the most modern day nude photos even though he basically had no say in it. I always feel just a little weird wherever I see nude baby photos of him. Must be weird being the infant subject in a famous naked picture.

 

I’m not saying it’s child pornography, because it isn’t. Again, the angle he’s going about this is goofy. But it’s another example of how easily children can be exploited before they are able to make decisions for himself. And how much of society is okay with them being treated as basically second class citizens. I don’t know if there is a legal way for him to receive back pay on royalties, but ethically I absolutely believe he should.

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39 minutes ago, Komusha said:


All of that doesn’t really matter. It was still a picture of him that has appeared on merchandise. When an sign a deal to appear in a major movie they have to receive royalties for action figures made out of their characters, even if the action figure doesn’t look exactly like them. This cover contains an actual image of him. And he’s naked on top of all of that, and taken when he was too young to give consent.

 

Obviously the big difference here is that the actors signed a deal guaranteeing royalties but the parents didn’t. But because of that, a nude photo of him is no one one of the most modern day nude photos even though he basically had no say in it. I always feel just a little weird wherever I see nude baby photos of him. Must be weird being the infant subject in a famous naked picture.

 

I’m not saying it’s child pornography, because it isn’t. Again, the angle he’s going about this is goofy. But it’s another example of how easily children can be exploited before they are able to make decisions for himself. And how much of society is okay with them being treated as basically second class citizens. I don’t know if there is a legal way for him to receive back pay on royalties, but ethically I absolutely believe he should.

 

I feel I sort of already addressed this follow up on my more recent post, but na I still don’t think he is owed anything. Nothing bad actually happened to him in regards to this besides not being given a complete golden goose at birth, only just a small boost of association he can use.

 

I feel like any issues should really be addressed to his parents, maybe they could buy him a car or something. He can make this all go away by simply just living his life instead of running around saying IM NIRVANA BABY to everyone.

 

His parents could have made it anonymous as part of the contract I’m sure and nobody including himself would ever know who it was.

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7 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

But did they buy the t-shirt because the baby was on it or because they liked the album? I figure it's probably the latter.

It kind of goes with what @GeneticBlueprint said. Nirvana basically was considered an indie band before Nevermind came out, and paying $200 to get parents permission to take a picture of the baby was probably pretty generous for the band at the time. It's only after the popularity of the album exploded that one could claim they are making money off his image (but again most people are buying the album for the music not the baby) but if you didn't see the album becoming popular you probably should blame your parents for not cutting a lucrative deal in which case the band would probably say forget it and come up with another idea for an album cover.

 

Or find another baby who wouldn't grow up to be so fucking weird about this situation at a minimum.

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1 hour ago, stepee said:

 

I feel I sort of already addressed this follow up on my more recent post, but na I still don’t think he is owed anything. Nothing bad actually happened to him in regards to this besides not being given a complete golden goose at birth, only just a small boost of association he can use.

 

I feel like any issues should really be addressed to his parents, maybe they could buy him a car or something. He can make this all go away by simply just living his life instead of running around saying IM NIRVANA BABY to everyone.

 

His parents could have made it anonymous as part of the contract I’m sure and nobody including himself would ever know who it was.

 

If actors get royalties for action figures and other merchandise then it's not crazy for him to feel like he should get something. Your argument doesn't hold water just because the baby isn't recognizable. It's still his likeness that is being used.

 

I'm not saying that it caused him harm, just that it's a weird situation that he's in. Must be weird to see your baby penis everywhere. If you don't think it would be weird then why don't you go ahead and post pics of you as a naked baby. I mean, there's no harm in it, right?

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