9 votes

When a blogger died from silicone genital injections, his fans blamed his partner

3 comments

  1. Deimos
    Link
    The article links to it, but this is a bit of a follow-up to this (long) article on The Stranger (posted on Tildes here)

    The article links to it, but this is a bit of a follow-up to this (long) article on The Stranger (posted on Tildes here)

    6 votes
  2. alyaza
    Link
    i'l leave other people to refine the tags and group location for this one since this is a bit of a hard one to tag, but this story really is something else. some of you may have heard rumblings...

    i'l leave other people to refine the tags and group location for this one since this is a bit of a hard one to tag, but this story really is something else. some of you may have heard rumblings about this story if you're in the right circles since it's been working its way up the media chain for a bit now, and the more details come out the more fucked up and crazy it gets:

    During his time with Dylan, and with his online fans’ encouragement, Tank had been enlarging his scrotum and penis with silicone injections, a body modification both dangerous and illegal. The fetish is typically associated with a “gainer” mentality — a consuming desire to enlarge your body, to put on as much weight as possible. Some gainers want muscle, others fat. For Tank, a self-described gainer, silicone injections to his genitals (link NSFW) drew immediate praise and encouragement on social media. As one fan said of a picture he posted to Tumblr, “that underwear bulge * SWOON * what a handsome minotaur man you are :smile:.” Wrote another, “That junk down south looks AMAZING. Bet your master lays on that bulge like a pillow every night.”
    On Oct. 9, Tank was admitted to the hospital with trouble breathing. He died six days later from lung problems caused by a silicone embolism.

    Their relationship, which they closely documented online, was based around a dominant–submissive power exchange in which Dylan was the “Master” and Tank was his “pup.” It orbited around several scenes: polyamory, BDSM, leather, pup play, bears, gainers, and body modification. It’s 2018 — plenty of people incorporate these scenes into a happy, healthy sex life, but some of Tank’s friends found his relationship with Dylan worrisome. Kevin Reader, who cohosted Tank’s Cubby House podcast, described their relationship as toxic, and a former partner of Dylan’s, Raymond Smith, said Dylan was manipulative.

    Dylan and the four pups who lived with Tank in Seattle until his death initially did not answer multiple requests for comment via emails, calls, and texts. When a BuzzFeed News reporter attempted to reach them in person, they called the police. That reporter was arrested and jailed. The following week, Dylan and a pup, Daniel Balderas Hafertepen, filed restraining orders against the same reporter. A week later, Dylan responded to an email from BuzzFeed News, answering a series of questions.

    Both Tank and Dylan publicly acknowledged the dangers of injecting silicone on their own blogs. Dylan said he’d seen friends die in pursuit of the fetish. Tank wrote that the procedure “can have major health risks if done incorrectly” and refused to offer instructions for how to do it or where to obtain medical-grade silicone. But he kept posting pictures of his size gains. Dylan told BuzzFeed News they sometimes manipulated the photos “to make his genitals and body appear larger.”
    ...
    Dylan denied forcing Tank to get injections. “This was his fetish,” he said. “I did not make him inject silicone. On the contrary, I helped him get some removed.” He said Tank got silicone injections by himself in Mexico in 2014, and again in Sacramento during a period when they were broken up in 2016. Dylan said this showed Tank’s “strong personal motivation to pursue silicone,” and called him a “proud exhibitionist.” In May 2018, Dylan said he brought Tank to a plastic surgeon who removed some silicone.

    1 vote
  3. jlpoole
    Link
    How absolutely ghastly and sad.

    How absolutely ghastly and sad.