SAN FRANCISCO — Christian watch-group Morality in Media is calling for a nationwide boycott of online discounter Groupon.com for providing money-saving deals on tours of BDSM production studio Kink.com.
"Selling coupons supporting the degradation of women is as low as a publicly-traded company can go," MIM Executive Director Dawn Hawkins said. "Groupon frames the tour as a historic one, comparing the opportunity to visiting the Smithsonian Institute because the building that houses Kink has an 'historic history in San Francisco.'"
Kink.com, which is headquartered in San Francisco's historic Mission District building, a 200,000 square foot reproduction of a Moorish Castle built in 1914 and used as the city's National Guard Armory and Arsenal up until the '70s, began offering hour-long tours to the public last year.
Groupon has provided shoppers discounted tickets (as low as $28) to the Kink.com studios twice this year and have no intention of stopping the practice, citing that Kink "has proven to be a responsible member of their community."
Needless to say, Hawkins is none-too-happy with the company's response. "Groupon should be thinking of their wider commercial audience, most of which, unlike Groupon, would not support torture and humiliation of women and girls for the sexual enjoyment of disturbed men. But since Groupon not only seems to support Kink, but is happy to profit from the torture of women, we have called for a national boycott."
