Nirvana baby’s lawyer ridiculed in CNN interview over lawsuit: 'It was more about capitalism than sexuality'

Spencer Elden, who was featured as a naked baby on a Nirvana album’s cover art, is now suing the band for alleged “commercial child sexual exploitation.” Chris Cuomo isn’t buying it.

In an interview with Mr Elden’s lawyer, Maggie Mabie, the CNN host questioned the idea that the 1991 Nevermind art is child pornography.

“I get you bringing a claim that he was never paid – or, I guess, his legal guardians or parents weren’t paid – for the photo,” Cuomo said. “But how do you get to pornography here?”

Ms Mabie said the cover art, which features an infant Mr Elden swimming after a dollar bill, speaks for itself.

“The focal point of the image is the minor’s genitalia,” the lawyer said. “It is a very over-sexualized image, and does constitute child pornography. More importantly, it was child exploitation in the way that they created it, and the way that they continue to distribute the image today.”

Cuomo didn’t see it that way.

“I don’t ever remember anybody ever writing or anything being out there in society about this image as a sexualized or pornographic image,” the host said. “I always thought that it was a suggestion of how right out of the womb, people are just grabbing for money and doing anything they can. I thought it was more about capitalism than it was sexuality.”

Mr Elden’s lawsuit alleges that Nirvana’s surviving band members, the estate of Kurt Cobain, and numerous record companies “knowingly produced, possessed, and advertised commercial child pornography depicting Spencer, and they knowingly received value in exchange for doing so.”

“As a result of the above, Spencer has suffered and will continue to suffer lifelong damages,” the lawsuit says.

As Cuomo pointed out, however, until now Mr Elden’s attitude about the album has not appeared to be one of suffering. He has recreated the cover art at least four times for various publications, and has the word “Nevermind” tattooed on his chest.

“You think that this man is really a good face for the pain of child pornography?” Cuomo asked. “Somebody who’s made money out of it, has a tattoo on his chest about it, has celebrated it at different times in his life and had all this time to reach out about it in the context that you’re offering now, and never did? You really think that this is something that would be comforting to real victims?”

Ms Mabie said that history was irrelevant.

“Spencer’s connection with Nirvana, while it may have been celebrated, is not the same as his image being displayed,” she said. “He can say, ‘I don’t have a problem being on the cover. I have a problem with my genitalia being displayed on the cover.’”