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Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

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Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#91

Post by fwip »

manigandham wrote: post #11

Similar to the recent actions by Twitter, Google, Apple and Amazon; Visa and Mastercard are private companies and can do whatever they want. Anyone who has an issue with what Visa/MC did must also take issue with the others.

This argument always reminds me of the evergreen dril tweet: https://twitter.com/dril/status/473265809079693312?lang=en (cw: profanity). You've rhetorically zoomed out so far that only the most abstract description of the category of the action is up for discussion. But this is begging the question - there's no reason that this must be the case.

This rhetorical trick of categorizing all of these as "private companies denying service," is the same one used by those who opposed anti-discrimination laws. Should an ice-cream store be able to kick out a person pissing on the floor? Should they be able to kick out a black person for being black? In each case, it's simply "a private company doing whatever they want." But, obviously, these two cases are not the same.

Personally, I think it's quite a different thing to kick people who incite violence off your social media platform than it is to ban sex-workers from using you as a payment processor. And, because they are different actions, with different intent and effects, it is, of course, possible to think "Hey, it's good that [x] is happening, but bad that [y] is happening."

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#92

Post by cathyreisenwitz »

kbar13 wrote: post #57

sex work should be legalized and regulated, just like marijuana. sex work and porn has been a reality since the beginning of time, and making it "illegal" and letting it fester in dark corners is unhealthy. without proper education, acceptance, and oversight, it encourages predatory behavior and other mental health issues like porn addiction. you don't have to think "porn is good" or "prostitution is good" to acknowl…

Sex workers prefer decrim to regulation because regulation ends up creating a white market dominated by a few anti-competitive players and a vast black market with all the existing problems.

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#93

Post by cathyreisenwitz »

manigandham wrote: post #11

Similar to the recent actions by Twitter, Google, Apple and Amazon; Visa and Mastercard are private companies and can do whatever they want. Anyone who has an issue with what Visa/MC did must also take issue with the others.

"Visa and Mastercard are private companies and can do whatever they want." Not without DOJ pressure, unfortunately.

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#94

Post by elliekelly »

cathyreisenwitz wrote: post #92
kbar13 wrote: post #57

sex work should be legalized and regulated, just like marijuana. sex work and porn has been a reality since the beginning of time, and making it "illegal" and letting it fester in dark corners is unhealthy. without proper education, acceptance, and oversight, it encourages predatory behavior and other mental health issues like porn addiction. you don't have to think "porn is good" or "prostitution is good" to acknowl…

Sex workers prefer decrim to regulation because regulation ends up creating a white market dominated by a few anti-competitive players and a vast black market with all the existing problems.

Source?

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#95

Post by banana_giraffe »

leetcrew wrote: post #64
occamrazor wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Android/iOS is a duopoly as pervasive as Visa/MasterCard. The ither examples only to a much lesser degree.

can someone ELI5 why Visa/MasterCard is frequently called a duopoly? as someone who mostly uses my amex and discover cards for day-to-day purchases, I don't really understand this. four major processors (two being their own issuers) seems like a decent amount of competition and diversity of offerings.

Visa and Mastercard combined represent 83% of the number of credit cards in circulation, and 100% of the number of debit cards in circulation.

That last one, too, is probably a big part of the reason for the classification. There are more Visa/MC debit cards out there than their are credit cards.

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#97

Post by manigandham »

fwip wrote: post #91
manigandham wrote: post #11

Similar to the recent actions by Twitter, Google, Apple and Amazon; Visa and Mastercard are private companies and can do whatever they want. Anyone who has an issue with what Visa/MC did must also take issue with the others.

This argument always reminds me of the evergreen dril tweet: https://twitter.com/dril/status/473265809079693312?lang=en (cw: profanity). You've rhetorically zoomed out so far that only the most abstract description of the category of the action is up for discussion. But this is begging the question - there's no reason that this must be the case. This rhetorical trick of categorizing all of these as "private companies…

I compared these situations because both are about explicility illegal activities clearly defined by law. They're more similar than different.

Your personal opinion on which decision you support is just that, your personal opinion, and only reinforces my point about the subjectivity and inherent hypocrisy of it all and whether private company action over state prosecution is the correct course of action.

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#98

Post by xirbeosbwo1234 »

manigandham wrote: post #11

Similar to the recent actions by Twitter, Google, Apple and Amazon; Visa and Mastercard are private companies and can do whatever they want. Anyone who has an issue with what Visa/MC did must also take issue with the others.

>Anyone who has an issue with this must also take issue with the others.

That doesn't follow. Someone can acknowledge that companies have the right to run itself however it wants but disagree with this particular decision. It is possibly incoherent to argue that Twitter may ban people but Visa may not ban anyone; it is perfectly coherent to argue that Twitter should ban certain people and Visa should not ban these particular businesses.

Also, I don't think it's a contradiction even to say that Visa may not ban anyone. Running a website is a form of speech. Every website absolutely must be moderated beyond what is required to remove spam or what is required by law. Telling them what kind of community they are allowed to run is an excessive infringement on their freedom of speech. This is similar to why I support net neutrality but fervently oppose any sort of mandatory neutrality on websites. It would take a tortured argument to claim that routing packets is a form of speech (particularly when these packets are encrypted), while running a website always requires taking an editorial role.

No one would find it strange if a book store decided not to carry a particular book. People would find it very strange if their credit card company refused to process a payment for a particular book.

I neither support nor oppose banning payments to Pornhub since I don't know much about the website. I have no skin flicks in the game.

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#99

Post by adrian_b »

manigandham wrote: post #68
elric wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anyone who has an issue with this must also take issue with the others. Yeah .... no. For a variety of reasons. But for one, it's impossible to do business online if you're not in the good graces of major payment providers (assuming you want to get paid). It might be hard(er) to advertise your business if Twitter bans you, but that's in no way comparable to how essential Visa/MC are to any business. Providers of cr…

None of this is considered critical infrastructure today, that's the point. What's important to you is entirely subjective and these are private companies that can apply their terms however they see fit. Visa/MC can easily say that ACH and cash payments exist as an alternative. If you feel that monopolistic powers by major tech companies need more oversight then that should apply equally. I don't see why communicatio…

Visa/MC are really critical infrastructure, because for many people they are the main means of payment or even the only one.

In most cases they are the only existing means for making remote payments. I would have much preferred a world in which the remote payments would not have been done by credit cards, but by wire transfers (with much lower fees than the current fees for wire transfers), but we do not live in such a world.

I am not sure about what weird conditions might be written in the small print of the contracts for credit cards, but certainly when Visa/MC advertise their services, they claim that you should pay for their cards in order to buy anything that you want, they do not invite you to pay them in order to let you buy only what they like.

So I do not believe that it is correct to say that VISA/MC are private companies that can do anything they like.

They have also obligations towards the customers who use their cards and they cannot decide unilaterally to ban some sellers, unless those are selling something illegal, which is not the case with Pornhub (after they took down what was said to be illegal content).

I do not think that making a referendum among Visa/MC customers about whether to ban some vendor or another would be the most appropriate solution, but certainly unilateral decisions taken just by the Visa/MC management are an abuse.

While I have never used Pornhub, so I have no opinion about how correct were their actions, I have paid in the past for a few other sites with erotic content and I would not like to discover one day that Visa or MC has again decided to block such a site without any valid reason.

Re: Sex workers say 'defunding Pornhub' puts their livelihoods at risk

#100

Post by slg »

manigandham wrote: post #75
slg wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bizarre comment. The complaint isn't that Pornhub, Visa, or Mastercard lack the right to do what they are doing. People are explaining reasons why it is a bad decision and those reasons aren't relevant to Twitter, Google, Apple, and Amazon. There is nothing contradictory about someone who believes these companies have the right to kick people off their platform while also thinking that these companies can m…

The point is that if you have an issue with companies taking private action over state prosecution then that should apply to all decisions. Whether you consider an individual decision to be a mistake is entirely subjective and irrelevant.

>The point is that if you have an issue with companies taking private action over state prosecution then that should apply to all decisions.

Why? I can agree that someone has a right while also disagreeing with how they exercise that right. I have no idea why you are labeling the specifics irrelevant.

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