Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges • Hacker News Board

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#261

Post by feklar » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:11 PM UTC

Thimothy wrote: post #109

empthought wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have a perfectly good approach already; it's called the Nordic model. Arrest johns, not prostitutes. And there are thousands of former sex workers that will give you an earful about what you think you know about prostitution and what prostitutes think.

Ah, the Nordic model... The country in the middle bans prostitution and offloads it to the neighboring countries. I have yet to see any macro advantage on it, besides a little reduction and a lot of smug people feeling better about themselves. A while ago I spent quite some time researching the prostitution thing, trying to make up my mind about it. I remember the UN report on global trafficking[1] being specially en…

Indeed just having one region legalize skyrockets trafficking. Prices also go down, so prostitution becomes less attractive to locals as a way to make money which means foreigners in poor countries have to be imported, which leads to trafficking rings. Vice claims of the 500k prostitutes in Germany two-third's are foreign http://www.vice.com/read/a-visit-to-one-of-germanys-all-you-...

It's extremely difficult to stop gangsters from trafficking because they operate in the trafficked persons home country as well, so if you run to the police in Germany or Canada they can seek retribution on your family members back home in Ukraine, Vietnam ect. Thus the not legal nor illegal does a good balance of preventing super brothels opening up full of imported sex workers while at the same time being able to arrest pimps without relying on the testimony of the sex workers.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#262

Post by dragonwriter » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:15 PM UTC

tessierashpool wrote: post #20

FWIW, this headline is not completely accurate. The story itself says further down the page, "Ferrer was arrested on felony charges of pimping a minor, pimping, and conspiracy to commit pimping." None of these are actually trafficking charges; they're run-of-the-mill prostitution charges. There's also a story from a young girl who was forced into sex work, which is certainly awful, and some stuff about studies and cl…

> The story itself says further down the page, "Ferrer was arrested on felony charges of pimping a minor, pimping, and conspiracy to commit pimping." None of these are actually trafficking charges; they're run-of-the-mill prostitution charges.

Prostitution with anything other than free and full consent by someone with full capacity to give consent is sex trafficking; pimping a minor, therefore, is a sex trafficking charge.

> There are a variety of new state and federal laws on sex trafficking

Yes, there are a number of new laws that cover aspects of sex trafficking that were not adequately covered (either because they weren't already illegal, or because the specific lack-of-consent related aspects didn't enhance the offense beyond some base non-trafficking offense), but that doesn't change the fact that pimping a minor is inherently a charge that is based on factors which meet the definition of sex trafficking, even if it was already both prohibited and enhanced beyond the equivalent non-trafficking charge (simple pimping) prior the recent round of additional trafficking-related legislation.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#263

Post by dragonwriter » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:20 PM UTC

anoctopus wrote: post #68

stephenr wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So, what kind of prostitution charge is average or not special? That kind. I don't even want to know how you consider a child prostitution charge "average or not special".

It's not that these charges are average, it's that trafficking charges are a distinct group from prostitution; prostitution charges are the far more standard group, and hence are run-of-the-mill, even though the specific charges within that group are not typical of that group.

> trafficking charges are a distinct group from prostitution

Incorrect. Sex trafficking includes (among other commercial coerced sex) any instance of prostitution which involves anything other than free and full consent from someone with capacity to consent to sex; minors by definition lack capacity to consent, so pimping a minor is an offense which falls completely within the bounds of sex trafficking. (Unlike simple pimping, solicitation, etc., which may overlap with sex trafficking, but also include acts which are not sex trafficking.)

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#264

Post by wdr1 » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:20 PM UTC

dzdt wrote: post #91

1024core wrote: post #21

Why is it that in such cases, the government reaches for the CEO right away; but when Wells Fargo employees open millions of fraudulent accounts, it's not the CEO's fault? If I were to commit identity theft (which is basically what the WF employees did), then I would be facing jail time; why hasn't anyone in WF been charged with criminal fraud yet? Why not the CEO?

I think Matt Levine's take on this is right on: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-09-09/wells-far... . Senior management wanted employees to do REAL cross-selling to make money, but the metrics were set so high that employees turned to fake accounts to meet the standard. The fake accounts did not benefit the bank in any substantial way: So that's about 2.1 million fake deposit and credit-card accounts, of…

"Give a manager a numerical target & he will hit it, even if it means destroying the company to do so."

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#265

Post by empthought » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:27 PM UTC

dorfsmay wrote: post #216

empthought wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So should pornography be illegal in your opinion? I think that very much like dangerous drugs and cigarette smoking, attacking the demand side of this issue will be more effective than outright prohibition. > How are drug trial not a form of "rape"? They are not sexual... ... that's how they're not a form of "rape," then. > Some people absolutely have been getting married to be able to get out of poverty, and in my…

> that's a terrible situation as well, but it has nothing to do with how reprehensible it is to purchase sex from a prostitute. If you take "morality" out of the picture, there is no difference, one is selling a one time sexual act for a negotiated amount, the other is selling a lifetime of sex + work for food and shelter. Both are economical deals. The difference is purely the spin one's willing to put on them, in o…

> Saying things like "people should be less sexual" is not going to solve any problem.

Who said anything like that? All I'm saying is that people should not exploit other people for sex. If they do, then they should feel ashamed. The rest of us should not feel impelled to defend people that do exploit other people for sex, whether they use violence or economic disadvantage to do so.

> Because society has made prostitution illegal and is not giving the same level of protection to prostitutes as to other citizens. Prostitution should be regulated and made safe.

That's just not true; even in countries which have decriminalized or legalized prostitution, a prostitute's life is much more fraught with peril than people participating in drug trials.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#266

Post by empthought » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:28 PM UTC

tuxracer wrote: post #259

empthought wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sex workers should not be called out nor stigmatized. Their patrons should be.

Based on what you've said so should the patrons of any service if the worker is providing a service they wouldn't otherwise be providing if they weren't being paid to do so.

No, because it's not a human rights violation to pay someone to clean a toilet. It is a human rights violation to pay someone for sex.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#267

Post by empthought » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:30 PM UTC

cwillu wrote: post #248

empthought wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is precisely a moral judgement. Moral judgements are a human responsibility. The question is whether or not we want to be a society that views people's bodies and sexual access to them as a commodity to be bought and sold. I find it baffling that anyone would laud this condition after giving it a few moments of compassionate reflection.

Consider the possibility that a few moments of compassionate reflection have lead Alice to conclude that when Bob says he loves what he does, it's not because Mallory is forcing him to say that. It's all well and good to say that it's against your own morals, but as soon as you start defending that on the basis of the consequences, you're conceding the "but it's just morally wrong!" argument. And in general, we (okay…

> And in general, we (okay, at least I, as I can believe that you wouldn't necessarily agree here) laud societies that have transitioned from deontological to consequentialist ethics.

If you want to get all academic about it, I am coming from a position of virtue ethics, which is why I am focused on the vicious men who purchase sex, and to a lesser extent other people who are explicitly or implicitly defending those men's actions.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#268

Post by triplesec » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 4:34 PM UTC

throwaway2016a wrote: post #189

jontas wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you own stock in the company and this causes the stock to go up (even if the rise is artificially inflated) you can still make plenty of money.

Yeah but what about fake accounts would make the stock go up? Wouldn't it actually make the revenue per account go down which would seem to me to be negative indicator. But again, I don't know the banking industry.

It's a short term bonus ploy, and the idea is it doesn't get found out while they're at the company Also a lot of head-in-the-sand doublethink too. Michael Lewis' book, and other in-depth reports about bankers' behaviour in the market / housing crash explains it nicely. Short term incentives for executives and moving jobs means that they aren't there when the chips are down.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#269

Post by cholantesh » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 5:14 PM UTC

apr wrote: post #45

tessierashpool wrote: post #20

FWIW, this headline is not completely accurate. The story itself says further down the page, "Ferrer was arrested on felony charges of pimping a minor, pimping, and conspiracy to commit pimping." None of these are actually trafficking charges; they're run-of-the-mill prostitution charges. There's also a story from a young girl who was forced into sex work, which is certainly awful, and some stuff about studies and cl…

It is unlikely that Ferrer was her pimp as it is usually understood. It looks like that the state wants to charge him as a pimp because he provided a venue for sex workers to advertise and therefore was effectively doing promotion. It is unclear at this point whether the court will agree with that interpretation or not. I am sure the 15 yo was brought into the charging documents as a sob story for the public (and lat…

>It looks like that the state wants to charge him as a pimp because he provided a venue for sex workers to advertise and therefore was effectively doing promotion

That's a bit disturbing to read, since sex workers use a lot of popular social networking sites to advertise their services. The effect of removing these venues is simply to push the trade further underground, thereby obstructing oversight and participant safety.

Re: Backpage Raided, CEO Arrested on Sex-Trafficking Charges

#270

Post by asddddd » Fri, Oct 07, 2016, 5:17 PM UTC

makomk wrote: post #119

themgt wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I posted a new thread w/ the NYT link [1], [2] because it had this helpful tidbit: A congressional investigation this year found that the website changed some of its adult classifieds to conceal the fact that the advertisements were for sex acts with minors. Mr. Ferrer was subpoenaed by a Senate subcommittee last fall to answer questions about reported child sex-trafficking ads, but he did not show up. Found to be co…

The website changed some of its adult clasifieds to conceal the fact that they were for sex acts with minors, or the people posting them changed them? Because one of these seems an awful lot more likely than the other, and I don't see how Congress could honestly have determined that the site itself did it. I suspect that someone's arguing that banning adverts for child sex is in fact concealing them because people wo…

Congressional comments from when Backpage was held in contempt:

> Our investigation showed that Backpage “edits” advertisements before posting them, by removing certain words, phrases, or images. For instance, they might remove a word or image that makes clear that sexual services are being offered for money. And then they would post this “sanitized” version of the ad. While this editing changes nothing about the underlying transaction, it tends to conceal the evidence of illegality. In other words, Backpage’s editing procedures, far from being an effective anti-trafficking measure, only served to sanitize the ads of illegal content to an outside viewer.

Turns out NCMEC showed up for the hearing that Backpage skipped, and didn't have many nice things to say about Backpage.

> “You see, it is sometimes hard to square Backpage’s public statements about its business practices with the reality on the ground. For example, the National Center recently was searching for a child who went missing – and is still missing – and found that she appeared in a sex advertisement on Backpage. That is sadly common. But what made this case even more incredible was that the Backpage ad actually contained a missing child poster of that same child. That poster had the child’s real name, real age, real picture, and the date she went missing. The other pictures in the ad included topless photos. We’d certainly like to know what supposedly market-leading screening and moderation procedures missed that one.

https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/subcommittees/investigations/me...