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Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

craigslist.org

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Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#551
post #497
post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the #metoo feminist supremacist movement Yes, damn those feminists and their opposition of rape... /s

Due process is dead -- a simple accusation is enough to crush the career of any public-facing authority figure, regardless of the proof provided.

Yeah, witness how the slew of accusations against Trump has crushed his career...

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can disagree with the means of the war, but the intent was to help society and the people most vulnerable in society by eliminating drugs through force. Ha, ha, no it wasn't. It was started by Republicans to get people angry at the hippies and black people. Read this: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/nixon-aide-war-drug... The salient quote is: "“We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against…

Sure that may have been one individual's motivation for the plan, but the public and subsequent governments thought it was a the best way to prevent drugs from infecting society. When lawmakers seek to punish someone, they aren't doing it because they relish the suffering of the other person, but because they hope that person's pain will dissuade others from committing those same crimes.

>lawmakers seek to punish someone, they aren't doing it because they relish the suffering of the other person, but because they hope that person's pain will dissuade others from committing those same crimes

Unfortunately this belief is completely unfounded in reality. I really wish this were the case, but we have mountains of evidence on how to help people fight addiction, poverty, get out of the criminal cycle, etc. And that's all ignored in favor of punishment.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could use the same argument against anything that groups of people consider "immoral". Alterations of the position: "While I'm in favor of people engaging in worship, I don't think anybody worships Mohammad with a healthy attitude towards the lord. They're typically victims of religious indoctrination at a young age, which has warped their perception, leading them to believe in a false god" "While I'm in favor of…

What morale decision am I making?

My point of view isn't to demonize those who have gone into prostitution now, in the past, or in the future, but recognize that it's not a choice that pretty much any of us would make for ourselves, nor the ones we care about.

There is a thin line between saying that very few people would make a choice, and very few people should make a choice. You are correctly asserting that you said "would" not "should", but others are correctly pushing back and saying that it is a common rhetorical technique to say one when actually meaning the other. If you meant what you said in a non-normative manner, you may need to emphasize this fact to prevent the more common reading.

Separately, I'm sure some people question whether you are correct that few would choose this lifestyle, and if so, why this would be. Personally, I think you are right that few would choose to work as prostitutes but that the reason is the societal stigma associated with sex work. I don't know how popular the choice would be if the stigma would be removed and the pay remained high. You seem to be asserting that it would remain extremely unpopular, but I'm not sure that's correct.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#554

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been thinking about this a lot this morning. I think almost every vice would be less damaging to society if it was in the open. Polite society doesn't want to see sex work or drugs, but they still exist. Hiding them makes things much worse for the people directly involved. It's trafficked kids with broken immigration status who are more scared of the cops than their captors. It's drug addicts who OD on tainted d…

> I think almost every vice would be less damaging to society if it was in the open. Polite society doesn't want to see sex work or drugs, but they still exist. Hiding them makes things much worse for the people directly involved. I understand what you're saying. However, compare sex work to slavery (which it often is). Nobody wants to be a slave. Some desperate people might agree to be enslaved to pay off a debt. Yo…

> . People are free to sleep with whom they choose, but when it's done for money, it's far too easy for exploitation to occur. If we say it's always illegal, we remove the veneer of respectability that enables one person to exploit another "by agreement".

That logic makes pornography illegal.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been thinking about this a lot this morning. I think almost every vice would be less damaging to society if it was in the open. Polite society doesn't want to see sex work or drugs, but they still exist. Hiding them makes things much worse for the people directly involved. It's trafficked kids with broken immigration status who are more scared of the cops than their captors. It's drug addicts who OD on tainted d…

I've been thinking about this peripherally for a while, especially the bigger picture when some law is passed, and it seems exceptionally out of touch with the reality, and does more harm than good. A depressing thought: What if we apply something akin to Occam's Razor? What if the lawmakers want to hurt the people struggling at at the lower rungs of society? To me it feels unlikely it is intentional in most cases, o…

I think the upperclass mostly "controls" lawmaking decisions for their own interest, and are almost entirely unaware of the condition/state of mind/customs of the lower classes. They don't understand how it works, and because they don't understand they feel superior, so they make decisions on behalf of the lower classes with the intent of nobly showing the masses the way while serving their own interests.

There's also a lot of superior moralizing etc.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#556
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is key. I strongly believe that legalization is the only answer to the problem. Driving things underground is only going to cause more issues and abuse to the sex workers. It's kind of ironic when in France, for example, a law gets passed criminalizing the customers while the sex workers go in the street to protest that law saying that it will create more abuse (and one year after, they were right). Trying to st…

> This is key. I strongly believe that legalization is the only answer to the problem. Why do we have to "believe"? There are many examples to learn from, to see what works and what doesn't. For example, this study [0]. "This paper suggests it’s the latter. Using trafficking data from 150 countries, the authors find that "countries where prostitution is legal experience a larger reported incidence of human traffickin…

It's worth pointing out that the "Nordic Model" used in Sweden is indeed harsh, but only for pimps and buyers.

Prostitutes themselves are not punished with a criminal record like they are in the US. Instead they are offered support to exit. Which makes sense if you really want them to to leave that industry. Legit jobs are hard to find with a record, so it's no wonder people who get arrested for crimes like prostitution and drug dealing often end up in the same situation after getting arrested.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#557
post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone just shared their heartwarming tale about how they met their spouse using craigslist personals and you have the audacity to tell them that their story is illegitimate because "back in my day" people met differently? Have some heart and recognize that their story of how they met is legitimate, cherished, and deserves protection.

I'm just trying to provide some historical information for millenials.

I'm a millenial and even I think dating apps are for pussies.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been thinking about this a lot this morning. I think almost every vice would be less damaging to society if it was in the open. Polite society doesn't want to see sex work or drugs, but they still exist. Hiding them makes things much worse for the people directly involved. It's trafficked kids with broken immigration status who are more scared of the cops than their captors. It's drug addicts who OD on tainted d…

Bring it all into the open. Have the government certify providers directly. Crack down on unauthorized middlemen. Tax it. I don't agree. Decriminalization is a better approach than legalization and regulation. If it is decriminalized, then victims don't have to live in fear of the police. Legalization and regulation often makes things worse, not better.

I’m open to decriminalization. There’s a spectrum between criminality and unrestricted markets. I think we’re way to far towards the criminality side of that spectrum. We can start decriminalizing now, open up more if it appears to work.

Whatever policy we choose, it should have a clear goal and be evaluated against how well t achieves that goal. “Fewer deaths by tainted drugs” and “fewer sex workers living with abuse” is a good place to start. I think decriminalization work further both of those goals.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#559
post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been thinking about this a lot this morning. I think almost every vice would be less damaging to society if it was in the open. Polite society doesn't want to see sex work or drugs, but they still exist. Hiding them makes things much worse for the people directly involved. It's trafficked kids with broken immigration status who are more scared of the cops than their captors. It's drug addicts who OD on tainted d…

I'm in favour of careful legalisation. The submitted article is talking about a reaction to the behaviour of one publication who were openly allowing people to advertise kidnapped drugged children for sex; and then when they took a minimal step back from that the publisher was giving advice to advertisers about how to create an ad to sell drugged kidnapped children for sex without hitting the publications new filters…

I am unaware of this behavior by Craigslist. I want to believe that people are taken seriously when they alert authorities to crimes against them. The #MeToo movement suggests this doesn’t happen as readily as I would like.

> but someone will still want to fuck 14 year olds

This is still wrong, we can still criminalize it. That’s fine. We can still give a lot of other sex workers way more safety and legitimacy than they have now. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

There could be secondary effects that help the 14 year olds. (1) Most Johns would prefer the legal adult market, so that’s where the money will be. (2) There would be a bigger stigma to the illegal stuff because there are good legal alternatives, creating s higher barrier to entry. (3) institutions would develop to support sec workers, and they’d have resources and visibility to help the minors, more than exists now.

The point is we can decriminalize/ legalize a LOT more than we do now, and have a net positive impact.

Re: Craigslist takes personals sections offline in response to FOSTA

#560
post #503

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>While I'm in favor of decriminalizing adults engaging in adult behavior, I don't believe anyone goes into selling sex with a healthy attitude towards sex. They're typically victims of sexual abuse at a young age, which has warped their perspective, leading them to believe that their biggest value is to sell their bodies for sex. Source? Also, healthy attitude? What's that and who exactly defined it?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20105147 https://www.mentalhelp.net/blogs/why-do-women-become-prostit... And, as to who exactly, psychologists.

Interesting links, thanks. From the Mental Help article:

> the major concern about [Johns] is not so much that they pay for sex but that they seem blind to the plight of these women. They convince themselves that prostitution is a choice and that none of the women they see are exploited.

There’s a lot of exploitation in our society, and I don’t like any of it. Simple example: when I go to a restaurant, it’s very possible that the person serving my food works 2-3 jobs and still can’t afford health care. I hate that. I would like to be confident that everyone I meet was able to get basic necessities like healthcare.

Legalizing prostitution would open the door to reducing exploitation. Does the prostitute have a state issued sex worker ID? Are you paying at least the state-mandated minimum? Did you pay via a certified escrow service that has strict requirements to watch for common signs of abuse? Then no worries, you’re probably not supporting exploitation.

Compare that to what we have now, which is a total lack of transparency. Demand for sex is not going away. We need to prevent it from causing exploitation by creating a safe, legal option.

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