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Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

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Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#681

Post by npteljes »

csours wrote: post #192

The problem with slippery slopes is that the world is made of them. You can't leave the slippery slope, at BEST you can choose which slope you're sliding down. Another way to think of this is 'long tail risk'. Some subset of people out there will develop real life problems from: porn, sex work, alcohol, weed, drugs, gambling, other 'moral' issues. It is difficult to meaningfully address both the median user and the p…

I completely agree. One could frame not banning these games as another slippery slope - which I'm sure they do.

I think many of these slippery slopes are defined in hindsight. What all of these represent are simply struggles for power.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#682

Post by shepherdjerred »

sedatk wrote: post #597
mixologist wrote: post #467

This actually took longer than I thought. It is really weird that for all my adult content I have to go to a dedicated adult store, yet for games I can find them on Steam and gog where kids shop for games. You don’t get porn movies on Netflix or Disney stream. You don’t get adult toys in your local grocery store. Why do we sell porn on Steam? Why haven’t game stores just spin off separate store front for porn content…

I've been using Steam as an adult for the last two decades. I have hundreds of games in my library. I've never seen one porn title recommended to me or while browsing the site. Steam also has extensive parental controls: https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/054C-3167-DD7F-49...

They popped up for me a few times without any prompting. It was weird.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#683

Post by 7moritz7 »

doctor_blood wrote: post #562
pyuser583 wrote: post #318

I read from a fairly reputable source that money laundering is a huge problem in online sex industry. Which makes sense - you have buyers and sellers who insist on anonymity, services that leave no trace once rendered, buyers and sellers lying to family and friends about what they're doing, etc. There's often no "normal" amount of consumption, for example, some sellers receive million dollar tips. Money laundering is…

That doesn't explain why Visa/Mastercard have gone after written erotica (gumroad, patreon, etc), Japanese manga/doujinshi distributors (DLsite), and video games.

I assume they just decided that the whole industry, even if run legitimately in some cases, has too high of a legal risk and hence don't decide on a case-by-case basis. With how often NSFW content gets reuploaded and the source becoming unclear, they probably see the biggest risk with undetected child porn on regular porn sites. If you are involved with that as a payment processor that's obviously a huge problem.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#684

Post by npteljes »

VerdisQuo5678 wrote: post #484
j_timberlake wrote: post #475

All the real hentai trash is on DLsite anyway. These people probably have no idea, and even if they did, they're powerless to change Japan. They'd definitely give up after encountering Kanji.

...sweet summer child visa is hitting DLSite hard https://cs.dlsite.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500002888202-What-p... actually it seems all the major western credit card players have already blocked them. i remember seeing pay with crypto so i guess thats what you need to use in the west

Another framing of this: Mastercard / Visa, and by extension whomever had them to do the crackdown, are now powerless to change DLSite.

Googling for news, it seems like the story between DLSite and M/V is a push and pull. Many articles turn up that say they have an agreement, then a disagreement, then an agreement again, then a suspension, then they bring it back again etc.

My point here is that their relationship with M/V seems to have failed to actually change them, so, the point "they're powerless to change Japan" stands.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#685

Post by Saline9515 »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #550
Saline9515 wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Violence in video games is quite different from paraphilias. While they usually have an origin deep buried in the psyche, exposure to specific types of porn can act as a trigger and reinforcement to it.

I fail to see how. We have entire sections of our brain dedicated to aggression and adrenaline management. Knowing how to recognize a threat, fight, and flight is every bit as base as knowing how to breed.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11757-020-00607-y

End of page 3, the author does a litterature review and finds that current studies show that exposure to CSAM increases probability of offending for those with predispositions.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#686

Post by bfg_9k »

gspencley wrote: post #207
RankingMember wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Puritanical origins of the US reverberate to this day. While coming for "freedom of religion" sounds like a noble origin story, the context was that they wanted the freedom to practice a much stricter, restrictive form of religion than that allowed by the Church of England.

I'm not so sure you can point the finger at the USA for this. I ran an online porn website for almost 20 years. For 15 years it was my primary source of income. I'm in Canada which, compared to the USA is extremely progressive. In 2022, after a decade of doing business with a certain bank as this business, never having hidden anything about what we did, my wife and I received an urgent, signature required, overnighte…

What aggravates me the most about stories like yours is that banks are effectively public utilities. They are regulated as such, are broadly considered too big to fail (especially in Canada - believe it or not at a domestic scale, their banks are far more important than any US bank is to the American economy) and thus receive an implicit tax payer underwriting, yet are able to act like this when you're not doing any illegal activities.

I understand the risk tolerance aspect from a bank, they wouldn't want to give a massive loan to a property developer or oil driller going under water. But when it comes to basic deposit services where nobody is asking them to risk their own money, they should be forced to allow any customer who isn't breaking any laws, such as in your case.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#687

Post by bfg_9k »

creer wrote: post #622
kelseyfrog wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably, the belief of Collective Shout is that there is a causal link between acting out incest, rape, and sexual violence in games and acting on those behaviors in real life. What would you do if you harbored that belief?

The issue is not with Collective Shout, who are rightly free to argue whatever they want. The issue is with payment processor - who fall all over themselves and invoke all sorts of random claims, to use their extreme power to ban content.

They're Australian. So no.. not really. There's no freedom of speech in Australia.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#688

Post by spixy »

themaninthedark wrote: post #611
ben_w wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don't like porn? Don't buy it. Simple as that. The claim isn't "we don't like it", the claim is "this is damaging to society". I don't agree with such things in many cases (and many people disagree with me when I'm the one saying something is damaging to society), but it's important to note the difference or you will always be arguing against something other than their claim. > No one, including governments or paym…

This is the exact claim of "hate speech" as well. Often both sexual content and hate speech get added to the same clause.

Except having virtual sex and threatening to kill/hurt someone in real life are two different things.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#689

Post by jackdoe »

can16358p wrote: post #105

What is wrong with these people who try to block certain content? Don't like porn? Don't buy it. Simple as that. No one, including governments or payment processors, should be in the position to decide whether a platform can sell something or not. I wish there was a payment processor who was brave enough to say a big fucking NO to censorship.

I guess you can also ask "don't like gambling, don't gamble".

It goes even further.

What was wrong with those people poisoning Socrates? For what? Don't like what he says, do not listen to him.

You know how in higher dimensional space everything is almost orthogonal? I think people are like that, some like porn, some are afraid of it, some want to be impregnated by aliens, some hate aliens.

Through good intentions democracy can be just as tyrannical as any tyrant; a pinch of incompetence and good intentions and it can not be stopped.

When should others "save" you? When it is absolutely obvious some people need saving.

Re: Steam, Itch.io are pulling ‘porn’ games. Critics say it's a slippery slope

#690

Post by rustystump »

furgot wrote: post #660
rustystump wrote: post #618

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sigh. You completely miss the point. Oh well. For what it is worth, i am against banning innocuous queer content. Cheers.

That's a lazy and intellectually dishonest way of responding to criticism of your ideas. You made a claim and were asked for evidence. It's your choice whether or not you provide it, but you were in fact understood, and to pretend otherwise is dishonest.

Read the article. What i am saying is exactly what is happening. Totally normal stuff is being bundled with the nasty and the baby is being thrown out with the bath water. Again, i dont want that to happen but people keep defending the gross with the normal which is a losing position. Idk what to tell you. :(
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