Backpage Founder's 93 Charges Lack Actual Sex-Trafficking Claims | Hacker News Reader

Backpage Founder's 93 Charges Lack Actual Sex-Trafficking Claims

reason.com

32 pointsFins19 comments

It was always about censorship and an aside of blocking sex workers/prostitution.

The founders have been ad hominem attacked but they are big in civil rights [3], personal freedoms and started the New Times and Village Voice alternative media which is a check on authority [1][2], Backpage was originally the New Times classified section.

The government filter/firewall is the authoritarian goal in this journey. Backpage and SESTA/FOSTA are solely about censorship and a step towards the internet filter/firewall [4].

Meanwhile Backpage really only added a filter to block words as any profanity/bad word filter does per direction from the government and lawyers [5].

The Backpage report claims of 'trafficking' amounts to simply a profanity filter that backpage created to PREVENT people posting bad ads or possible 'trafficking' not encouraging it [5].

The report says Backpage 'knowingly concealed evidence of criminality' for removing bad terms being posted due to a profanity/word filter? They didn't want people posting ads with these terms because they were bad words, not that they supported it[5].

That argument is like saying, because a site profanity filter removed racial slurs that the site was 'knowingly concealing evidence of racism'.

New Times has been kicking up dust on authoritarianism since the 70s. Lacey and Larkin also won a lawsuit against Arizona as recently as 2013 for false arrest which is still used to attack them [1][7]. They had exposed Sheriff Joe Arpaio's real estate corruption and his home address was in the article and is public information. Arpaio demanded all information on every visitor to the website, the article and previous articles about him for who knows what, they refused and published that and they were arrested for not turning over private user data for merely reading an article about Arpaio [7].

> In December 2013, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors agreed to pay Phoenix New Times founders Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin $3.75 million to settle their false arrest lawsuit against the county defendants.

Massive authoritarian overreach is happening on the internet from many sides.

When authoritarian overreaches begin, you first go towards censorship, attacking civil rights, alternative media and funders of rights.

The crazy thing is they literally had these guys in a jail cell in the courtroom [6] like they were Hannibal Lecter, it feels very authoritarian and a bit scary considering their civil rights / alternative media / anti-war background and they merely ran a website [6]. The money laundering charges are because they tried to move ownership of the site offshore due to authoritarian overreach attacking it [5][6].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_New_Times

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Village_Voice_Media

[3] http://www.laceyandlarkinfronterafund.org/

[4] https://www.wired.com/2017/04/internet-censorship-is-advanci...

[5] https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Backpage%20Report...

[6] http://time.com/5233804/backpage-prostitution-money-launderi...

[7] http://www.laceyandlarkinfronterafund.org/the-incident/

I read some article that claimed that the sex workers are really against the new laws. If I'm to believe the article, there are apparently a bunch of sex workers who weren't forced into the sex trade by some evil person (I think most do it because it is the "easiest" path to making decent money). These workers used craigslist and backpage to have clients contact them and then there is some way they screen the clients (is luckydude some creep or just some normal schmoo who wants his ashes hauled? They network and talk to each other about clients somehow).

Now with the internet removed as an easy way to screen these workers are claiming they'll have to work the streets or work with pimps which is far worse.

I hadn't really thought about that but I can see it. So perhaps these new laws are not so great. Who would have thought our awesome congress would do that?

Interestingly, it is also apparently quite difficult to find actual trafficking victims, at least in the US.

Find any local Asian "spa" that caters to men. Not much to do with Backpage, but trafficked humans are all over the US.

Eh, are you equating, ahem, "sexual services providers" with trafficking victims?

For some reason, every major prostitution bust catches quite a few working girls and johns, but actual trafficking victims are few and far between. And every time I read about a "massage" parlor bust in a paper, it's always "such and such has been charged with pandering", not "such and such has been rescued from the clutches of Backapge-enabled traffickers".

Not to say that it doesn't happen, if there were trafficked sex workers "all over the US", someone would have pointed a few by now. Chances are you'll find them in less public-facing businesses anyway. But busting those doesn't make moral crusaders feel quite as good.

Nope. I'm not. The spa owners may be "providers". The girls themselves are mostly not.

See https://www.pri.org/stories/2018-01-25/across-us-many-illici... for one example. Another: http://www.columbusmonthly.com/article/20150507/LIFESTYLE/30... Or this: https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/the-lost-girls/

You'll find similar stories for every major US city. They are slaves lured here under false pretenses and/or sold to traffickers by their families. Generally they are forced to stay in the "spa" 24/7 paying off false debts that will never be paid off.

I did mention this is mostly unrelated to Backpage.

Edit: Downvote at will, but provide some evidence that the women working in Asian spas are there by choice.

My whole rant was directed at GP's claim of " it is also apparently quite difficult to find actual trafficking victims". It isn't difficult. It's pretty clear that most of those places are benefiting from traffickers, thought I don't know what percentage of overall "sex for sale" they represent.

That doesn't mean all (or even most) prostitution is related to trafficking. However, I stand by my claim that most Asian spas and massage parlors are mostly supported by trafficking. It isn't difficult to see, find, etc, in any major US city.

I have seen quite a few of the same in Chicago as well. It is always hand-wringing over there being internet forums where johns review services, and a lot of assumptions that anyone engaged in prostitution obviously must be trafficked, or forced, or coerced, because surely nobody could ever possibly do it willingly.

Sure. Not discounting there are girls that do this work willingly. Just that the Asian spas, for the most part, aren't in that category. They are a special case that does indicate traffickers exist and are prolific in the US.

And they are likely not the only case. I believe there's a Russian/Ukrainian equivalent as well.

Here's a pretty convincing story that Chicago (since you called it out) has this issue as well: https://medium.com/@markguarino10/a-victim-centric-approach-...

And it doesn't sound "difficult" to find or validate.

You would have to believe there are women that want to live 24/7 in these strip mall dungeons on purpose, sleeping on massage tables, paying off inflated debts, to deny the trafficking angle.

Having lived there, I'll take hagiographies of Tom Dart with as many grains of salt as stories of a bright and promising young politician Rod Blagojevich. After all, he had been going against anything sex-related long before he had thought up the trafficking angle.

You do realize that for any foreigner/legal resident caught giving happy endings in a parlor the options are either deportation (or at beast "moral turpitude" that makes naturalization basically impossible), or claiming to be a trafficking victim? Validating how many of them actually are is far more difficult than that.

It seems more clear to me. Who chooses to live, eat, and sleep in a small strip mall sublet, sharing a room and one bathroom with 10+ other people of their own volition? Leaving the place almost never? What they say is less telling than how they live.

I could point you at pretty much every Mexican construction worker in SV (or Chicago) who bunk 10 to a room, doing hard physical work for less money.

Sure. Voluntary hard labor vs involuntary institutional daily rape followed by bunking where it happens until you're too old to sell. Maybe the customer doesn't know the provider didn't want this lifestyle, but it's still an unwilling participant situation.

They are both unfortunate, but not the same.

Of course it is, when it happens. Ity's the prevalence of it happening that is disputable, given both the dearth of verifiable prosecutions and strong incentives for any sex worker to claim trafficking victim status.

Most of them are both (a) minors and (b) minorities, so it's no surprise people assume this is a rare phenomenon. It only happens to black and latina girls, thus, it doesn't happen at all.

Why do you think the NCMEC is so up in arms about Backpage? They know damn well what happens to runaway girls. Not all of them see themselves as victims.

When more underage white girls start turning up in prostitution busts you won't have a problem finding victims.

Cynic in me asks what NCMEC would do, if there were no great epidemic of trafficking. And a nice easy target to pin it on.

Interestingly, all the examples below talk about grown up Asian women.

Not to say that trafficking never happens, or should not be stopped, but if it were as prevalent as they say, somebody would have presented a few by now.

For those unaware of the previous run at Craigslist by several States Attorneys, here's a summary:

Questioner: "If you close down this safe forum, workers will just go to another forum." State Attorney: "Then we'll sue them too."

So States Attorneys don't see themselves in any way as social workers, just as law enforcement willing to play whack-a-mole forever without regard to the societal cost.

States Attorneys's salaries and power depend on a steady crime rate, not reducing crime.

And the recent closure of craigslist personals section while keeping the “therapeutic services” section where the actual sex work solicitation occurs is worth consideration also.

I emailed Craig about that and they are gone now.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com