15 ms·

I'm not a fan or opponent of crypto, but the pervasiveness of child pornography is insane. I started doing sex work at 11 and was later human trafficked, and go

by werber 5y ago

I'm not a fan or opponent of crypto, but the pervasiveness of child pornography is insane. I started doing sex work at 11 and was later human trafficked, and got a tattoo when I turned 18 near my groin, in large part to know what images and videos were of me underage. I consume and love porn, and have no shame in that, and I'm sure a lot of reposters think they are posting a barely legal image, but I have seen myself as a child online so many times in legitimate places, Tumblr, twitter, reddit, etc. This is a reality for so many people who have been abused, there was an article recently on here about MindGeek, and there efforts to make sure they didn't have child porn on their products, and the takedown of x tube and all of that change, but it's fucking hard. It's so much easier to tell if it's an 8 year old than a 15 year old, even though the trauma is similar for the victim. I don't know, I'm rambling, consume ethical pornography.

throwra620 5y ago
giraffe_lady 5y ago
For a couple years around a decade ago I moderated a decent-sized but not massive subreddit and the frequency of child porn reports on there was chilling. It was every week at least. This was not at all a sexual sub, not even adjacent to porn or titillating images or anything. Reddit was more permissive than they should have been for a lot longer than they should have been and may not be representative. But even accounting for that, it really opened my eyes to how common it can be. This is also what turned me against free speech fundamentalism in the end. Every attempt at getting this addressed was shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship. Every time it was actually improved caused what felt like an internet-wide backlash against the changes.
- commandlinefan 5y ago
  > shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship Not to defend the material in question in any way - but the people who expressed concern... were right. As soon as Reddit gave mods the tools they needed to expunge the really terrible stuff from the site, those tools were almost immediately used to ban completely unrelated conspiracy subs.
  - throwanem 5y ago
    I think lots of folks would consider that an entirely worthwhile tradeoff. Would you like to try to argue that it's not?
    - ipaddr 5y ago
      Why stop the tradeoff. Without the internet these things could not spread. Shut it down. People can take photos without permission from the government. Stop selling camera and charge camera resellers. Would you like to argue where your line is?
      - throwanem 5y ago
        Somewhere short of enabling revictimization so that r/thedonald doesn't have to pay for hosting.
  - giraffe_lady 5y ago
    Um do you want to try again at not defending it? My information is very out of date but I'm curious how you know how unrelated they were. My more-than-lay understanding is that the trading didn't happen in the open. Users used questionable comments, line-toeing images, and "jailbait jokes" to find each other and then swapped in DMs or off-site entirely. Reddits mods have always had a rich grapevine. In my time I never once heard of a sub getting banned that didn't have a months or years long reputation for turning a blind eye to that. Possibly that completely changed after I left, sure.
    - newguynewphone 5y ago
    - notch656a 5y ago
      You can ban all speech and it would end the spread of these images altogether, at least to the extent the law can be policed. The ends don't justify the means.
- hedora 5y ago
  The older I get, the more I believe the issue is with centralization (which the DMCA had a huge part in establishing). What if there were no redit servers, and each subredit was self hosted? What would the incentive be for people to post child porn on some small independently run server? As the subredit owner, you could just censor whoever you wanted, with very little global internet drama. Tools for autoflagging posts could still exist. Over-censored forums would piss off users, and be easily replaced. Similarly, under censored ones would lose users / get busted. This all worked fine pre-internet. Editors would decide who and what would be posted. It still works for things like audio fiction podcasts, where "slush readers" filter submissions, and money / reputation are exchanged when stuff gets published. In addition to leading to much better moderation than the big Internet sites, it creates jobs for domain experts. The main problem is that it doesn't scale to a $1B/mo business that investors can siphon money off of. Instead, it's best structured as an ecosystem of small botique businesses.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    > What would the incentive be for people to post child porn on some small independently run server? But... that's precisely what the article is about? > The Korean agent showing Janczewski around eventually pointed the phone’s camera at a desktop computer on the floor of Son’s bedroom, a cheap-looking tower-style PC with its case open on one side. The computer’s guts revealed the hard drives that Son seemed to have added, one by one, as each drive had filled up with terabytes of child exploitation videos. > This was the Welcome to Video server. > "I was expecting some kind of glowing, ominous thing," Janczewski remembers, "and it was just this dumpy computer. It was just so strange. This dumpy computer, that had caused so much havoc around the world, was sitting on this kid’s floor."
    - otterley 5y ago
      The banality of evil, indeed.
    - crtasm 4y ago
      > But... that's precisely what the article is about? The incentive in this case was profit from/access to more CSAM. GP is referring to how most subreddits/forums do not have that incentive.
- rubyist5eva 5y ago
  > This is also what turned me against free speech fundamentalism in the end. Every attempt at getting this addressed was shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship. The solution is to put these vile pieces of sludge in prison forever, or execute them - not turn against liberty. This is a red herring for at least morally questionable people.
  - giraffe_lady 5y ago
    If executing people fits with your conception of liberty I think we have very different understandings of liberty, and what "morally questionable" means.
    - notch656a 5y ago
      - rubyist5eva 5y ago
        Hey man, bullets are pretty cheap.
    - rubyist5eva 5y ago
      I have no objection whatsoever with executing people that torture our most vulnerable for sexual gratification. Liberty means the freedom to do what is right. Child exploitation isn’t even in an adjacent universe to that.
      - worik 5y ago
        > I have no objection whatsoever with executing people that torture our most vulnerable for sexual gratification. I have a problem with you executing people. There are plenty of hypothetical people whom we could agree deserve execution. The problem is: Who has the power? What else will they do with it? If the subjects of that power are kept alive then there is a chance to "put right" injustices, if not then not. That is the problem with execution as a "tool of justice"
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- throw_m239339 5y ago
  > This is also what turned me against free speech fundamentalism in the end. Every attempt at getting this addressed was shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship. Every time it was actually improved caused what felt like an internet-wide backlash against the changes. Child porn never add anything to do with "free-speech". I'm sorry but trying to link the 2 as they are somehow related issue is completely absurd. Reddit still has plenty of child porn, revenge porn and child grooming subs, so much that Reddit now keeps modlists hidden cause the depraved people Reddit hires as "supermods" apparently need that kind of protection to continue their misdeeds. I hope one day that depraved website and its depraved admins and "supermods" get its day of reckoning, in a court of law.
  - tsimionescu 5y ago
    > Child porn never add anything to do with "free-speech". Well, they are related in that the tools needed to combat one can also be used to combat the other. If I can delete a post because [I believe] it contains child porn, I can also delete a post because it's saying something I don't like.
ktownsend 5y ago
Thanks for taking the time to post this, and I'm sorry you had such a sh*tty start to life. I think it's important to repeat this over and over that the lines are so blurry with content online, and it's not really getting better. The whole idea of ethical porn is something that needs more discussion, and it's an area where if you enjoy porn you should put your money where your ideals are and encourage something involving consenting adults respecting certain norms, and treating people involved with the human dignity they deserve. Paying to encourage those kinds of ethical productions is the only sensible solution, IMO. Endlessly frequenting copy-and-paste free content sites is a race to the bottom that isn't doing anyone any good. In any case, I hope you have some people in your life who have shown you the respect you deserve as well, and been there to help when you needed it, and not just take what they could get from you whatever the cost. Edited for clarity and typos.
- werber 5y ago
  lol, it wasn't shitty, it was weird. there have been maybe 10-20 horrible days in my life. I also got to hang out with every rock star I looked up to, and hang out with almost every celebrity I loved. I have a few left on the list, but, with great highs come great lows. And, I never smoked crack, so at least I can say that.
- beebmam 5y ago
  If it's your kind of thing, there are so many incredibly talented furry & anime digital artists who you can commission to draw beautiful & ethical art for adults, where no sentient beings were ever harmed in its creation.
account-5 5y ago
Thank you for taking the time to write this. And sorry your childhood started how it did. Your story is important and more like it needs to be known more commonly. A couple of weeks ago on a related topic I was getting down voted for expressing that the child in these images is revictimised every time their images are viewed and shared. The attitude was the harm was already done so there was no issues, but that is definitely not the case.
flashgordon 5y ago
Holy mother of God. Hats off to you for "coming out" "normal". I know it is so so stupid of me to use the "normal" word but I wanted to celebrate your rescue, your enduring and the whole journey. Wouldn't wish it on anybody (even my worst enemy). Just reading this makes me so angry but I hope you are able to guide/provide safety to others based on your experience. Anything others can do in our daily lives to counter/attack this problem?
- werber 5y ago
  Umm, I honestly didn't have a problem with the sex work I did when I was younger until I was raped by NYPD officer at 17. I started off doing webcam shows, and I don't really have anything bad to say about it. I started prostitution at maybe 14, and it was honestly kinda fun, I don't recommend it, but a lot of the people paid for me thinking that I was an 18, if something bad happened I would pull the you just raped a child card, and have them empty their bank accounts at an ATM. And I still support sex workers. I was human trafficked not as a sex slave, but as a software and creative worker due to not having a visa in a country when I was about 19. I was being driven around in expensive cars and living in one of the poorest ghettos in the world. I didn't realize I was working for a gang until I had a package in my lap I was told not to look into, and obvi, I did and it was a brick of powder, so probably cocaine, but maybe heroin, and I kept doing the work, sleeping on my pile of clothes in a vermin infested home with plywood floors. I ran for my life when I came into the office and there was a pile of blood and a dead body. And when I say I ran for my life, I mean the physical act of running from people trying to murder me to shut me. Sorry for the vagueness, and lack of advice. Don't be a sex worker if you don't want to be raped, don't be lgbtqia+ if you don't want to be raped, and more than anything, don't be a woman. It's a reality for men as well, but most rapists are men, and most "victims" are women.
  - samsin 5y ago
    Why do you view the pornography at 15 as traumatic, while prostitution at the same age as "kinda fun"?
    - 5y ago
jbirer 5y ago
- willcipriano 5y ago
  - jbirer 5y ago
    - nl 5y ago
      @dang
  - dang 4y ago
    This is also a bannable offense on HN, regardless of how awful another comment is. Actually I was about to ban the GP for what they posted, but what you did here is so egregious that people would complain if I did that but didn't also ban you. So you actually threw the moderation response out of whack with this. In the future, flag the comment and email hn@ycombinator.com if more is needed. Don't post personal attacks and definitely don't do anything doxy. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - willcipriano 4y ago
      I appreciate your work here Dang and if you have to ban me I understand. I felt that I had to do something, no matter how small, to prevent someone who would speak like that about an eleven year old being raped repeatedly from coming in contact with children. I'm sorry for any headache I caused you.
- dang 4y ago
  You can't post like this here, and we ban accounts that do. No more of this, please. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

by werber 5y ago

throwra620 5y ago

giraffe_lady 5y ago

For a couple years around a decade ago I moderated a decent-sized but not massive subreddit and the frequency of child porn reports on there was chilling. It was every week at least. This was not at all a sexual sub, not even adjacent to porn or titillating images or anything. Reddit was more permissive than they should have been for a lot longer than they should have been and may not be representative. But even accounting for that, it really opened my eyes to how common it can be. This is also what turned me against free speech fundamentalism in the end. Every attempt at getting this addressed was shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship. Every time it was actually improved caused what felt like an internet-wide backlash against the changes.

commandlinefan 5y ago
> shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship Not to defend the material in question in any way - but the people who expressed concern... were right. As soon as Reddit gave mods the tools they needed to expunge the really terrible stuff from the site, those tools were almost immediately used to ban completely unrelated conspiracy subs.
- throwanem 5y ago
  I think lots of folks would consider that an entirely worthwhile tradeoff. Would you like to try to argue that it's not?
  - ipaddr 5y ago
    Why stop the tradeoff. Without the internet these things could not spread. Shut it down. People can take photos without permission from the government. Stop selling camera and charge camera resellers. Would you like to argue where your line is?
    - throwanem 5y ago
      Somewhere short of enabling revictimization so that r/thedonald doesn't have to pay for hosting.
- giraffe_lady 5y ago
  Um do you want to try again at not defending it? My information is very out of date but I'm curious how you know how unrelated they were. My more-than-lay understanding is that the trading didn't happen in the open. Users used questionable comments, line-toeing images, and "jailbait jokes" to find each other and then swapped in DMs or off-site entirely. Reddits mods have always had a rich grapevine. In my time I never once heard of a sub getting banned that didn't have a months or years long reputation for turning a blind eye to that. Possibly that completely changed after I left, sure.
  - newguynewphone 5y ago
  - notch656a 5y ago
    You can ban all speech and it would end the spread of these images altogether, at least to the extent the law can be policed. The ends don't justify the means.
hedora 5y ago
The older I get, the more I believe the issue is with centralization (which the DMCA had a huge part in establishing). What if there were no redit servers, and each subredit was self hosted? What would the incentive be for people to post child porn on some small independently run server? As the subredit owner, you could just censor whoever you wanted, with very little global internet drama. Tools for autoflagging posts could still exist. Over-censored forums would piss off users, and be easily replaced. Similarly, under censored ones would lose users / get busted. This all worked fine pre-internet. Editors would decide who and what would be posted. It still works for things like audio fiction podcasts, where "slush readers" filter submissions, and money / reputation are exchanged when stuff gets published. In addition to leading to much better moderation than the big Internet sites, it creates jobs for domain experts. The main problem is that it doesn't scale to a $1B/mo business that investors can siphon money off of. Instead, it's best structured as an ecosystem of small botique businesses.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  > What would the incentive be for people to post child porn on some small independently run server? But... that's precisely what the article is about? > The Korean agent showing Janczewski around eventually pointed the phone’s camera at a desktop computer on the floor of Son’s bedroom, a cheap-looking tower-style PC with its case open on one side. The computer’s guts revealed the hard drives that Son seemed to have added, one by one, as each drive had filled up with terabytes of child exploitation videos. > This was the Welcome to Video server. > "I was expecting some kind of glowing, ominous thing," Janczewski remembers, "and it was just this dumpy computer. It was just so strange. This dumpy computer, that had caused so much havoc around the world, was sitting on this kid’s floor."
  - otterley 5y ago
    The banality of evil, indeed.
  - crtasm 4y ago
    > But... that's precisely what the article is about? The incentive in this case was profit from/access to more CSAM. GP is referring to how most subreddits/forums do not have that incentive.
rubyist5eva 5y ago
> This is also what turned me against free speech fundamentalism in the end. Every attempt at getting this addressed was shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship. The solution is to put these vile pieces of sludge in prison forever, or execute them - not turn against liberty. This is a red herring for at least morally questionable people.
- giraffe_lady 5y ago
  If executing people fits with your conception of liberty I think we have very different understandings of liberty, and what "morally questionable" means.
  - notch656a 5y ago
    - rubyist5eva 5y ago
      Hey man, bullets are pretty cheap.
  - rubyist5eva 5y ago
    I have no objection whatsoever with executing people that torture our most vulnerable for sexual gratification. Liberty means the freedom to do what is right. Child exploitation isn’t even in an adjacent universe to that.
    - worik 5y ago
      > I have no objection whatsoever with executing people that torture our most vulnerable for sexual gratification. I have a problem with you executing people. There are plenty of hypothetical people whom we could agree deserve execution. The problem is: Who has the power? What else will they do with it? If the subjects of that power are kept alive then there is a chance to "put right" injustices, if not then not. That is the problem with execution as a "tool of justice"
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
throw_m239339 5y ago
> This is also what turned me against free speech fundamentalism in the end. Every attempt at getting this addressed was shot down in the name of free speech and anti-censorship. Every time it was actually improved caused what felt like an internet-wide backlash against the changes. Child porn never add anything to do with "free-speech". I'm sorry but trying to link the 2 as they are somehow related issue is completely absurd. Reddit still has plenty of child porn, revenge porn and child grooming subs, so much that Reddit now keeps modlists hidden cause the depraved people Reddit hires as "supermods" apparently need that kind of protection to continue their misdeeds. I hope one day that depraved website and its depraved admins and "supermods" get its day of reckoning, in a court of law.
- tsimionescu 5y ago
  > Child porn never add anything to do with "free-speech". Well, they are related in that the tools needed to combat one can also be used to combat the other. If I can delete a post because [I believe] it contains child porn, I can also delete a post because it's saying something I don't like.

ktownsend 5y ago

Thanks for taking the time to post this, and I'm sorry you had such a sh*tty start to life. I think it's important to repeat this over and over that the lines are so blurry with content online, and it's not really getting better. The whole idea of ethical porn is something that needs more discussion, and it's an area where if you enjoy porn you should put your money where your ideals are and encourage something involving consenting adults respecting certain norms, and treating people involved with the human dignity they deserve. Paying to encourage those kinds of ethical productions is the only sensible solution, IMO. Endlessly frequenting copy-and-paste free content sites is a race to the bottom that isn't doing anyone any good. In any case, I hope you have some people in your life who have shown you the respect you deserve as well, and been there to help when you needed it, and not just take what they could get from you whatever the cost. Edited for clarity and typos.

werber 5y ago
lol, it wasn't shitty, it was weird. there have been maybe 10-20 horrible days in my life. I also got to hang out with every rock star I looked up to, and hang out with almost every celebrity I loved. I have a few left on the list, but, with great highs come great lows. And, I never smoked crack, so at least I can say that.
beebmam 5y ago
If it's your kind of thing, there are so many incredibly talented furry & anime digital artists who you can commission to draw beautiful & ethical art for adults, where no sentient beings were ever harmed in its creation.

account-5 5y ago

Thank you for taking the time to write this. And sorry your childhood started how it did. Your story is important and more like it needs to be known more commonly. A couple of weeks ago on a related topic I was getting down voted for expressing that the child in these images is revictimised every time their images are viewed and shared. The attitude was the harm was already done so there was no issues, but that is definitely not the case.

flashgordon 5y ago

Holy mother of God. Hats off to you for "coming out" "normal". I know it is so so stupid of me to use the "normal" word but I wanted to celebrate your rescue, your enduring and the whole journey. Wouldn't wish it on anybody (even my worst enemy). Just reading this makes me so angry but I hope you are able to guide/provide safety to others based on your experience. Anything others can do in our daily lives to counter/attack this problem?

werber 5y ago
Umm, I honestly didn't have a problem with the sex work I did when I was younger until I was raped by NYPD officer at 17. I started off doing webcam shows, and I don't really have anything bad to say about it. I started prostitution at maybe 14, and it was honestly kinda fun, I don't recommend it, but a lot of the people paid for me thinking that I was an 18, if something bad happened I would pull the you just raped a child card, and have them empty their bank accounts at an ATM. And I still support sex workers. I was human trafficked not as a sex slave, but as a software and creative worker due to not having a visa in a country when I was about 19. I was being driven around in expensive cars and living in one of the poorest ghettos in the world. I didn't realize I was working for a gang until I had a package in my lap I was told not to look into, and obvi, I did and it was a brick of powder, so probably cocaine, but maybe heroin, and I kept doing the work, sleeping on my pile of clothes in a vermin infested home with plywood floors. I ran for my life when I came into the office and there was a pile of blood and a dead body. And when I say I ran for my life, I mean the physical act of running from people trying to murder me to shut me. Sorry for the vagueness, and lack of advice. Don't be a sex worker if you don't want to be raped, don't be lgbtqia+ if you don't want to be raped, and more than anything, don't be a woman. It's a reality for men as well, but most rapists are men, and most "victims" are women.
- samsin 5y ago
  Why do you view the pornography at 15 as traumatic, while prostitution at the same age as "kinda fun"?
  - 5y ago

jbirer 5y ago

willcipriano 5y ago
- jbirer 5y ago
  - nl 5y ago
    @dang
- dang 4y ago
  This is also a bannable offense on HN, regardless of how awful another comment is. Actually I was about to ban the GP for what they posted, but what you did here is so egregious that people would complain if I did that but didn't also ban you. So you actually threw the moderation response out of whack with this. In the future, flag the comment and email hn@ycombinator.com if more is needed. Don't post personal attacks and definitely don't do anything doxy. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - willcipriano 4y ago
    I appreciate your work here Dang and if you have to ban me I understand. I felt that I had to do something, no matter how small, to prevent someone who would speak like that about an eleven year old being raped repeatedly from coming in contact with children. I'm sorry for any headache I caused you.
dang 4y ago
You can't post like this here, and we ban accounts that do. No more of this, please. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html