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posted by martyb on Friday March 23 2018, @01:25PM   Printer-friendly
from the The-best-laid-schemes-o'-mice-an'-men-[an'-Congress]-Gang-aft-agley dept.

In Passing SESTA/FOSTA, Lawmakers Failed to Separate Their Good Intentions from Bad Law

The U.S. Senate just voted 97-2 to pass the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA, H.R. 1865), a bill that silences online speech by forcing Internet platforms to censor their users. As lobbyists and members of Congress applaud themselves for enacting a law tackling the problem of trafficking, let's be clear: Congress just made trafficking victims less safe, not more.

The version of FOSTA that just passed the Senate combined an earlier version of FOSTA (what we call FOSTA 2.0) with the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act (SESTA, S. 1693). The history of SESTA/FOSTA—a bad bill that turned into a worse bill and then was rushed through votes in both houses of Congress—is a story about Congress' failure to see that its good intentions can result in bad law. It's a story of Congress' failure to listen to the constituents who'd be most affected by the laws it passed. It's also the story of some players in the tech sector choosing to settle for compromises and half-wins that will put ordinary people in danger.

[...] Throughout the SESTA/FOSTA debate, the bills' proponents provided little to no evidence that increased platform liability would do anything to reduce trafficking. On the other hand, the bills' opponents have presented a great deal of evidence that shutting down platforms where sexual services are advertised exposes trafficking victims to more danger.

Freedom Network USA—the largest national network of organizations working to reduce trafficking in their communities—spoke out early to express grave concerns [.pdf] that removing sexual ads from the Internet would also remove the best chance trafficking victims had of being found and helped by organizations like theirs as well as law enforcement agencies.


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Arik on Friday March 23 2018, @02:06PM (7 children)

    by Arik (4543) on Friday March 23 2018, @02:06PM (#657118) Journal
    That's all this is. 'We can say we did something' - without doing anything meaningful.

    Want to stop trafficking? Do police work. Search the ads, make contact, investigate, and if you find evidence of a crime pursue it accordingly.

    No, no, let's just sweep it all under the rug by banning the ads instead. Will it help the victims? Of course not. But it will look great when it's time to run for re-election anyway, and it's so much cheaper and easier to do.
    --
    If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Friday March 23 2018, @02:27PM (5 children)

    by Ethanol-fueled (2792) on Friday March 23 2018, @02:27PM (#657123) Homepage

    Yeah, agreed. The past couple years all these "trafficking" things have been appearing in San Diego. Trafficking awareness billboards. All throughout the military industrial complex company--sponsored "report human trafficking" posters. How the fuck does that apply to us? You need to be a citizen, or at the very least a permanent resident, to work there.

    Probably the result of "Haiti Hillary" and the Dyncorp lobbyists' guilt complex. "Hey everybody, look what we're not doing and are totally against today!" Kinda like how Qualcomm recently put up billboards bragging about being a "San Diego Native" even though they're totally fucking Americans out of jobs with their huge army of H1-B labor.

    The most prudent thing to do about human-trafficking itself would be to halt unauthorized migration and enforce federal immigration laws. It's not human trafficking, after all, if those women are prostituting themselves in their own countries rather than ours. Which brings me to my next point -- the easiest way to solve most of prostitution's problems would be to just legalize it.

    • (Score: 4, Informative) by insanumingenium on Friday March 23 2018, @07:01PM

      by insanumingenium (4824) on Friday March 23 2018, @07:01PM (#657223) Journal
      Those notices you are seeing were probably due to the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act [ca.gov]. Some businesses in California is required to publicly disclose they they checked and they aren't doing any human trafficking and don't believe they are doing business with anyone doing any human trafficking.
    • (Score: 2, Troll) by PinkyGigglebrain on Friday March 23 2018, @07:18PM (3 children)

      by PinkyGigglebrain (4458) on Friday March 23 2018, @07:18PM (#657233)

      The USA should adopt similar laws to what most Nordic countries have.

      Last I heard was ;

      Offering sex in exchange for money: legal

      Offering money in exchange for sex: illegal

      The only people who get punished when these laws are enforced are the clients who "victimize"* the sex workers. It also allows sex workers to report abuse and violent behavior without them having to worry about being arrested themselves.

      Of course many of these types of laws in the USA (other places too) are not about helping victims but are about controlling to people. And this law is a perfect example of the later.

      *Many sex workers are doing it by choice. It might be their only income or an occasional supplement to their regular paycheck. The real victims are forced into sex work by threats or intimidation, and since they can not go to the police in the USA because they are more likely to be arrested than helped the laws just enable the real criminals.

      --
      "Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
      • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday March 23 2018, @09:14PM (1 child)

        by tangomargarine (667) on Friday March 23 2018, @09:14PM (#657261)

        So you can be arrested for engaging a prostitute, but the prostitute can't be arrested for offering it? Yeah, that protects the prostitute, but if I were a John I'd be nervous as hell about the whole thing.

        --
        "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 24 2018, @12:05AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 24 2018, @12:05AM (#657320)

          And it does little to solve the problems that black markets bring.

      • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 23 2018, @11:01PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 23 2018, @11:01PM (#657295)

        Offering sex in exchange for money: legal
        Offering money in exchange for sex: illegal

        The only people who get punished when these laws are enforced are the clients who "victimize"* the sex workers. It also allows sex workers to report abuse and violent behavior without them having to worry about being arrested themselves.

        The issue I have with this style of policy is that, if a sex worker really is being forced into it against their will, whoever is controlling their situation isn't going to give them any chances to contact the police. The only people such sex workers will have contact with, who might be able to help them, are the customers - who risk their own arrest if they go to the police.

  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday March 23 2018, @02:34PM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday March 23 2018, @02:34PM (#657125) Journal

    This is what you get when you kill your hippies [wikipedia.org]

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    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford