Dearest readers, I'm sure most of us have by now caught up with the shocking yet not so shocking news- Backpage is gone, likely permanently. It was seized by the FBI, and the people in charge have been accused of money laundering, human trafficking and so on. The accusations have been helped by the fact that USA changed its laws, allowing for prosecution of websites that feature user ads for sex services featuring trafficked individuals. Previously, no website was ever guilty of the content posted on it by other people. Putting aside that this law was unfairly passed to affect certain types of sites instead of a blanket law to affect all sites (including Facebook, YouTube etc.), I think it is really important to address all the wrong reasons for which this was done, the downsides of taking it down, and the horribly biased portrayal of Backpage in the media. Oh, and I'll do it while suspending my own bias, so there's that.
The number one wrong reason why Backpage was taken down is because it's a part of the government's was or sex work. While it is certainly not the most glamorous type of work in the world (though it can be), and it carries with it a list of risks and dangers, it is by far not the only such type of work. Working in the military- while noble- can be nasty, bloody, murderous and supremely dangerous. You may say it's a necessary evil, but then there's a host of people who would say the same for sex work. Also, sex work is stigmatized due to the West's religious and cultural traditions. The same traditions don't nearly stigmatize jobs where you excel by becoming increasingly proficient at killing people with guns, knives and bare hands (looking at you, military). Again, I don't have any qualms about military; I simply believe that there is a religious and cultural bias against sex work that is not being extended to other types of work with similar traits, and it unfairly helped stoke the fire against Backpage. Another big issue with the seizure of the site is that, in many ways, Backpage it the storefront of a major company that I assume paid at least most of its taxes and employed people. While managers, presidents and CEO's in companies of all sizes tend to get indicted and jailed from time to time, it almost never involves shutting down the whole company. Did Volkswagen get completely shut down or banned from USA for what its management allowed and even encouraged to happen with falsifying emissions test results? No, of course not.
Now, let's look at the downsides of taking Backpage down, as yes they do exist for a variety of stakeholders. First, the authorities all over North America, if not the world, will suffer insofar as the fight against human trafficking goes. For example, RCMP here in Canada used Backpage ads to try and identify those individuals who are victims of human trafficking, and the website even made it easier to figure out where they are on any given day. While this wasn't a full-proof approach, they did use it and it did work at least some of the time, which in human trafficking and forced escorting cases is better than nothing. Another downside is that Backpage hurt independent escorts and other adult service providers. It was a behemoth of a site, a one stop solution, and it charged a reasonable amount of money for what it did. Now that it's gone, independent workers are forced to pay sometimes exorbitant sums on other smaller, less known sums in order to advertise. Also, since many of these smaller sites are fighting to become the next Backpage (sans the criminal allegations and getting taken down by FBI), one needs to advertise on all of them, which is far from ideal. Finally, Backpage strictly enforced ad rules in terms of written content, pics and videos that kept everyone in check. I have yet to see most other sites in this space do the same.
Finally, let's go over the media's mostly biased and horrible portrayal of Backpage. First, the initial and later reports in most major North American news outlets have called Backpage a major online brothel. This is a false equivalency at best. Backapge was a site with all sorts of classifieds that had an Adult section as well. Next. online brothel is an oxymoron. A brothel is a physical location that often offers resources, security and relative safety to sex workers. Backpage was not tasked with that- it's merely an advertising site. Next, the media focused on the legislative change that helped this happen without discussing possible laws to regulate and punish YouTube and Facebook for content posted on these platforms that breaks the law or causes harm to individuals citizens as well as entire societies. Finally, the media makes every sex worker into a victim or a trafficked victim, which couldn't be further from the truth. Sure, they can say that the government or society have failed sex workers and that's why sex workers do what they do. Hmm, but then we can go back to the example of military and say that the sole reason for its existence is also that the governments of the world consistently fail to guide us to a post-military world of global peace and prosperity. Hey, there are people who argue that most of us end up doing jobs we hate because the government or the society or whatever has failed us in some way. I'll leave that one up to you.
So to reiterate, I am not a Backpage apologist, and I really tried to type this while suspending my bias towards many aspects of this topic. This is the side of the Backpage scandal that isn't receiving enough coverage, and that is problematic to say the least. The most problematic thing of all, however, is that an entire company got taken down over the oldest profession in the world that has been in huge demand ever since the first time a woman in a cave somewhere accepted a piece of mastodon meat in exchange for sex. Go figure...
The number one wrong reason why Backpage was taken down is because it's a part of the government's was or sex work. While it is certainly not the most glamorous type of work in the world (though it can be), and it carries with it a list of risks and dangers, it is by far not the only such type of work. Working in the military- while noble- can be nasty, bloody, murderous and supremely dangerous. You may say it's a necessary evil, but then there's a host of people who would say the same for sex work. Also, sex work is stigmatized due to the West's religious and cultural traditions. The same traditions don't nearly stigmatize jobs where you excel by becoming increasingly proficient at killing people with guns, knives and bare hands (looking at you, military). Again, I don't have any qualms about military; I simply believe that there is a religious and cultural bias against sex work that is not being extended to other types of work with similar traits, and it unfairly helped stoke the fire against Backpage. Another big issue with the seizure of the site is that, in many ways, Backpage it the storefront of a major company that I assume paid at least most of its taxes and employed people. While managers, presidents and CEO's in companies of all sizes tend to get indicted and jailed from time to time, it almost never involves shutting down the whole company. Did Volkswagen get completely shut down or banned from USA for what its management allowed and even encouraged to happen with falsifying emissions test results? No, of course not.
Now, let's look at the downsides of taking Backpage down, as yes they do exist for a variety of stakeholders. First, the authorities all over North America, if not the world, will suffer insofar as the fight against human trafficking goes. For example, RCMP here in Canada used Backpage ads to try and identify those individuals who are victims of human trafficking, and the website even made it easier to figure out where they are on any given day. While this wasn't a full-proof approach, they did use it and it did work at least some of the time, which in human trafficking and forced escorting cases is better than nothing. Another downside is that Backpage hurt independent escorts and other adult service providers. It was a behemoth of a site, a one stop solution, and it charged a reasonable amount of money for what it did. Now that it's gone, independent workers are forced to pay sometimes exorbitant sums on other smaller, less known sums in order to advertise. Also, since many of these smaller sites are fighting to become the next Backpage (sans the criminal allegations and getting taken down by FBI), one needs to advertise on all of them, which is far from ideal. Finally, Backpage strictly enforced ad rules in terms of written content, pics and videos that kept everyone in check. I have yet to see most other sites in this space do the same.
Finally, let's go over the media's mostly biased and horrible portrayal of Backpage. First, the initial and later reports in most major North American news outlets have called Backpage a major online brothel. This is a false equivalency at best. Backapge was a site with all sorts of classifieds that had an Adult section as well. Next. online brothel is an oxymoron. A brothel is a physical location that often offers resources, security and relative safety to sex workers. Backpage was not tasked with that- it's merely an advertising site. Next, the media focused on the legislative change that helped this happen without discussing possible laws to regulate and punish YouTube and Facebook for content posted on these platforms that breaks the law or causes harm to individuals citizens as well as entire societies. Finally, the media makes every sex worker into a victim or a trafficked victim, which couldn't be further from the truth. Sure, they can say that the government or society have failed sex workers and that's why sex workers do what they do. Hmm, but then we can go back to the example of military and say that the sole reason for its existence is also that the governments of the world consistently fail to guide us to a post-military world of global peace and prosperity. Hey, there are people who argue that most of us end up doing jobs we hate because the government or the society or whatever has failed us in some way. I'll leave that one up to you.
So to reiterate, I am not a Backpage apologist, and I really tried to type this while suspending my bias towards many aspects of this topic. This is the side of the Backpage scandal that isn't receiving enough coverage, and that is problematic to say the least. The most problematic thing of all, however, is that an entire company got taken down over the oldest profession in the world that has been in huge demand ever since the first time a woman in a cave somewhere accepted a piece of mastodon meat in exchange for sex. Go figure...