Another 62 ‘Girls Do Porn’ Victims Sue Pornhub for $600 Million

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨tree@lemmy.zip⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://www.404media.co/girls-do-porn-victims-sue-pornhub-for-300-million/

A lawsuit filed by more victims of the sex trafficking operation claims that Pornhub’s moderation staff ignored reports of their abuse videos.

Sixty-one additional women are suing Pornhub’s parent company, claiming that the company failed to take down videos of their abuse as part of the sex trafficking operation Girls Do Porn. They’re suing the company and its sites for sex trafficking, racketeering, conspiracy to commit racketeering, and human trafficking.

The complaint, filed on Tuesday, includes what it claims are internal emails obtained by the plaintiffs, represented by Holm Law Group, between Pornhub moderation staff. The emails allegedly show that Pornhub had only one moderator to review 700,000 potentially abusive videos, and that the company intentionally ignored repeated reports from victims in those videos.

The damages and restitution they seek amounts to more than $311,100,000. They demand a jury trial, and seek damages of $5 million per plaintiff, as well as restitution for all the money Aylo, the new name for Pornhub’s parent company, earned “marketing, selling and exploiting Plaintiffs’ videos in an amount that exceeds one hundred thousand dollars for each plaintiff.”

The plaintiffs are 61 more unnamed “Jane Doe” victims of Girls Do Porn, adding to the 60 that sued Pornhub in 2020 for similar claims.
Girls Do Porn was a federally-convicted sex trafficking ring that coerced young women into filming pornographic videos under the pretense of “modeling” gigs. In some cases, the women were violently abused. The operators told them that the videos would never appear online, so that their home communities wouldn’t find out, but they uploaded the footage to sites like Pornhub, where the videos went viral—and in many instances, destroyed their lives. Girls Do Porn was an official Pornhub content partner, with its videos frequently appearing on the front page, where they gathered millions of views.

archive: archive.ph/zQWt3#selection-593.0-609.599

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Comments

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Kirkkh@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
What the actual fuck Pormhub. That’s like watching an action movie to only find out yet later that they actually murdered the actors. Never go long on that site again.

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- rostby@lemmy.fmhy.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I never last that long anyways
  
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- DudemanJenkins@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Amazon still sells Milo & Otis
  
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- jaybone@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Is there a good porn site alternative?
  
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  - SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    The entire internet
    
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  - tim1996@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Pretty much only somthing like Reddits gonewild community. Wich forces uploaders to verify and not be a seller. Its mostly for pictures tho. Atleast thats as far as i can see.
    
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Damage@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
It’s quite simple honestly, if you profit off something, you have the responsibility to make sure it’s legal. We all like platforms like YouTube where you can find anything you want, but the truth is that they’re currently unsustainable when forced to comply with the law.

With the advent of AI there’s hope for improved systems for detecting violations, but it doesn’t seem to be there yet.

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- hellothere@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I agree that pornhub, et al, should be liable for abuse their platform distributes, but how on earth is AI meant to help in sex trafficking?
  
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  - riskable@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    AI will help with sex trafficking by generating all the porn so humans won’t need to be involved at all.
    
    In the future the equivalent lawsuit will be from the victims of hackers who used people’s PCs to generate porn.
    
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  - elbarto777@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Ideally, sci-fi style, an effective AI can sift through all the reports and take down the videos that are clearly suspicious (as opposed to popular and well-known videos of porn stars that could be found elsewhere, for example, in dvd format.) It could message the reporter asking for more information, for example. Then it could message an actual human for the videos it is not confident to deem as abusive.
    
    It could do this without never being tired never being hungry, never feeling shocked.
    
    In practice, we’re not there yet. Close, but not there.
    
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  - StalksEveryone@futurology.today ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    that’s for the bad guys to figure out in prison after being arrested
    
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- NuPNuA@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  As soon as you open anything to user generated content you run the risk that they’re going to do something dodgy with that access. More than a decade ago I remember they added the emblem creator to Call of Duty and people were making swastikas within minutes.
  
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- assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Well here’s the question, is an AI detection software legal if it’s trained to identify this material? Strictly speaking, unless it is 100% free, selling the AI software would be profiting off the illegal material that you used to teach the AI.
  
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- barsoap@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  
  It’s quite simple honestly, if you profit off something, you have the responsibility to make sure it’s legal.
  
  Morally, yes, in practice that’s not how our economy generally works, this is a gigantic can of worms from cobalt mines to work safety in Asian textile factories and back and forth and into a gazillion places. Germany has recent legislation about this but AFAIK it’s the only such legislation in the world.
  
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  - Damage@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Well, countries’ laws, with some exceptions, only have authority within their own borders.
    
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- ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Yes, but how far does due diligence go in a matter like this? If company A is buying things they get from company B and company B gives company A all the proper paperwork, is it company A’s responsibility to make sure company B didn’t do anything illegal to obtain what they had? Was there a reason for company A to suspect company B was illegally obtaining something that many other companies legally and legitimately acquire?
  
  I don’t think so. I think in that case it would be completely company B that is at fault 100%.
  
  I think it starts to become also company A’s fault when it can be shown that they were aware of company B possibly obtaining things illegally or that company A started getting complaints about what company B was illegally doing. This here is more like what pornhub has done. They seemed to have purposefully understaffed the review and complaints department in order to more or less ignore complaints. Up until that part I don’t think PH would be responsible.
  
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  - Damage@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    If you re-sell for example stolen goods, your proceeds from those sale may be taken from you together with whatever stolen good you have on stock, and if you are found to be aware of the illegal origin of those goods, then you are an accomplice and are charged accordingly.
    
    That’s why buyers of used items have the difficult task of ascertaining whether those items are stolen or not.
    
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Hyperreality@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Given their videos were so highly ranked, the prevalence of coercion in the industry, and the fact that it's often impossible to tell if someone's been threatened behind the scenes, it's highly likely that most people reading this who have watched porn online have also watched plenty of videos of actual rapes.

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- anarchy79@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I wonder how many products you’ve bought in your life were made by child labor.
  
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  - ClockworkOtter@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    There is no ethical consumption under capitalism
    
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  - Hyperreality@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Do two wrongs make a right?
    
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  - ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I guess it would depend on if the person wears clothing or not
    
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  - scarabic@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Not to mention the animal suffering we’re all responsible for with all our soaps and cosmetic products being sprayed into their eyes and rubbed into their skin to make sure it’s safe for us. And while I believe animals can be raised for meat humanely and ethically, they’re very often not.
    
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- Arotrios@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I avoid this by not watching porn that makes me sad. There's plenty of consensual, happy, joyful sex-positive porn out there.
  
  While your point is valid about this particular situation (which is horrible and criminal on multiple levels), your overbroad generalization of porn and the implied assumption of guilt in the viewers is what's led folks to react negatively to your statement.
  
  On a larger level, this kind of statement plays into the puritanical doctrines towards sex that paint it as a negative force, and subsequently leads to the twisting of a positive, creative act into a negative expression of power and rape in those that accept those doctrines.
  
  Porn is not at fault here, nor are its viewers. Those at fault in this crime are the producers and publishers, who were well aware of the abuses happening under their watch, and deceived their viewers into believing they were observing consensual performance acts. I hope that these women get every cent and more, and it would be excellent to see a class action suit from Pornhub's subscribers arise in tandem to and in support of their complaint.
  
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  - RaoulDook@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Exactly, it’s not too hard to find videos where you can see by their faces and sounds that they’re having a good time. If they’re not then it’s a turn off
    
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  - Cryophilia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    That works for you but a lot of people get off on the “dominating” side of things, especially women.
    
    I’m like you, I hate that kind of stuff so I’m pretty sure I’ve never gotten off to it, but it’s popular for a reason.
    
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- onlinepersona@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Alright, get rid of your phone. Everyone who bought a diamond is evil too. Do you love chocolate? You monster! Children most likely collected that. Clothes? My dear boy, you are supporting the exploitation of third world poors. Did you buy cheap veggies? Bloody psycho, you might as well be standing with a gun over the hordes of immigrants picking most of those for unliveable wages. Go to the cinema, watch a video on youtube, or listen to music on spotify, or vote for a conservative? How dare you support industries that have known child molesters, wage slaves, lobby for worse living standards, donate to hate groups, and and and?
  
  “Oh, but that’s involuntary, I need those to survive”. Do you? Do you really? Did you need to buy a new phone? Is chocolate really necessary? Why don’t you pick your own fruit? Music, video, and other pleasures aren’t necessary to survive either.
  
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  - winter@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    That’s a lot of words for “I know, but I really don’t want to give up my porn 😭”
    
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  - Hyperreality@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Do you have an argument other than a tu quoque?
    
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  - LadyAutumn@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    So you’re fine with the fact that you’ve almost certainly, essentially guaranteed to have, masturbated to a woman being raped? What the living fuck is wrong with you?
    
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- disposabletentacle@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  This is why I stick to hentai. No traficking or coercion or questionable consent there, just a bunch of nerds doing what they love.
  
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  - _danny@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    [deleted]
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  - Tick_Dracy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    You don’t know if someone is being held hostage in a basement, and being threat to death in order to draw some pictures, while being whipped whenever they fail to meet the daily quota. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
    
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  - DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Drawing shotacon, as Zeus intended.
    
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- LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  But what is the prevalence of coercion in the industry? Is that known? Can it be known?
  
  Most people I’ve heard speak about their experiences in the porn industry say this type of coercion is rare. GDP was a unique situation. Virtually everyone knew (or should have known) they were bad news for years before law enforcement got involved. I remember arguing with people about this. And actually one of the things people said was “who cares, this kind of thing is everywhere in the industry, they know what they’re getting into.” So I actually think that not only is there no evidence to support that, but this idea can even be harmful by painting the better behaved studios with a broad stroke, and giving the fewer bad actors somewhere to hide.
  
  I think the best way to help sex workers, if this is something that concerns you, is to treat them with respect, call out the hateful stigma against their work, and support efforts to organize for worker protections. Despite the fact that most studios are not out there raping people left and right, like most industries, there is often a power imbalance between workers and owners and this sometimes leads to exploitation.
  
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- Rengoku@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Sabe your fucking houlier than thou attitude for yourself.
  
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  - Hyperreality@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque
    
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  - LadyAutumn@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I don’t understand, are you saying that not being okay with watching porn of a woman being raped is somehow a pretentious position? What are you on?
    
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- loopedcandle@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I am a regular consumer of online porn. And I’ll admit, I loved their videos. Now knowing what was going on, that’s on me to do some thinking, i have probably watched a rape and helped the perpetrator make money from that act. That’s hard on the conscience. I don’t know what to think about it.
  
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  - Ookami38@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    The fault lies squarely on the shoulders of the producers. You hold as much guilt for that action as anyone who has ever purchased a cell phone has for the conditions for the workers are subjected to. Which isn’t to say 0, but it’s so small that it may as well be.
    
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  - eatthecake@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Really? You don’t know how to feel about jerking off to rape? I know how to feel about you. POS.
    
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- Son_of_dad@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Hate their videos, most of the girls always look bored or not into it, which is now clear why. That’s why there’s a rise in homemade, Indy models and couples putting up the best videos recently, cause you can tell the people involved are actually into it and enjoying it.
  
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  - Cryophilia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    These things move in cycles.
    
    People want amateur porn.
    
    Companies don’t.
    
    Amateur porn rises until it gets purged, then a few years later it rises again.
    
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- Ookami38@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I think the bigger problem is, you as a consumer have no way of knowing. And it’s SO prevalent, that yeah, you almost certainly have. But I can’t really know, or do much as a consumer. Don’t make it like the people just watching are the ones perpetuating the problem instead of the ones who are producing this shit.
  
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  - Son_of_dad@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I can always kind of tell. Half those videos the girls look straight up scared and not enjoying it
    
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- Kirkkh@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Wow the downvotes are really telling. You’re totally right — I’ve gravitated to supporting the girls directly with OF, I know that’s not perfect but it’s hopefully a safer direction.
  
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  - jcit878@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I just can’t get behind (heh) OF personally. evey video I’ve ever seen has just looked like a tiktok/insta “influencer” having sex and it is just a massive turnoff for me. the lighting is just so off all the time. looks more produced than actual produced stuff. just doesn’t do it for me
    
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  - Default_Defect@midwest.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Unfortunately, we can’t know for sure that OF models aren’t subject to similar abuse either, but its likely a safer bet.
    
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- eatthecake@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I have never watched porn. Some would say that makes me inhuman but it can be done. Those of us with experience in the sex industry would never say ‘sex positive’.
  
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Son_of_dad@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
I always hated GDP videos cause the girls never looked like they wanted to be there, now I know why, they didn’t. There’s a lot of porn out there where the girl is very clearly not enjoying it or just laying there, I don’t know how anyone finds that hot.

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- Cryophilia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Honestly I’m running into that a lot with women, especially younger women. They all want to be “dominated” and it does nothing for me.
  
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  - PM_ME_FEET_PICS@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Consensual non-consent is also surprisingly common with younger women as well. Makes me very uncomfortable.
    
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- A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Rapists.
  
  Rapists find it hot.
  
  Like the rapists that ran GDP.
  
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  - wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Or, like, half of the BDSM community who enjoy when this is roleplayed, like what everyone watching these videos thought it was.
    
    Unless you think anyone who plays video games with guns only find it fun cause theyre murderers?
    
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- Thranduil@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Gdp?
  
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Wanderer@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Think the free and open internet dream is dead.

Corporations are going to rule the world.

The amateur porn glory days are gone.

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- Smoogs@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Right cuz that’s the real tragedy here. Not that many women got raped, extorted, targetted, bullied had their livelihood and reputations ruined.
  
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- SCB@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  This is literally the golden age of amateur porn.
  
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- MinusPi@yiffit.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  The Fediverse is the solution.
  
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- MiltownClowns@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Onlyfans.
  
  I think you mean the glory days of stolen porn and videos uploaded w/o both parties consent are gone. Which is a weird thing to reminisce about when you think of these as videos of people and not things to make your peepee hard.
  
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- DrFuggles@feddit.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Lustery.com exists, fyi
  
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surewhynotlem@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Can we have AI generated porn now ?

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- lloram239@feddit.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  We’ve had that for about a year now.
  
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- Cethin@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Why take jobs away from people? There are plenty of porn actors who are not being abused. Why would we want to centralize it all more than it is with an automated “AI” tool?
  
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tryptaminev@feddit.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
If the allegations hold up in court i hope aside from the victims to be properly compensated that multiple heads go to prison. Being the head of an organized crime ring that is trafficking and rapeing people for profit, in this case at least all C levels of Aylo, should get a life sentence and all assets seized.

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mojo@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

The emails allegedly show that Pornhub had only one moderator to review 700,000 potentially abusive videos(…)

Well that’d be an interesting job to put on a resume

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nicoweio@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Was this after PH removed all content from non-verified accounts? If so, one might wonder how much it actually helped.

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mosiacmango@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
For the full scope of what these sick fucks at GDP did to hundreds of women, read the DOJ sentencing document for the main actor/recruiter

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ubermeisters@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
OP article says 61 women, just as a polite heads up.I think you’ve got a title edit to make maybe, if you care.

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Mandy@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
the fact the website had girls and porn in the same sentence alone is like, a big fucking red flag. Being called a girl as an adult, especially in porn feels demeaning at best or at worst, has some worrying implication (intended or not)

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299792458c137@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
62? what about hundreds more vids they had just like that? add the fact that most of the people who watch porn just skip past the interview so they seldom see the consent of the actors involved.

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protovack@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
what they did was clearly terrible, but at the same time, this is what happens when you make the age of consent for this stuff 18. you could make the exact same argument about military service, they use all the same tactics. I hope they win and get some money and a piece of their dignity back, but what’s done is done. raise your kids right, and don’t normalize objectification of women, teach your daughters to be strong, and they’ll never have to respond to a sketchy ad about “modeling” in the back of some city rag.

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eatthecake@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Tha vast majority of men could not care care less about how the victims of their porn feel. Im fairly certain that an erection shuts down any empathy in most men.

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FormerlyChucks@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
It’s time to ban all pornography, literally nothing good comes from it.

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