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.
read more: https://www.404media.co/girls-do-porn-victims-sue-pornhub-for-300-million/
And I've stated my view many, many times. I'm not cool with women getting abused. I would vastly prefer it if everything was ethical. It's not a realistic goal, and thus not one I entertain.
I consume porn. Most people consume porn. I have almost certainly watched a woman be raped. I have acknowledged that, as shitty of a thing as it is. I also do my best to ensure that the porn I consume is as ethical as possible. That's a REALISTIC goal. You will not keep the whole of the world from consuming porn, it's a useless endeavor. You CAN help educate people on what to look for in porn to help ensure it's safe. You CAN make some noise about the production companies being scumbags.
Happy? I've said all this already, but it's not a simple yes or no, there's nuance, and it will be lost.
Yeah, you said you'd do your best to ensure the porn you watch is ethical. I question what lengths you'd be willing to go to so that you're certain of that, but I'll take that you're willing to admit some work is owed on the part of men consuming porn to ensure that what they're consuming is ethical.
Do I think that its entirely possible to ever be 100% sure? No, and I will always avoid it for the rest of my life. So much as witnessing it feels inherently wrong, as I do not know the circumstances under which it is filmed. I implore people to do the same, but saying that you'll go out of your way to try and be sure that your not consuming sexual abuse materials is at least acknowledging that its not acceptable to you.
Think about it next time you're watching a video. Don't berate yourself but imagine the circumstances it was filmed other, whether that woman feels safe and feels like she can safely withdraw consent. Be empathetic to her, see her as an actual person and not a commodity being distributed. And follow through, you say you'll try and vet the content you consume - actually do that. And when women talk about how porn affects them, how it affects their relationships their careers and the way they're treated and viewed by society - listen. If you don't hate us then you should consider our perspectives and our experiences with an industry that affects us uniquely in a way it doesn't equally affect men.