FBI Seizes Backpage.com, a Site Criticized For Sex-Related Ads (reuters.com) 163
The FBI has reportedly seized the sex marketplace website Backpage.com, according to a posting on its website on Friday. "The posting said the U.S. Justice Department would provide more information at 6 p.m. EDT," reports Reuters. "It said U.S. attorneys in Arizona and California, as well as the Justice Department's section on child exploitation and obscenity and the California and Texas attorneys general had supported the work in shutting down the website." From the report: Lawmakers and enforcement officials have been working to crack down on the site, the second largest classified ad service in the country after Craigslist that is used primarily to sell sex. The U.S. Senate passed legislation last month making it easier for state prosecutors and sex-trafficking victims to sue social media networks, advertisers and others that fail to keep sex trafficking and other exploitative materials off their platforms. The Supreme Court in January 2017 refused to consider reviving a lawsuit against backpage.com filed by three young women alleging the site facilitated their forced prostitution. But the site has since then faced a slew of other lawsuits alleging child sex trafficking. According to AZCentral, local FBI officials have confirmed "law enforcement activity" Friday morning at the Sedona-area home of Michael Lacey, a co-founder of Backpage.com. The raid comes amid what appears to be a shut-down of the website.
When does google.com get seized for the same thing (Score:5, Insightful)
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When they no longer feed their congress critters money.
Re:When does google.com get seized for the same th (Score:4, Insightful)
To add to your point - this seizure is global, backpage and its affiliates (cracker etc) have a global presence, including in countries where prostitution is legal ( e.g. New Zealand), and now those sites, escort categories and *everything* else, are gone.
People here on Slashdot constantly rail against EU laws being enacted globally, and here we have a US law being enacted in just that fashion.
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Nah, we complained about the Megaupload seizure, and about the TPP being shoved down other countries' throats. The situation with Assange looks pretty sketchy as well.
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'ER' not datamining like FBI datamining. Why seize Backpage, not so much what they did but their collection of data about what other people did. Even if they can not get the conviction to stick, they can still go on a fishing expedition through Backpage servers and find who did what with whom for direct prosecutions or FBI level extortions or to add to other investigations.
sex is bad (Score:4, Informative)
Americans need to learn sex is bad, if you have sex you will have babies, and no one wants americans to have babies.
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It seems these 'chimps' are more skilled and hard working than you, or they wouldn't be able to take your job.
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Oh, yes. Religion has zero business running anything in a free society.
Re: sex is bad (Score:2)
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The US military doesn't enforce Christianity, ...
Don't tell that to victims of the Evangelical Mob at the U.S.A.F. Academy. [archive.org]
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Fortunately most that part of the Christian right is busy dying off from old age now. You'll find most modern Christians are plenty happy to enjoy sex, they just get married first. Unfortunately, the sex-negative half of feminism seems determined to take up the slack with their own pinched-faced moral scolding. I guess there's just a percentage of people who will adopt whatever ideology is convenient in order to be unhappy and try to force it on others.
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Keep in mind that the Christian right really hasn't been a voting force for a while. On the other hand, the puritan left has become a voting force. You've got sex-negative feminism as you pointed out, but there's also a general sex-negative leftism as well. Just look at all the neo-puritains that rail against video games and movies that have sexual content from the left.
What I find annoying as hell is how the old-hacks who railed against movies and video games, now feel emboldened by the very loud minorit
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Keep in mind that the Christian right really hasn't been a voting force for a while. On the other hand, the puritan left has become a voting force. You've got sex-negative feminism as you pointed out, but there's also a general sex-negative leftism as well. Just look at all the neo-puritains that rail against video games and movies that have sexual content from the left.
What I find annoying as hell is how the old-hacks who railed against movies and video games, now feel emboldened by the very loud minority voices among the left pushing for censorship to the point that they can dust off their old talking points and start anew. And the same media outlets, those same voices who screeched that those right-wingers were assholes for trying to censor, are right there...nodding their heads in agreement. Here's two good examples, Jack Thompson is now paraded by leftist sites as a moral voice. And a nearly dead right-wing organization got Cosmopolitan removed from walmart by riding on the heels of left wing screeching.
On what planet do you think the christian right has lost voting power? Because this is earth, where the Christian right, who make up almost a majority of the population far outweighs the fledgling "sex negative left". Either you are anti-left astro turfing, or a neck beard libertarian far out of touch with reality.
Re: sex is bad (Score:4, Funny)
America has no Puritanism left because America has no left. Bernie Sanders is on the moderate right and he's as left as America gets.
If you think Bernie Sanders is on the moderate right, then you're so far left that Stalin might be right-wing. Nearly all of his views are to the left of the NDP and Greens in Canada. And we call the NDP "communist lite" for their views.
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But yes Stalin is definitely right-wing, can't you see how he destroyed the Russian revolution and many others?
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Trump is in the Whitehouse, women are protesting in the streets, the government is explicitly anti-feminist...
Conservatives are trying to make you register to see porn, regulate people's bathroom usage...
And somehow it's still feminism's fault.
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Trump is in the Whitehouse, women are protesting in the streets, the government is explicitly anti-feminist...
And yet nobody, not even them can explain what they're protesting. They had no problems ignoring the Clintons for decades doing worse then Trump's locker room talk, or ignoring and/or covering up payouts for sexual harassment in government. The government being anti-feminist is a good thing, if you don't think so then you haven't figured out just how fast a persons life is destroyed by a false accusation. Remember feminism promotes "listen and believe." And also promotes no-punishment for false accusati
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Considering modern feminism dumped equality, decided to go full authoritarian. Screeches that a "penis in vagina" is rape. Has a very serious man-hatred problem. Fights against domestic abuse shelters for men. That prominent voices state that rape can only be done by men. Promoting anti-equality under law legislation - meaning guilt before innocence no matter the case. Promoting anti-exculpatory evidence laws. Promoting no jail sentences for violent female offenders.
Yeah, I'd say feminism has some good blame to soak.
Well, feminism is not a homogeneous movement. However, the anti-equality stance is right in the name and the faction you refer to is basically nothing else than gender-based fascism. As such, they are far worse than the worst excesses of the patriarchate ever was. Yes, I am aware that that basically amounted to treating grown women as children and that is not acceptable. But these feminazis are treating men as not even human and that is far, far worse.
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You're quite right, it's not homogeneous. But those very loud voices with those points you made are the views that are being pushed in colleges, universities, and in the media. To the point where non-radfems, are attacked in the media for being "the wrong kind of feminist."
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Of course there are some asshat feminists. But do they have any real power? Could they actually have got the FBI to take down backpage.com? Are the millions of women who marched around the world all feminazis?
It's just a stupid conspiracy theory, they kind of shit Mashiki eats for breakfast. If feminism was that powerful the world would look very different.
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"That's why you got Trump." pretty much sums up your comment and my agreement with the last line.
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Well, what can I say? +1, insightful is probably the right thing. Also remember that the catastrophe of the prohibition was caused by a female movement. I am beginning to suspect that women with power are on average so much worse than men with power (who are really, really bad), that this is the origin of the idea of the patriarchate.
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What, no religious fuckup standing up for his or her perverted beliefs? I am disappointed. Now they seem to have added "cowardice" to their core values.
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You are deranged.
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This is not true. You are overgeneralizing, most Christians do believe sex should be enjoyed. But that it should be enjoyed within marriage, and that as a part of the deal, you have to accept the responsibilities of raising children. James Dobson is one example of a Christian author who explains that sex is god's gift, but it has a dual purpose, it has to be both for pleasure AND for making children and you have to accept both as part of the deal. It is also written that sex has to be inside a context of a
Re: sex is bad (Score:2)
Actually, no, they don't. Biblically, sex is marriage, therefore there is no other sort.
Re: sex is bad (Score:2)
Obviously, So anything you can do to help marginalise the christian right further would be greatly appreciated.
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We* never said that.
Love,
The Christian Right
* For values of "we" equal to the vast majority of people who are Republican, Christian or both.
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What's wrong with sex for the pure enjoyment of it? Why should you shackle yourself to any one person for life, or necessarily be expected to risk pregnancy out of any and every sexual encounter?
There's nothing wrong with free sex or multiple partners through out one's life. If you find a person whom you're willing to settle down with, marry, and have kids, great. But marriage shouldn't be the only place where people can enjoy physical love.
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If you view it as "shackling yourself to one person" you are having sex with the wrong people.
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What if you want to have sex but don't want to necessarily be in a life-long relationship with any one person? Or perhaps haven't met that person yet?
You don't get a choice if a child is born as a result. You're going to interact with that person for the rest of your life whether you like it or not.
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Exactly. Time to teach people about birth control in high school health ed, nationally, so they know what's available, how to use it, and how to get it. (Ideally, give out free condoms everywhere, no questions asked, like NYC health clinics and universities do.)
No exceptions. It's part of modern science and technology, and I don't care if it steps on some Bible/Koran/Torah thumpers' sensitive widdle toesies. It's all about personal choice, and the best way to prevent abortion is not to get pregnant in t
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Time to teach people about birth control in high school health ed, nationally, so they know what's available, how to use it, and how to get it. (Ideally, give out free condoms everywhere, no questions asked, like NYC health clinics and universities do.)
Is this not already being done? I'm under the impression that birth control is highly publicised and free. Condoms are given out free (no questions asked) where I've been.
Where are you living where this is not the case?
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I didn't realise it was that popular. I looked it up now and first hit on google says that 23% of sex-ed classes are abstinence. Of course that doesn't mean that birth control isn't taught and/or provided in those 23% of public schools.
Looking deeper into it (I wanted to see if any correlation exists between states with free BC and teenage pregnancies) and I found this public research over here. [nih.gov]
Some interesting information from that document:
Among the 48 states in this analysis (all U.S. states except North Dakota and Wyoming), 21 states stressed abstinence-only education in their 2005 state laws and/or policies (level 3), 7 states emphasized abstinence education (level 2), 11 states covered abstinence in the context of comprehensive sex education (level 1), and 9 states did not mention abstinence (level 0) in their state laws or policies (Figure 1). In 2005, level 0 states had an average (± standard error) teen pregnancy rate of 58.78 (±4.96), level 1 states averaged 56.36 (±3.94), level 2 states averaged 61.86 (±3.93), and level 3 states averaged 73.24 (±2.58) teen pregnancies per 1000 girls aged 14â"19 (Table 3).
The most effective method (assuming that the study had a sound methodology) appears to be comprehensive sex-ee rather than BC only. The studies conclusion mentions this as well.
It is also interesting to note that even the states with comprehensive sex-ed had more than double the teen pregnancy rate of other countries. I take that to mean that there is some other factor on teen prengancy rates that has a larger impact on the rate than sex-ed.
For example, the difference in rate between comprehensive sex-ed and abstinence only sex-ed is 16.8 - this is a smaller difference than than the difference between the US rate and other developer countries' rates: the US' best rate is 30.6 higher, 37.56 higher, 44.56 higher, 27.16 higher and 15.06 higher than the other countries in the study.
This tells me that merely providing comprehensive sex-ed and banning abstinence-only sex-ed like other countries do would still leave the US with a rate so much higher it can only be regarded as an outlier.
These researchers should have looked at the results as an opportunity to research what factors influence the average rate in other countries to be so much lower than the lowest in the US.
Replacing absintence-only sex-ed with comprehensive sex-ed doesn't fix the US' teen pregnancy rate. It lowers it, yes, but not by much, comparatively.
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Who says everyone needs to "participate in the community" in exactly the same manner? Personal choice -- people should marry because they want to, not have marriage as their only option to satisfy a human need.
Some people want to get married, settle down in a boring suburban hell, and have kids. Others may want to marry and not have kids. Still others might just want to sample the wares and maybe eventually settle down. Others might think there are more important things than marriage and kids, but contr
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Not really...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Re: sex is bad well, since the actual article was (Score:2)
Definately, the legal age for americans to have sex should be at least 35: any younger and they are still fertile.
Not signed yet (Score:4, Informative)
SESTA isn't in effect yet. It hasn't been signed into law yet.
They've stated this siezure is the result of prior laws, they have been investigating this under already existing legislation for a while now.
Which means SESTA wasn't even necessary to begin with.
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Of course SESTA is necessary. You just don't understand the big picture.
Making ISPs and web hosting companies responsible for all illegal human trafficking related content that travels across their systems is the first step. Afterwards, that responsibility will be expanded to included copyrighted materials so that the big media companies can bankrupt anyone who doesn't help them enforce whatever draconian copyright protection schemes they choose to impose.
This is the goal. It has always been the goal. I
"sex marketplace website"?? Really?? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: "sex marketplace website"?? Really?? (Score:1)
There is nothing wrong with sex marketplaces to begin with.
Now that Craigslist and backpage are both down, what will happen with all these horny North Americans? What to do, to have fun with some guns, to try some opiates? Sniff some glue?
This is Prohibition version two. Just like version one, led by vaginoamericans.
Slippery Slope (Score:1)
This makes me uneasy at some level, just due to the nature of overreach. Nor does it necessarily deal with the root problem—those that seek to exploit children. Although I suppose it makes the "shopping" portion of that transaction harder.
Also, I just had such a massive shart that I'm probably going to have to throw these pants away. Which sucks because they're my favorite jeans.
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If I had mod points, you'd get one lol
Re:Slippery Slope (Score:4, Interesting)
Just goes to show (Score:1)
Laws only get enforced when you piss off someone important.
Think of the children! (Score:2, Insightful)
Corrupt FBI won't investigate people threatening to shoot up kids in school, but they will spend all this effort on a "sex marketplace website". Not even sure why I'm surprised the FBI is so worthless.
Because (Score:1)
Because FREEDOM........
Sadomoralism (Score:5, Insightful)
But that's the point. To the right, selling sex is an immoral sin. To the left, any woman that chooses prostitution is suddenly without agency, and therefore being exploited, her opinion on it being irrelevant. Either way, it's not a decision that an adult should be free to make. So they punish these human moral failures by increasing suffering all around, all while grandstanding about how they're "saving" people when in fact they're doing the opposite. It's the same exact thing as the drug war. You take a dangerous activity that's conducted among consenting adults, prohibit it by force of law, and in doing so "send the message" that you stand against it and are fighting it, but you're actually greatly increasing the harm instead of decreasing it.
It's called sadomoralism, and the left and right are both guilty of it, just with different justifications and trappings around the edges. No matter how many people you lock up, you're never going to stop it, and by going that route, you maximize the harm. But of course, regulating such things in a manner that actually reduces the harm means accepting that some people can then engage in the activity without being able to punish them for it-- and that's too high a price to pay no matter how devastating the alternative, whether it's hard drugs or prostitution, and whether you're talking about team (R) or team (D); because a utopia where drug abuse and prostitution vanish from the earth forever can always be achieved if we just refuse to give in and punish a little more.
Re:Sadomoralism (Score:5, Interesting)
It's called Puritan authoritarianism. Long ingrained in US culture, coming from both religion (R) and secular (D) do-gooders.
Frankly, the US would have been a better place if the Mayflower had hit rocks and turned the zealots it was carrying into fish food. Canada was settled by the British and French for profit instead of by Puritan refugees, and it's a much more tolerant place than the US.
Re: Tolerant. Lol. (Score:5, Interesting)
That was the 60s and 70s in Canada.
The US sent kids to "youth centers" (basically like prisons) for minor crimes like mocking school officials less than 10 years ago. Judges responsible were eventually jailed, but don't think that such atrocities are only a Canadian thing...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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You wrongly believe that the sex trade is Pretty Woman with a bunch of young women just doing what they do like any other 9-5 job. The reality is its pimp beatings and getting people hooked on drugs or brought to this country as a sex slave in some parlor or under ground brothel so they have no choice but to sell themselves for a few bucks to survive, whether under age or not.
You can argue all that goes away if its just made legal. I don't know if it would or not, but that doesn't really matter as the FBI a
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Things like "talk to any sex worker" are all that needs to be said to make you the delusional one. I don't say all sex workers are equal and treated the same. Whether a majority or not I don't think anyone knows, but the numbers of people forced into the situation is high. I've seen it first hand. Pretty sure Lawrence Taylor found his under age prostitute via backpage.
Re: Sadomoralism (Score:2)
How do you define slavery, coercion? One obvious component is a person NOT receiving the fruits of his or her labor. If he or she did get get the full compensation, there would be no motivation for someone coercing them to do the labor, what would they receive for so doing?
Yet what the law criminalizes is not the labor (sex) but the compensation for it (money). To avoid these laws, a person MUST have someone else who takes the money and MUST give sex away 'free', and MUST have no legal recourse for getting
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You wrongly believe that the sex trade is Pretty Woman with a bunch of young women just doing what they do like any other 9-5 job. The reality is its pimp beatings and getting people hooked on drugs or brought to this country as a sex slave in some parlor or under ground brothel so they have no choice but to sell themselves for a few bucks to survive, whether under age or not.
No, that is what the puritanical laws of the US make the sex trade.
Pimps can only operate because the trade is underground. Look at Amsterdam, prostitution is legal and most women are not forced into prostitution. Health services are available, Dutch police take violence very seriously. Even Colombia is evidence against your assertion. Again prostitution is legal and you get very few strung out girls on drugs.
Most of the negative effects of the sex trade in the US are a direct result of sex workers be
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That's where you're wrong. The vast majority of Johns don't pay out hundreds for a romp. They pay very little, so little that the only way women would take it is because they have no choice. We're talking well under $50 range. That is the real sex trade industry that is built around lower income clients and exist in the seedy underbelly of society. And there are WAY more people in that income bracket that those willing to throw hundreds for an hours romp.
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Bullshit, at least in Australia. At a legal licensed brothel you'll probably pay $160 for half an hour or $200 for an hour, and it only goes up from there. At a massage parlour offering sex on the side, it might be $60/hour for the massage, plus another $50 for a handjob or $100 for sex. The vast majority of guys paying for sex are paying in the $100-$200 range for an appointment. Street workers taking $50 for a blowjob are very rare.
The typical prostitute is 30 years old,two kids, no husband, and no qu
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Backpage has plenty of massage parlor ads. And plenty of fake bait and switch ads where lord knows who shows up. Get your head out of the clouds. Backpage was a great place to meet crack whores, meth heads, and catch some great STDs while helping funding organized crime. It didn't create some sort of safe Amsterdam like environment.
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Frankly, the US would have been a better place if the Mayflower had hit rocks and turned the zealots it was carrying into fish food. Canada was settled by the British and French for profit instead of by Puritan refugees, and it's a much more tolerant place than the US.
And while we were getting the religious outcasts, Australia was getting the criminal ones. The relative outcomes probably says something profound.
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Australia only began getting the criminals when America and England had a falling out and England could no longer send their prisoners to the penal colonies in America. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Canada...
(1) Is moving towards legalization of marijuana on a Federal level. Check.
(2) Mostly legalizes or ignores prostitution among consenting adults. Check.
(3) Has 15-20% of the incarceration rate (per 100,000 people) as the US. Check. NOT one of the world's largest jailers.
(4) Got rid of the death penalty 50+ years ago.
(5) Recognizes an explicit legal right to privacy.
The US is moving backwards in many of those respects.
Canada is only "intolerant" if you want to own powerful rifles or spout Naz
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Tor (Score:1)
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Hardly. It's not about prostitution at all. Do you think the pussygrabber-in-chief wants to end prostitution? How else would he ever get laid, but for paying? This case was nothing more than an end-run attack against the protections of service providers from liability for end-user content under section 230 the CDA... a hedging of their bets in case SESTA failed to pass. They want to be able to put the screws to tech companies, an force them to aid in their agenda of chipping away at free speech and pri
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And yet he is all over Twitter.
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Politics (Score:1)
A lot has been said about the Puritanism of this.
Some might be interested in knowing that the co-founders of Backpage were previously arrested and charged years back for printing the home address of Sherriff Joe Arpiao of Arizona. Yes, THAT Arpaio. At the time, this information was already public.
The Sherriff's arrest for which he and fellow New Times [phoenixnewtimes.com] founder received awarded 3.75 million dollars [phoenixnewtimes.com].
Make of this info what you will.
Brilliant idea! (Score:5, Insightful)
"Hey FBI, here's this website that is like a honey pot for sickos so you can easily identify them and weed them out!"
FBI: "No thanks, shut it down. We'd rather only find out about horrible exploitation after it has gone on for years and the victim finally gets away."
Kill one, 5 more grow in it's place (Score:1)
A quick Google reveals at least five alternatives to BackPage.com ... What does the FBI really think it's accomplishing except driving these sites further underground and out of their reach?
You have to agree universally, left and right (Score:2)
Trump is not that bad after all.
Re: You have to agree universally, left and right (Score:2)
Trump has been trying to shut the FBI down and has damaged it at every opportunity. This case may be lost in court because of Trump, as a result. So, if you like the stuff Backpage was accused of then Trump is not so bad.
What I am to do with this stained couch then? (Score:2)
Without Craigslist, how much crap will end up in landfills instead of transferring between homes? I would sue the federal government over this just for the environmental harm they are causing.
Next for the FBI (Score:2)
Banning toilets around America, because "your mom" has been offering her services via phone number there for the past 40 years.