Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.
Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.
7. No duplicate posts.
If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners.
The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
And, ultimately, did nothing as there are now a bunch of clone sites operating under functionally identical names.
The thing that gets me is that if prosecutors like Harris know that sites like this is used for human trafficking; where is the bragging that they helped take those people down? Just like the article states, all they did was take down the site and let the actual offenders roam free. Everyone knows how flexible and versatile the internet is. Take down one site and several take it's place. When you brag about taking down a site and not doing anything about the reason why the offenses on the site exist, then you're just working to score political points.
EDIT: In case it wasn't clear in my comment I want to stress that I am commenting on why prosecutors like Harris brag about taking down these platforms without ever bragging about taking down the human traffickers using said platform. I am not criticizing her for not going after the owners. I know she went after the owners. The article talks about it. But it also talks about not doing much to actually helping the people who need help.
One of the 3 founders committed suicide before the trial completed, one was convicted, and the 3rd still has over 30 charges that haven't been ruled on yet. None of them are 'roaming free'.
You're kind of missing the point of my comment. I wasn't talking about why didn't they go after the actual owners. I was talking about why they didn't go after the human traffickers using the site. The article goes in depth about how it did nothing but make it worse for the people stuck in the situation where they are forced to sell their bodies.
The California Department of Justice employs 5,000 people. Do you think they have only done this one thing? Do you think they have press conferences for every individual person they prosecute? Do you understand why a whole mainstream platform facilitating criminal behavior is worth more attention than an average criminal?
Except my comment wasn't regarded the California DoJ. It was regarding Kamala Harris. She spearheaded the initiative to take down the site. She talked about it and used it as a talking point on how tough she is on human trafficking. Except, what actions did she actually take on human trafficker's? Why go for the platform that is easily replaceable and not the actual people perpetrating it? All she ended up doing was creating an environment that is less safe for sex workers and victims of human trafficking.
She was the Attorney General of California when the backpage founder was arrested.