Austin Wolf discussion not allowed?
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I have been part of this platform for 14 years. During that time, I have contributed a significant amount of content and even donated money to support the site.
Over the past few months, I have become increasingly concerned about the direction this website has taken. The distribution of this pedophile’s work is troubling enough. What makes it worse is that opposing views appear to be suppressed by admin action, with comments being removed simply for expressing disagreement.
What I find especially unacceptable is the apparent double standard in moderation. When my comments, and others that were not offensive, are repeatedly removed, while comments defending this content remain visible, it sends a very clear message about whose views are welcome here and whose are not.
After 14 years on this platform, I no longer feel welcome. At this point, I am seriously considering leaving the site permanently. -
@chuckBKK Comments have been removed from these torrents mostly for veering off topic. Most of the comments on these torrents have been about his legal troubles, and have nothing to do with the content itself.
The problem comes in where many of these comments border dangerously close to the threshold of hate speech, which we do not tolerate. The comment section of torrents is not the place to discuss his legal issues, or any other such topics that are not related to the videos themselves.
While Austin may have very troublesome legal issues at the moment, this does not change the fact that the videos posted here are in no way related to said legal troubles, and as such, remain completely legal.
The only difference between martyrdom and suicide is press coverage! -
@MrMazda
I appreciate your response. My comments are not about discussing the legal case for its own sake. I much rather question that this person’s content is available on the platform at all, and that users are not allowed to voice objections to that fact in the relevant comment sections.From my perspective, this is not simply an off-topic issue. The uploader, creator, and content cannot be neatly separated in a case like this, especially when users are raising legitimate ethical concerns about hosting the material.
I understand that others may see this differently, and I am expressing an opinion. My view is that removing all content by a convicted pedophile would be the more responsible course of action. If there is no other appropriate place on the site to state that view, then it is difficult to see where such concerns can be raised at all.
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@chuckBKK The forums are intended for discussions. You'll notice that no removal of objections has happened here.
While I understand where you're coming from, this isn't quite the same situation as say Tracy Lords, who was known to be underage at the time of filming, which is why they were banned.
In the case of Austin however, none of the videos that have been released have been underage, so the same potential risk isn't there in this case. We're here for porn, not to be the "moral police". I'm sure there are many other porn stars who have a troublesome personal life (LeGrand Wolf comes to mind), but we have no way of knowing it as a fact and/or there is no connection between said troublesome personal life and the content that they have produced. It's just that with this one, it's the devil we know, so to speak.
The only difference between martyrdom and suicide is press coverage! -
@chuckBKK said in Austin Wolf discussion not allowed?:
When my comments, and others that were not offensive, are repeatedly removed, while comments defending this content remain visible, it sends a very clear message about whose views are welcome here and whose are not.
You know that's not even true, I have defended that his content should not be banned and my comments have been removed just like everyone else's. The fact that the website chose not to ban his content is read differently by different people, you might think the site staff is lenient or outright sympathize with him, others will think that banning his stuff could be a form of censorship and punishment towards members who consume his videos.
You can think it says a lot about them, that might be true... They might sympathize with that creator, or find it totally irrelevant, or they might just not even know about any controversy at all.
I have deleted videos of various creators from my collection because of personal controversies, people who I later found out were racists, transphobes, pro Israel, rapists, etc... It is a choice that I am entitled to make but it's not up to me to decide for others. If the content itself is 100% legal people have the right to find, keep and indulge in it.
You can go to an Austin Wolf torrent and comment "just so you guys know, he's a pedophile" and for as much as what you'd just stated is a fact, it has nothing to do with the torrent content.
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@ianfontinell-0 Thank you for putting it so well.
We aim to be a place where there's something for everyone, and as long as it's legal, we do not see a need to ban or censor it. While I understand that some content may not be for everyone, for those who don't like or otherwise don't want such content for whatever the reason, they can simply scroll by. After all, we are here for porn, not to be the "moral police".
Now... If there were a specific issue with a performer being known to be underage (such as Tracy Lords), then absolutely we will remove such content immediately, but as long as the content itself is not illegal, censoring it would only go against our goal to be inclusive to everyone (within legal limits of course).
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@MrMazda As I said, ethical considerations matter to me. In this case, we are not talking about rumor or vague controversy. We are talking about someone who was sentenced to 19 years in prison for crimes involving minors. That fact changes the ethical context for me, even if the videos themselves are technically legal.
I am glad this thread has remained visible. At least here, people can state their view openly. -
@ianfontinell-0
My main issue was the removal of non-offensive comments that were trying to raise an ethical objection, even if only to reach the one person who might care. That was the point I was making. -
@chuckBKK said in Austin Wolf discussion not allowed?:
I am glad this thread has remained visible. At least here, people can state their view openly.
This is the best place (only place tbh) to discuss that, because here you can object to a rule without defying it. I have thought about this in the past, if the moderators had a way of putting a disclaimer in certain torrents to help people decide if it's for them or not.
Initially I was thinking things like, this contains some duplicate files, or poor image quality, or choppy fps... relevant info that you only get to know after the file is downloaded. If we had this feature, it could also be used to inform about other things.
Or at the very least, instead of just waiting to remove off-topic comments the moderation could use the comment section to make a brief statement, maybe that would also help de-escalating this discussion in the comment section.
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@ianfontinell-0 said in Austin Wolf discussion not allowed?:
Or at the very least, instead of just waiting to remove off-topic comments the moderation could use the comment section to make a brief statement, maybe that would also help de-escalating this discussion in the comment section.
Agreed. Any communication at all would be nice.
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@ianfontinell-0 said in Austin Wolf discussion not allowed?:
This is the best place (only place tbh) to discuss that....instead of just waiting to remove off-topic comments the moderation could use the comment section to make a brief statement,
Or people can have the discussion in the only appropriate place for the discussion. Some comments make sense: "RIP Blake Mitchell" makes sense on content he's in for hopefully obvious reasons.
It's even feasible to make commentary on performers. I think a comment here is what alerted me to Johnny Rapid's behavior. But it was just a comment about the performer, and personally I think that's helpful information for deciding whether I want to download the file.
But a debate about whether such content should be allowed obviously doesn't belong on the content page itself.
Personally, I think Johnny Rapid represents a good case as to why I'm appreciative of the hand-off (except illegal content) approach mods take here. While I personally don't need to see his content any more, I'm sure lots of people disagree and reasonably so. Playing "whose crimes cross the 'do not post' threshold?" is a silly game. And that's before we start policing on politics. There are plenty of gay-for-pay performers that have political views some here would find offensive. I'm glad they're listed here, you can choose do download them or not.
