NFL team owner Robert Kraft was swept up in a bust of a sex-trafficking day spa

[ZiprHead]

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Even the sheriff who led the (very probably) unconstitutional suveilance operation admits that there is no evidence of human trafficking.

Outspoken Florida sheriff admits they can't prove human trafficking in Kraft case

There is a big difference between an inability to prove and no evidence.

Thank you. I was just going to post the same. Simply another example of Derec's bias to characterise it the way he did.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

[
Even the sheriff who led the (very probably) unconstitutional suveilance operation admits that there is no evidence of human trafficking.

Outspoken Florida sheriff admits they can't prove human trafficking in Kraft case

There is a big difference between an inability to prove and no evidence.

Thank you. I was just going to post the same. Simply another example of Derec's bias to characterise it the way he did.

Presumption of innocence is supposed to be a thing, isn't it? There is no evidence that you do or do not run a human trafficking ring either.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Presumption of innocence is supposed to be a thing, isn't it? There is no evidence that you do or do not run a human trafficking ring either.

Which is exactly the point I was making. If all of these working conditions can potentially be used by a legal business, the police then lack the tools to be able to prevent the raping of sex slaves. Thousands of women continue to get raped with impunity because they are given cover by these "legitimate" businesses using essentially the same modus operandi. The existence of places which are indistinguishable from rape factories should be offensive to everybody because it means that rape factories cannot easily be shut down.

If the owners of businesses who have their employees work in these conditions get thrown in prison for labour violations or whatever else they can come up with, it's one less piece of cover to be offered to human traffickers and much easier for the police to save women who need saving. While I have no problem with prostitution, I do have a problem with business owners who set these kind of conditions for those who work for them and I do have a problem with business plans which police can't distinguish from mass rape, thus reducing their ability to stop mass rape.

 

[laughing dog]

Thank you. I was just going to post the same. Simply another example of Derec's bias to characterise it the way he did.

Presumption of innocence is supposed to be a thing, isn't it? There is no evidence that you do or do not run a human trafficking ring either.

No, there is not.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Presumption of innocence is supposed to be a thing, isn't it? There is no evidence that you do or do not run a human trafficking ring either.

Which is exactly the point I was making. If all of these working conditions can potentially be used by a legal business, the police then lack the tools to be able to prevent the raping of sex slaves. Thousands of women continue to get raped with impunity because they are given cover by these "legitimate" businesses using essentially the same modus operandi. The existence of places which are indistinguishable from rape factories should be offensive to everybody because it means that rape factories cannot easily be shut down.

If the owners of businesses who have their employees work in these conditions get thrown in prison for labour violations or whatever else they can come up with, it's one less piece of cover to be offered to human traffickers and much easier for the police to save women who need saving. While I have no problem with prostitution, I do have a problem with business owners who set these kind of conditions for those who work for them and I do have a problem with business plans which police can't distinguish from mass rape, thus reducing their ability to stop mass rape.

This I agree with. Take them down for actual violations they actually are doing, if they are doing them. And don't presume greater harms are happening at any particular place without good evidence.

 

[laughing dog]

Presumption of innocence is supposed to be a thing, isn't it? There is no evidence that you do or do not run a human trafficking ring either.

Which is exactly the point I was making. If all of these working conditions can potentially be used by a legal business, the police then lack the tools to be able to prevent the raping of sex slaves. Thousands of women continue to get raped with impunity because they are given cover by these "legitimate" businesses using essentially the same modus operandi. The existence of places which are indistinguishable from rape factories should be offensive to everybody because it means that rape factories cannot easily be shut down.

If the owners of businesses who have their employees work in these conditions get thrown in prison for labour violations or whatever else they can come up with, it's one less piece of cover to be offered to human traffickers and much easier for the police to save women who need saving. While I have no problem with prostitution, I do have a problem with business owners who set these kind of conditions for those who work for them and I do have a problem with business plans which police can't distinguish from mass rape, thus reducing their ability to stop mass rape.

This I agree with. Take them down for actual violations they actually are doing, if they are doing them. And don't presume greater harms are happening at any particular place without good evidence.

And how would law enforcement get good evidence without presuming some greater harm in the first place?

 

[Tom Sawyer]

This I agree with. Take them down for actual violations they actually are doing, if they are doing them. And don't presume greater harms are happening at any particular place without good evidence.

Of course you can presume greater harms. Because they're actually committing greater harms. If not to their own employees then to the employees down the road whom the cops have a more difficult time in helping because of their immoral actions. Throwing them in prison for health code violations, violations of labour standards or whatever makes their businesses unviable and prevents them from protecting the mass rape of sex slaves.

These are evil people who are abusing their employees for profit and are helping to protect rapists. Some of them even go so far as to donate money to Donald Trump's election campaign. Get them the fuck off the street and eliminate this aspect of the industry.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You're still missing the fact that the anti-prostitution forces have redefined "trafficked" to include large numbers of women who are voluntarily in the profession.

How about writing about what YOU think instead of what you think I think.

For example: You could have written: "Anti-prostitution forces have redefined "trafficked" to include large numbers of women who are voluntarily in the profession " instead of trying to tell me what I think, which frankly comes across as a personal attack on me and really undermines your point.

You could make your point stronger by referring to or even linking to sources that back up your point.

The problem has been repeatedly pointed out to you, at this point it's clear you don't care.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

If prostitution was legalized and this stuff didn't have to happen in shady places, it would be much easier for prostitution businesses to differentiate themselves from trafficking.

Which is definitely part of why I favor a legal/regulated approach. It makes it much easier for the police to find the bad actors.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

They did. Many times. You ignored it and kept on speaking as if you never saw it.

instead of trying to tell me what I think, which frankly comes across as a personal attack on me and really undermines your point.

You are in desperate need of that mirror again. Why don't you remember how this feels when you do this so frequently to others ?

These particular women appear to have had no agency in their "professional" life, according to the news reports. Whether they were voluntarily trafficked or not is not relevant to the issue of whether they were, in essence, raped (which is Toni's point).

Yet, you, LP and Derec persist in harping about the trafficking definition as if it matters, when it does not in this discussion. Your MO of persistent in sniping at a woman poster over her failure to rise to your level of moral outrage or to address your irrelevant issues is both extremely tiresome and revealing. But smile, it is almost the weekend.

I have seen nothing which makes me think they're anything but garden variety illegal aliens.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Yes. Also, they could look into not cramming a dozen women into small, dirty rooms which they can't leave, holding onto their passports, constantly shipping them off to different places so that they don't know where they are and can't develop any type of support structure - things like that. Given the number of legitimate prostitution services which don't do things like that in places where prostitution is illegal, they aren't really a necessary part of the business model and anyone who runs a prostitution company that doesn't base its business model around the raping of sex slaves would be free to not do any of that. If they're going to do that, then they really can't complain about people saying that their human traffickers ... since that's actually what they are.

Even the sheriff who led the (very probably) unconstitutional suveilance operation admits that there is no evidence of human trafficking.

Outspoken Florida sheriff admits they can't prove human trafficking in Kraft case

Imagine - they have done invasive (hidden cameras in massage rooms) surveillance long enough to ensnare 100s of customers in BS "solicitation" charges, and yet they failed to obtain any real evidence of "trafficking", the ostensible goal of the operation.

Now, some of the things you say would point to likely trafficking. Keeping passports for example. If true (a big if) that would be pretty good evidence. But apparently they only have things like the living conditions of the women. While that is indicative of poor working conditions, and an employer who cuts corners (reason enough for me not to patronize that place), it is not indicative of trafficking, i.e. keeping these women against their will.

Keeping passports would keep them from going elsewhere, it wouldn't keep them from going to the police.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Keeping passports would keep them from going elsewhere, it wouldn't keep them from going to the police.

It would be a clear sign of criminal activity too. One would have to wonder why they would take a passport from someone. If not to entrap them, then why? It may not be conclusive, but it is a pretty clear sign of being trafficked against their will.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Your MO of persistent in sniping at a woman poster

My responses to Toni and calling her out when complaining about behaviour she routinely engages in has nothing to do with her gender, and everything to do with said behaviour. I note that despite this behaviour I do think she is usually at least not merely trolling, so I don't have her in ignore, as I do Laughing Dog (a male I think), whose text I only saw because Loren quoted it.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Keeping passports would keep them from going elsewhere, it wouldn't keep them from going to the police.

It would be a clear sign of criminal activity too. One would have to wonder why they would take a passport from someone. If not to entrap them, then why? It may not be conclusive, but it is a pretty clear sign of being trafficked against their will.

In what way is it "inconclusive"? What is the legitimate reason that an employer who isn't trafficking his employees would take those employees' passports?

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

In what way is it "inconclusive"?

In the way that it doesn't prove it on its own.

What is the legitimate reason that an employer who isn't trafficking his employees would take those employees' passports?

There does not have to be any legitimate reason to do it for doing it to not necessarily be human trafficking. But like I said, it is a very good sign of it. It is very good evidence. It isn't conclusive evidence.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

In what way is it "inconclusive"?

In the way that it doesn't prove it on its own.

What is the legitimate reason that an employer who isn't trafficking his employees would take those employees' passports?

There does not have to be any legitimate reason to do it for doing it to not necessarily be human trafficking. But like I said, it is a very good sign of it. It is very good evidence. It isn't conclusive evidence.

It seems like if you (or anyone else) cannot come up with a reasonable reason why, then in this context, trafficking is the answer insofar as a beyond reasonable doubt burden.

 

[Toni]

Yes. Also, they could look into not cramming a dozen women into small, dirty rooms which they can't leave, holding onto their passports, constantly shipping them off to different places so that they don't know where they are and can't develop any type of support structure - things like that. Given the number of legitimate prostitution services which don't do things like that in places where prostitution is illegal, they aren't really a necessary part of the business model and anyone who runs a prostitution company that doesn't base its business model around the raping of sex slaves would be free to not do any of that. If they're going to do that, then they really can't complain about people saying that their human traffickers ... since that's actually what they are.

Even the sheriff who led the (very probably) unconstitutional suveilance operation admits that there is no evidence of human trafficking.

Outspoken Florida sheriff admits they can't prove human trafficking in Kraft case

Imagine - they have done invasive (hidden cameras in massage rooms) surveillance long enough to ensnare 100s of customers in BS "solicitation" charges, and yet they failed to obtain any real evidence of "trafficking", the ostensible goal of the operation.

Now, some of the things you say would point to likely trafficking. Keeping passports for example. If true (a big if) that would be pretty good evidence. But apparently they only have things like the living conditions of the women. While that is indicative of poor working conditions, and an employer who cuts corners (reason enough for me not to patronize that place), it is not indicative of trafficking, i.e. keeping these women against their will.

Keeping passports would keep them from going elsewhere, it wouldn't keep them from going to the police.

Yeah, it does. How else could they prove they were in the country legally? (assuming they are legal).

People in power--those with money, diplomats, etc. have long used the passport as a way to control their employees. I've seen it happen in real life, with people who likely have a better command of English and a better education than the sex workers do.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

In what way is it "inconclusive"?

In the way that it doesn't prove it on its own.

What is the legitimate reason that an employer who isn't trafficking his employees would take those employees' passports?

There does not have to be any legitimate reason to do it for doing it to not necessarily be human trafficking. But like I said, it is a very good sign of it. It is very good evidence. It isn't conclusive evidence.

Well sure, but only in the same way that a beefy Italian guy going from store to store along a street and being handed envelopes of cash by the owners isn't conclusive evidence of a protection racket. There is a possibility of something else, but one would need to be an absolute idiot to consider it to be a viable possibility.

 

[ronburgundy]

In what way is it "inconclusive"?

In the way that it doesn't prove it on its own.

What is the legitimate reason that an employer who isn't trafficking his employees would take those employees' passports?

There does not have to be any legitimate reason to do it for doing it to not necessarily be human trafficking. But like I said, it is a very good sign of it. It is very good evidence. It isn't conclusive evidence.

IOW, "it isn't conclusive" and yet there is no plausible alternative explanation and therefore all rational people (and courts) would conclude beyond any reasonable doubt that they are trafficking.

 

[ronburgundy]

Presumption of innocence is supposed to be a thing, isn't it? There is no evidence that you do or do not run a human trafficking ring either.

Which is exactly the point I was making. If all of these working conditions can potentially be used by a legal business, the police then lack the tools to be able to prevent the raping of sex slaves. Thousands of women continue to get raped with impunity because they are given cover by these "legitimate" businesses using essentially the same modus operandi. The existence of places which are indistinguishable from rape factories should be offensive to everybody because it means that rape factories cannot easily be shut down.

If the owners of businesses who have their employees work in these conditions get thrown in prison for labour violations or whatever else they can come up with, it's one less piece of cover to be offered to human traffickers and much easier for the police to save women who need saving. While I have no problem with prostitution, I do have a problem with business owners who set these kind of conditions for those who work for them and I do have a problem with business plans which police can't distinguish from mass rape, thus reducing their ability to stop mass rape.

This I agree with. Take them down for actual violations they actually are doing, if they are doing them. And don't presume greater harms are happening at any particular place without good evidence.

We don't need to "presume" greater harms, we can rationally infer them beyond any reasonable doubt, just like we can rationally infer that humans evolved from earlier species even though no one observed direct evidence of that happening.