Edit - This is a post to the meta group of Blåhaj Lemmy. It is not intended for the entire lemmyverse. If you are not on Blåhaj Lemmy and plan on dropping in to offer your opinion on how we are doing things in a way you don't agree with, your post will be removed.
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A user on our instance reported a post on lemmynsfw as CSAM. Upon seeing the post, I looked at the community it was part of, and immediately purged all traces of that community from our instance.
I approached the admins of lemmynsfw and they assured me that the models with content in the community were all verified as being over 18. The fact that the community is explicitly focused on making the models appear as if they're not 18 was fine with them. The fact that both myself and one a member of this instance assumed it was CSAM, was fine with them. I was in fact told that I was body shaming.
I'm sorry for the lack of warning, but a community skirting the line trying to look like CSAM isn't a line I'm willing to walk. I have defederated lemmynsfw and won't be reinstating it whilst that community is active.
I guess Trans Littles can just go fuck off then? One of the biggest Trans comics artist is openly a little. Why are we in the business of regulating what consenting adults do?
Don’t be disingenuous. Genuine consent practices also consider that not everyone else consents to witnessing their play, so they don’t do it where it’s not welcomed. And it’s not welcomed on Blahaj Zone, in this case. That’s all.
Exscuse me but you're the one being disengenious, a NSFW instance had what!? Porn!? Stop the fucking presses. Are we going to defederate from all porn instances or just the ones you find icky? Where can I post my objection to having to be subjected to porn at all?
I wrote a comment but got more aggressive than I intended. My overall point though is there are young looking adults, there are old looking kids. Making a sweeping statement like you did is just wrong
the same community (adorableporn) is also on reddit btw with 2.2m subscribers.
i have no grand moral opinion on this type of content. for me it is the same as femboy content for example, where people also push for a youthful, girly aesthetic.
as long as the content is made by consenting verified adults, i don't care.
it's like adults cosplaying with japanese school uniforms or calling your partner "mommy" or "daddy".
probably not the best move in terms of sexual morals for sure, in the grand scheme of things tho this is just how people express their sexuality i guess.
i had no problem distinguishing the models on the community from children.
maybe it's more difficult in some cases without looking for the onlyfans link or sth similar of the model somewhere in the post, but that's just human anatomy.
that's why the guy at the gas station asks for my ID card, because it is not always super clear. but apparently clear enough for reddit admins and PR people from ad companies.
i agree playing into the innocent baby aspect is probably not great for sexual morals and i wouldn't recommend this comm to a local priest or a nun, but this type of content thrives on pretty much every mainstream platform in some shape or form.
i get it, if this instance wants to be sexually pure and removed from evil carnal desires tho. that's kind of cool too for sure.
I think both instance admins have a valid stance on the matter. lemmynsfw appears to take reports very seriously and if necessary does age verification of questionable posts, something that likely takes a lot of time and effort. Blahaj Lemmy doesn't like the idea of a community that's dedicated to "adults that look or dress child-like". While I understand the immediate (and perhaps somewhat reactionary) concern that might raise, is this concern based in fact, or in emotion?
Personally I'm in the camp of "let consenting adults do adult things", whether that involves fetishes that are typically thought of as gross, dressing up in clothes or doing activities typically associated with younger ages, or simply having a body that appears underage to the average viewer. As the lemmynsfw admin mentioned, such persons have the right to lust and be lusted after, too. That's why, as a society, we decided to draw the line at 18 years old, right?
I believe the concern is not that such content is not supposed to exist or be shared, but rather that it's collected within a community. And I think the assumption here is that it makes it easy for "certain people" to find this content. But if it is in fact legal, and well moderated, then is there a problem? I don't believe there is evidence that seeing such content could change your sexual preferences. On the other hand, saying such communities should not exist could send the wrong message, along the lines of "this is weird and should not exist", which might be what was meant with "body shaming".
I'm trying to make sense of the situation here and possibly try to deescalate things, as I do believe lemmynsfw approach to moderation otherwise appears to be very much compatible with Blahaj Lemmy. Is there a potential future where this decision is reconsidered? Would there be some sort of middle-ground that admins from both instances could meet and come to an understanding?
Reminds me of a lot of the debates around kink at pride/ddlg kink stuff. The latter is really not my thing and makes me uncomfortable, but I recognise that that's a personal thing between me and my partners that I can't, and shouldn't, police among others.
There's also ethical debates to be had on porn in places like Lemmy/pornhub/etc. -- we can't know that the person has consented to being posted, or that they have recourse to get it taken down and stop it being spreaded if they do not.
Then there's the realpolitik of, regardless of ethics, whether it's better to have porn of this type in visible, well moderated communities, or whether it's better to try to close off ethically dubious posting.
It's one I don't really have squared off in my head quite yet. Similarly with kink at pride; I've read about the historic importance of kinksters and recognise that, but at the same time I want there to be a space where queer kids can be involved with pride without being exposed to kink. Is that just prudish social norms talking? Idk; I'm still working it through.
For what it's worth, I feel like while society has become more socially accepting of people being different (imperfectly, but we have), at least in the US we've become more and more prudish when it comes to sex itself. Part of the changing era has led to a reduction in exploitation and things that were generally viewed as sketchy, but not all that big of deal (kids inheriting porn mags, sexual harassment, imbalances in power), where now sketchy behavior is quickly called out.
That said, I feel like a lot of hard conversations have been completely avoided because they'd be awkward and uncomfortable and instead we just pretend they aren't there.
Like in theory, anyone under 18 in the US can't legally see so much as a titty (unless it's art), read sexually explicit material, or see a movie or tv show with explicit content. And then, literally nobody wants to talk to teenagers about sex. I watched a reddit thread eat itself alive because a dad was furious that his wife had bought their daughter a dildo after he had confiscated her laptop when catching her looking at them and asked his wife to deal with it. People were calling for her to be reported for sexual abuse, while actual women were being attacked for sharing their own experiences as teens. Things just seem a little crazy.
People are so uncomfortable with the concept that they want to disappear anything that reminds them that 18 isn't actually a magical division between childhood and adulthood. And then you have this thread, where lemmynsfw was banned because a community sharing "cute" pornstars was a step too far despite being actual professional adults. Idk, it seems exactly like Australia's whole thing where they started banning pornstars in their late twenties because they have small tits as part of a project to "fight" child porn.
Ada was clear in another comment thread that yes, emotion was absolutely involved in her decision. That isn’t a bad thing. Why is there a social attitude that decision-making is only valid if it’s cold and unfeeling?
Personally I’m in the camp of “let consenting adults do adult things”
Me too. I don’t think anyone is arguing against that. Anyone can still access LemmyNSFW’s content elsewhere, Blahaj Zone simply isn’t going to relay it anymore because some of it is incompatible with Ada’s goals in nurturing this community.
But if it is in fact legal, and well moderated, then is there a problem?
Yes. Legality has nothing to do with acceptability. This instance already bans lots of content that doesn’t actually violate any laws. It’s a judgment call.
The reason I brought up emotion in my reply was because I've felt that the lemmynsfw admins have been able to explain their decision quite reasonably and seemed to be open to conversation, wheras Ada was set on one goal and upon finding disagreement, wasn't in the right mindset to continue a constructive conversation. Which, to be fair, due to the nature of the content, is understandable.
If the content that the Blahaj Lemmy admins are concerned about are limited to certain communities, and part of the issue is the concentration of content in said communities in the first place (at least, as I speculated in my original reply), then I don't quite understand why blocking these communities only isn't something that was considered, rather than defederating the entire instance. I do respect Blahaj Lemmy's decision not to want to host such content. Or is there some technical limitation that I'm not aware of?
Why is there a social attitude that decision-making is only valid if it’s cold and unfeeling?
Probably because everyone agrees that we don't make the best decisions when emotional? In fact we tend to make our worst decisions when emotional? There's a pretty significant difference between society judging people for being emotional, and society disapproving of emotional decisions. Because people making significant choices when they aren't thinking clearly is pretty obviously a bad idea.
Yes. Legality has nothing to do with acceptability. This instance already bans lots of content that doesn’t actually violate any laws. It’s a judgment call.
And yet teen porn is one of the most popular categories around. This sounds like a subcategory confined to a single community, and precisely what the block function is for. There's a pretty big difference between Exploding Heads and a single disliked community.
Edit: After finally seeing a link to the lemmynsfw discussion, it's not a kink community or anything fringe. It's literally a community around cute pornstars.
On a personal level, the vibes are off. Their defense seems really defensive and immediately moves to reframe the situation as body shaming. There's a difference between an adult who looks underage posting porn of themselves and a community dedicated to porn of adults who look underage. Reducing the latter down to body shaming seems like unfair framing to me.
Did you check the community in question? I'm quite suprised to hear one could think that's csam. To me it looks just like your typical low-effort onlyfans content. None of the models even looked "barely legal" but more like well over 20 in most cases.
I think it’s really strange to call that a technicality. Adults with babyfaces and braces doing porn (which appears to be what this was about, as far as I can tell) is worlds apart from children being abused. Calling that a “technicality” is like saying the difference between a slasher movie and a snuff film is a “technicality.” People who watch slasher movies arent actually wanting to see snuff films deep down inside. And people who find adults with babyfaces attractive arent actually lusting after kids deep down inside.
"If someone made a community intended to fool people into thinking it was kiddy porn, that would be a real problem. If someone of age goes online and pretends -- not roleplays, but pretends with intent to deceive -- to be a child and makes porn, that is a real problem. Nobody here is doing that."
JFC what a shitty take. Roleplay of CP is still fucking disgusting.
For the people like me that don't know the term: CSAM is Child Sexual Abuse Materials. It's the term used instead of CP as "pornography" is more commonly used for pleasure or conveys the idea of consent.
As for the porn that uses people that look under age, it's no different than the anime children that are thousands of years old. It doesn't matter how old they are, they look like children and it's gross.
The world is messed up. I feel like advertising any adult material as "barely legal" should be banned too. It skirts the boundary too close. Not as close as the aforementioned thousand year old child body but it feels almost as bad imo.
I agree with you but not on the last point. There is a difference since they are real people, adults, and that they consent on being sexually attractive and arouse. I am not attracted to young looking bodies but that's a notable difference to me. Also I don't know how I feel about a community (in a broader way than a lemmy comm) focusing and fetichising on young looking adults (I do know that it disturbs me but I want to talk about society wise), but I understand that some people are attracted to young looking bodies and/or juvenile ones, and I feel like adults that consent to answer their desires is better than CASM
So is this guy lying? There's nothing about making them look under 18. At least what I can see from my instance, it seems focused on being very softcore, not even a focus on small girls. In fact the latest post I see is from a milf account.
I get the feeling there's going to be a lot of comments here from people who disagree.
This is not your instance. This is not even my instance, I am just signed up here (and thank you Ada, I like it here and I approve of this decision. CSAM-like porn is icky). There is no need to focus on the morality of sharing porn that ends up being viewed as CSAM. Hosting porn involves legal risk, and federating with an instance that has porn on it means that eventually you will host porn images. If you have your account here and you don't like this choice, consider moving instances or hosting your own.
Not only that, does anyone remember /r/jailbait on reddit? They did not do anything about that subreddit because the images were "legal", but the userbase they attracted began sharing real CSAM in the DMs. To be clear: I don't know what community we're talking about (lemmynsfw does not appear to have a jailbait community, I did not look hard) but you do not want the sort of people around that this attracts.
Bloody hell this thread is a mess of people from other instances complaining. I wish Lemmy would add the ability to set a community as private to it’s instance. Or only commentable by instance members. If you’re not from this instance, this defederation doesn’t affect you and you should step off. The admins job here is to protect us, the users on this instance. Not appease you.
I can't dispute this. i didn't know this was a problem. but i don't want ass to do with it. i have a separate account there for adult-oriented fetish content as portrayed by adults. can't we just have that?
I am very disheartened by the number of people replying here who read “a community skirting the line trying to look like CSAM” and felt the need to go purposefully seek out that community to look through its images.
Probably because the community in question isn't trying to "skirt the line" and just posts popular pornstars that range from 18 to the mid twenties. I thought it was a kink community until someone finally linked the lemmynsfw post and it's actually just a community for cute pornstars.
Calling it CSAM-adjacent just means that nobody's comfortable actually looking at it to figure out what's going on, and hugely exaggerated.
I feel like the people getting upset over this are taking these hypotheticals of "young looking adults just wanting to be able to make porn equally and that technically the community did nothing wrong".
The problem is that just ignores the fact that pedophiles would definitely use communities like that as a "foot in the door" to a comminity that would naturally have a lot of closetted pedophiles. The issue isn't young looking adults making porn, the issue is a community based around youngest possible looking adults is naturally gonna attract and encourage pedophiles.
It's like they say, "all it takes is allowing one nazi in your bar for it to rapidly turn into a nazi bar".
I mean yeah, but I think the solution here is just age verification. If you're posting nsfw OC, you should have to verify age with mods, and if you're posting nsfw from online, you should be able to prove they're of age if prompted (like, if it's a famous pornstar, they should be verified on pornhub or onlyfans or something so it's easy to check whether they're of age).
Like, I have small tits, I'd like to be able to post nsfw without people insinuating I'm pedo-baiting or that people attracted to me are intrinsically pedophilic. Just have strictly enforced age-gates and ban anyone being creepy
Would you mind posting chat logs like the lemmynsfw team for transparency sake? Not trying to cause more drama but I think the whole thing just needs to be more transparent. Sorry if this is an out of line request.
If I believe the mod of the community in question is telling the truth, Seems like the incident in question was just a misunderstanding. The community name is
spoiler
adorableporn
I will refer to this as "the first community" in the following text.
The mod of the community copy/pasted the dictionary definition from vocabulary.com, which contains the word "childlike".
IMO, the community in question is not trying to skirt the line of Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM). In fact, there is a subreddit of the same name which has absolutely nothing to do with people that appear underage.
That said, the same mod also moderates, and posts to a different community with a concerning name. The spoiler below shows the name and the first three paragraphs of the sidebar as they appear:
spoiler
Community is now open to posting. Posts not having verification info will be removed.
FauxBait is a place for sharing images and videos of the youngest-looking, legal-aged (18+) girls. If you like fresh, young starlets, this is the place for you!
Just to be clear: We only feature legal, consenting adults in accordance with U.S. Laws. All models featured were at least 18 years old at the time of filming.
Also, I'm not sure if the timestamps can be trusted, but said mod was instated as the only active mod of the first community at the same time that Ada made this post, which would mean that the mod account could not have been the one that wrote the original sidebar of the first community. Not sure what to make of that. For the sake of balance though, said mod does seem to be doing verifications of the age requirements. Also, the modlog for the first community shows two admin removals from at least 10 days before this debacle, both of which err on the side of caution, so at least the admins to seem to care about enforcing their rules.
The situation seems very muddy, but I personally don't think the original incident was that big of a deal (assuming the mod is telling the truth). However, I certainly don't blame the blahaj admins for defederating as it's certainly the safest option. Wouldn't want blahaj lemmy to get taken down :| Also happy to see less pron in my feed; I'm too lazy to block the individual /c/. Personal Instance-level blocking can't come soon enough.
but I personally don’t think the original incident was that big of a deal
The post I saw looked like an underage teenage girl. It was reported as child porn and looked like it to me before I even looked at the community.
Then when I looked at the community, I discovered it wasn't accidental. The whole point of the community is to appeal to folks looking for people that look like underage teenagers.