Craigslist Adult Services no longer ‘Censored’, now removed completely
Craigslist replaced the link to its Adult Services section with a ‘Censored’ banner a few days ago. That has now disappeared, but so has the section in its entirety.
To describe the Craigslist section dedicated to the advertising of adult or erotic services as controversial is being polite. The Adult Services section has caused an absolute split between those who either see no harm in it or actually support its existence and those who hate it and think it’s causing people untold harm.
Craigslist has tried its best to placate those in the latter camp, but all to no avail. In the end, they want it gone completely and they won’t rest until it has. Which led to 17 U.S. state attorneys recently calling for the section to be closed for good. And it appears they have won.
Just a few days ago, the U.S. versions of Craigslist replaced the Adult Services section with a ‘Censored’ banner. Strangely, there was no explanation or official statement, and Craigslist has refused to comment on the issue. Now, the ‘Censored’ banner has disappeared, but so has the section it was hiding.
It has to be assumed that rather than being a publicity stunt to provoke public sympathy at the pressure it found itself under, this was legitimate. The banner was probably put in place while the section was cleared out, as well as subtly informing its users that this was something Craigslist was being forced to do begrudgingly. But still no comment has been forthcoming from the company.
This comes hot on the heels of the revelation that those U.S. attorneys want to see Craigslist remove the Adult Services section from all its sites around the world, even though they have no jurisdiction over anywhere but the States.
And of course the inevitable has happened, with advertisers of erotic services already using alternative sections to sell their risqué wares. So all in all, this was at best pointless, at worst counter-productive.
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