Comment by david-gpu
2 months ago
Why does anybody care that their porn viewing habits become public? To me it sounds as ridiculous as somebody threatening to publish a log of the food we eat or the music we listen to.
2 months ago
Why does anybody care that their porn viewing habits become public? To me it sounds as ridiculous as somebody threatening to publish a log of the food we eat or the music we listen to.
Empirically, there's a sizeable market of people willing to pay thousands to keep their porn viewing from becoming public. Prenda Law[0,1] was an extortion racket that blackmailed people with their porn history, and demanded in the region of $4,000 per victim. Their total revenue was at least $15 million, that the courts could find.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prenda_Law
[1] https://hn.algolia.com/?query=prenda
I don't doubt that it happens, but I am asking about why. What's the thinking process?
LBGTQ+ in highly oppressed environment (ie in some countries they execute gays in 2025). Even if not, some folks have quirks they would be ashamed of if it went public, ostracized, lose jobs, in some cases divorces etc.
Is it really that hard to imagine? US alone made (for us Europeans a bit weird but we don't mind at the end) very popular categories of porn like "banging stepsister/brother/mother/father", I am pretty sure those folks wouldn't like that history revealed to their close ones.
And TBH, I simply don't want to know other folk's preference even if its a very mundane one. Don't need to add that 'feature' to the mental model of them I have in my mind, what I have is already too much sometimes.
Perhaps it is less about what whether they watch , but what kind of pornography it is .
Most people aren’t not comfortable to be open about those topics. Many of the reasons would be worthy of months or years of therapy for even themselves to understand.
Porn is considered a highly private activity for many reasons: societal disapproval, religious prohibitions...heck in some countries, watching gay porn is potentially a death sentence.
I get wanting to keep illegal activities unknown to the authorities, so I'll concede that.
But in the context of this thread, where a company was threatening to do this in a developed democratic country, that is not an issue, is it?
Societal disapproval can be divided between people you interact with and strangers. Why would anybody what strangers think of them, particularly when those strangers would have to been rummaging into porn watching databases to begin with?
As for coworkers, friends or family, why would they be interested in learning about your porn habits again? And if they bother you about it, wouldn't you want to rethink whether you want to keep them around? Personally, I don't keep in touch with people who seriously judge my life choices -- and that has only happened once, so it's not such a big deal either.
>But in the context of this thread, where a company was threatening to do this in a developed democratic country, that is not an issue, is it?
Along with some other parts of your comment, I can only ask, are you really that naive? Governments can change, laws can change, societies can become more sinister, along with their governing institutions. Look no further than the United States right now for something of a haphazard example, but many others from history and the modern world abound.
It's not about a given context not being risky, it's about a fundamental right to have one's own private business respected firmly, so long as it doesn't materially or physically harm others, being entrenched enough that it's hard to remove even when the state and society go bad.
The same goes for your last comment: Defending one's privacy on nothing more than how supposedly unlikely it is that others would be interested in your personal habits is a downright stupidly bad idea, and yes, it can easily turn into a big deal if something changes.
Would you be willing to share your full name and your porn browsing habits? Here, to everyone reading this thread?
2 replies →
Ah, the myth of the 'developed democratic country', as if our societies are somehow enlightened enough as to not collect material to hang us with should the need arise to silence us.
As recent events have proven we cannot be sure that a bunch of religious conservatives won't come into power.
I am a member of a leftist political party in my country and I have no doubt that if the fascists get their hands on the membership database I'm shipped off to a prison camp.
Yeah, that is something I can understand. Same sort of reason I am scared of my (otherwise boring) reading habits becoming public.
Why have privacy if you have nothing to hide?
On another note, a lot of places, including those in the west will ostracize you for listening to the wrong music or eating the wrong foods.
> On another note, a lot of places, including those in the west will ostracize you for listening to the wrong music or eating the wrong foods.
Some groups will, yes. In a lot of cases it's just simple hypocrisy; lots of "anti-gay" congressmen somehow keep getting caught soliciting sex in airport bathrooms or on grinder.
I find it quaint and amusing people expect politicians to live privately same as their public personas.
As long as they votes consistently with their stated public beliefs (icky or flawed as they are ) on which they got elected does it matter they are very different private person ?
I would go so far as to say, them being different publicly than in private is a qualification for the job, if they cannot dissociate their personal beliefs from the will of their electorate then they shouldn’t do the job .
Don’t we all have one work persona and another home one ? Being a congressman should be no different.
On the other hand, the ones who sell on a public persona to get votes and switch their voting pattern after election to a different belief system is far more of hypocrite (Sinema or fetterman?)
Why would you care about remaining in good terms with somebody who would ostracize you for listening to the wrong music or eating the wrong food? Is that a person that deserves your friendship?
They can sometimes kill you too.
> if you have nothing to hide
We have everything to hide to you.
The mandate is ancient.
people have things they don't want everyone to know. how is wanting a small amount of privacy ridiculous?
Why would anybody even want to know the porn you watch? And what would they do about it, or how would that affect you?
"Hey, Jimmy, I went searching for your porn habits and found that you are into fat redheads. Shame on you, shame on you. You are now excommunicated from... Somewhere". How is this not a much bigger social faux pas for the accuser rather than the accused?
Post your browsing history and a list of your co-worker's and family's emails then, let's put your theory to the test. Bonus points if you post it to kiwifarms too.
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Didn’t Armie Hammer get fired from everything for being into (but not in any way practicing or even hinting at wanting to practice) erotic cannibalism?
Do you expect people to hold up the so-called faux pas or Jimmy's absolutely hilarious fat redhead fetish that his coworkers will be giving him the stink-eye for a few months before everyone forgets about it?
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> Why would anybody even want to know the porn you watch?
They might be interested in seducing you.
Otherwise, no reason.
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> as ridiculous as somebody threatening to publish a log
And in fact, privacy laws saw slow codification because the violations they are relevant to are largely preposterous.