Lula just vetoed Nicarágua and Venezuela in BRICS. I am very curious about how he intends to be independent of the imperialist core while following the core’s booklet.

When you responded to @[email protected], you said that you were against all porn.

Yes, and I also didn’t suggest banning pornography or anything like that. If you think that my statement alone that I am against pornography threatens pornography as a whole, you are greatly overestimating my influence.

You simply generalized all sex work as harmful to the worker/performer.

It is a convention, at least as I understand it, that when we are talking colloquially about a phenomenon, we are talking about how that phenomenon generally happens, even if we don’t use the word “generally” or something equivalent, since it is common sense that for everything there is at least one exception. If you feel like your case doesn’t fit into any of the issues I’ve outlined, with all honesty in my heart: good for you. However, most cases are not that lucky. Exception, instead of contradicting the rule, proves it, otherwise, it would not be an exception, it would be the rule itself.

Did you understand that I defend legalization, I just don’t defend it being controlled by big companies?

much like the failing war on drugs

It’s insightful of you to associate these two problems, in fact, in that they are similar. In both cases, there is also no point in legalizing so that large companies control activities, creating, in the case of drugs, big tobacco 2.0.

I linked an article that talks about the problem in general, two studies that talk about specific subjects and cases and an article that talks specifically about the content of porn films (I corrected the link, I was linking another text, not the one where the information originates ). There is exception for everything. Despite your individual experience, most pornography consumed does not involve direct compensation from viewers to actors to begin with. I do not aim to talk about prostitution and pornography in its entirety, but in general.

But anyway:

I was probably going to jerk off anyway

Yet, you only streamed because you needed to pay rent, or didn’t you?

Also, I did not propose immediately anything that would threaten the activity in the way you practiced it,on the contrary, banning pornographic networks would possibly encourage this type of pornography. If we got to a state where most porn was like this, we would have made a huge progress.

Obviously, no censorship measure can reach all cases, especially when it comes to pornography, you can find it in every corner of the internet. But it can cover most cases if it targets the most popular sites. For example, there is a lot of child pornography on the surface web, despite it being banned in most countries, but the ban makes access difficult and guarantees punishment in any case that the law takes notice of. It is not a definitive strategy, as it aims at the effect and not the cause, but it is something.

To be clear, I’m reading your response as against porn in all forms and for all audiences based on your wording, is that what you mean?

Yes.

How can you be against porn?

I am against porn because I am against prostitution, and porn is a type of prostitution, with the same problems of prostitution plus some more. The central problem is sexism.

It’s neither good or bad, it exists and I basically don’t watch it, but I recognize that others do, why is that a problem that needs solving?

Good and bad are Manichaean categories, as a materialist, I avoid using them. My problem with pornography is the reality of it as well as the reality of prostitution in general. The porn industry is the home of abuse, in every sense. First in the rawest sense, the physical and mental abuse that actresses go through; second in the reproduction and propagation of the culture of abuse, considering that it is the most recurrent theme in porn films; third in the economic sense, pornography, like prostitution in general, is the sale of consent: the actress or prostitute receives money to have sex with someone she would not have sex with under other circumstances, in short: paid rape.

I do not, however, advocate banning either prostitution or pornography, mainly because it would not solve the problem and could even worsen the vulnerability of women in these professions. I however think that pimping should be criminally punished, just like porn networks, which are just a socially accepted form of pimping. Several social problems produce prostitution and pornography, mainly economic inequality, but also the misogyny embedded in the culture of our society, and only a different form of sociability could put an end to these practices. As long as we are not living in this new system, governments can take palliative measures to alleviate the various problems of these practices, but this is not the case at all with this measure by the Spanish government.

EDIT: I have corrected the third link to the article where the information comes from.

I am against porn, but this don’t solve anything.

Easy, they can set guidelines and block in the country sites that do not follow these guidelines.

investigative journalists in authoritarian countries

You mean like the US? Who achieved the feat of persecuting a foreign journalist as if he were an American citizen?

EDIT: I know that Mullvad is also critical of american surveillance, but I find it very funny that when in the West they call a state democratic that does exactly the same (or worse) than a state in the East that they call “authoritarian”. It really reveals how empty of meaning this word is. “Ah, but these Western states have ‘democratic institutions’.” News for you: the states you call “authoritarian” have them too. In both cases, they can be and de facto are dictatorships.

The only solution I see is to immediately return the artifacts. Soon the Puritans will start breaking them.

Responding to the part you added later: the question is not simply having individual use value, which one could argue that prostitution has, the question is whether labor transforms matter into merchandise or not, in short, whether it produces or not value (having value and producing value are different things).

(Paintings, Movies, TV Shows, Games etc) shouldn’t be included either because there is no tangible value being created.

No, there is tangible value being created. You take the combined work of everyone involved in production and end up with a commodity. Paintings, Movies, TV Shows and Games are commodities.

It shouldn’t be, that’s what I’m saying. It’s unproductive labor, in the sense that it doesn’t produce value. The service sector is paid with the product produced by the producing sector (mainly industry and agriculture). Counting their “production” is counting the same money twice. Artists as a whole don’t necessarily fit into the service sector, because their work can produce value, depending on how they work. For example, craftsmen and musicians who record their music produce value, because their work is transformed into a commodity.

EDIT: I know I spoke a bit confusingly, but English is not my primary language and I read Marx in my language, so I don’t know the precise translation of many terms.

No, it doesn’t make sense. Prostitution doesn’t produce value, counting drug trafficking is much more reasonable. I know that other “legal” services are already counted, but when they don’t play a role in producing value, they shouldn’t be.

The burden of proof lies with the accuser.

Sorry for the late response. Yes, I actually did. I would do a point-by-point analysis of what makes this report an extremely biased piece and why it should not be considered a valid source, but I will save us both the effort (mine of writing and yours of ignoring it, since, honestly, you are not going to change your mind because of something someone on lemmy said). However, for the sake of rhetoric, I will summarize the problematic of the main subject (civilian targets), but I make it clear that by my own metric I find this insufficient.

Let’s talk first about the damage to electrical installations and water distribution. The electrical installations were clearly the target, and the water distribution suffered collateral damage because they are dependent on the electrical installations. While civilians are obviously affected when you hit these types of installations, it’s not hard to imagine what military interest they might have: they can and do power the enemy army’s electronic equipment. Now, I can’t talk about food distribution points, hospitals and shelters without touching on the source issue. This report uses four main sources: aerial images, photojournalism, Russian statements and Azov statements. While there is no problem with the first two sources, they can only show us the damage, but not the perpetrator or the intent (except in the first case, which is all too obvious). The only thing that supports the idea that the attacks on these three types of facilities were carried out by the Russians and with the intention of causing terror are the claims of Azov. There is one particular case where the Russians admitted to having committed the attack (unlike the others), but there is controversy between the Russian version and the Azov version. This is insufficient. You cannot report as true the version of any side of a war without supporting evidence. These sources are biased by definition. So, the suggestion that the one who really carried out the attacks in an attempt to vilify the Russians and cause terror was Azov, has as much value as Azov’s version. It can even be said that, in the case of Azov, there are precedents for this type of action, a specific one: they did it on a smaller scale during the events of the 2014 coup, and a general one: fascists like them do this all the time, since the proto-fascist Confederates. To be clear, I am not saying that this is what happened, only that it could have happened. A conclusion on this subject requires conclusive evidence.

Not deliberately bombing civilians…ok you know they are^[1]. It’s a tried and true russian “war” tactic. They are also stealing children^[2] and taking them to families in rural Russia in order to russify them^[3]. That is a war crime and a very definition of genocide. They’ve stated over and over that Ukraine is not a real country^[4] and the language is not real. Erasing a culture like that is also a definition of genocide. 30,000+ children murdered in locations no where near a contested front line^[5]. Defending that is disgusting.

My man, how is saying

Russia is definitely not deliberately bombing civilian targets

the same to defend the invasion? HOW?! And again, you are the one who is cutting off any possibility of dialogue with those you disagree with. You are so sure that you are right that you do not let a shadow of doubt come near you.

My man I appreciate your anger towards oppressors, but first and foremost, Israel is the one killing Palestinian children, Hamas is one of the Palestinian organizations that resists the Israeli yoke. I know that the Earth is a sterile promontory, but the disorganized action of one individual, whether violent or not, is incapable of bringing about meaningful change. At best, it would bring you a false, self-indulgent, and brief sense of fulfillment, which would quickly be replaced by a much greater misery than you have ever felt for yourself and others around you. I think it would do you good to find someone in your offline life with whom you could talk about these anxieties. By doing so, you could begin to transform this destructive feeling into constructive action for a world different from this foul and pestilent congregation of vapors.

And you are all going late. The way you guys are absolutely incapable of arguing with anyone who doesn’t parrot the status quo media’s cant tells me you’d be much better off back on reddit, your natural habitat, so to speak.

Do you realize that I never once said that I advocated the invasion of Ukraine? That I simply stated that the situation has NOTHING to do with Palestine? Your mind has been so corroded by ideology that you cannot tolerate anyone even slightly disagreeing with your narrative.