IDEAS FOR ACTION
Those who defend this cruelty for profit will not be convinced with good arguments or calls to compassion. This situation calls for immediate, direct, uncompromising action. There are numerous ways to take direct action against this form of abuse, despite the systems of oppressive laws and property relations that protect it with their lawyers and police. Anonymity is highly recommended when useful.
The deeper societal oppression has and will be fought with steady long-term struggle. The less we heal collectively, the more we pass on cultural poison and waste to the coming generations.
Proposals for action:
Anyone with any relevant information can expose the individuals who make these films, their locations, lawyers who protect them, businesses that they associate with etc.
Finding and publicizing personal and business information and distributing it to the public could be the best tool for disrupting this oppression and allowing for popular justice to be enacted. Natural accountability measures have been blocked by the secrecy and legal protections of this sector of the market. Here’s a start:
Perpetrators: “Duke Skywalker” - Donato Cassano possibly in Fair Lawn, NJ and his “partner” “Big Red,” “Bootleg” David Brian Horter, Pauly Harker, “Jimmy Hooligan,” and others
D & E Media LLC: Address: 360 Glenwood Ave #6,
East Orange, NJ 07017
Phone: (973) 673-8880
Lawyers/reps.: Joseph D. Obenberger
3 First National Plaza / Suite 3700
Chicago, IL 60602
Phones: (312) 558-6420
https://facialabused.wordpress.com/
http://www.trademarkia.com/company-d--e-media-llc-312325-page-1-2
http://www.trademarkia.com/correspondent-joseph-d-obenberger-1-196265
https://thedirty.com/gossip/philadelphia/meet-mr-bootleg/#page-3
https://thedirty.com/gossip/manhattan/meet-pauly-harker/#page-2
https://twitter.com/DukeSkywalkerhttps://twitter.com/xxxmrbootleg
Stand in solidarity with sex workers in organizing for collective power
-Check out this site full of links to organizing efforts and positive movement for sex workers around the world: http://www.bayswan.org/orgs.html. People are doing good work in Rhode Island, for example: http://www.rifuture.org/sex-workers-of-rhode-island-unite.html – don't miss the audio interview.
-The One Big Union, the Industrial Workers of the World (www.iww.org), is open for all working people to join. Sex workers have their own union within the IWW - Sex Trade Workers Industrial Union 690 (http://www.iww.org/unions/dept600/iu690).
-This courageous piece by an IWW organizer about finding liberation from sexual and emotional abuse and the interconnections with fighting for dignity at work is outstanding – these are powerful words (http://www.iww.org/content/my-body-my-rules-case-rape-and-domestic-violence-survivors-becoming-workplace-organizers).
-Here is an inspiring article about respect and self-determination for sex workers in the context of the labor movement: inthesetimes.com/working/entry/4796/a_new_labor_movement_for_the_oldest_profession_sex_workers_organize
-In this adult performer's opinion, it's “Time for porn stars to self-organize” (https://www.facebook.com/notes/outrage-magazine/time-for-porn-stars-to-self-organise/378786344181).
-If you love the work porn performers do, show some solidarity when you can! Porn performers could really benefit knowing they would be supported by their fans in organizing to protect each other and fight for common goals.
Stop blaming Black women and other women for falling into traps set by oppressors and instead listen to them.
The most common response I read that people have to Ghetto Gaggers (GG) is to blame the women, and often ALL Black women, for these women participating in their own degradation. It's clear that many people refuse to hold the aggressors responsible and fall into the trick of turning it against the victims of brutality. The white men who carry out this violence and those who pay for it and protect it are responsible for their actions and for the damage they are causing. There are numerous comments referring to GG that people have made across the internet describing all Black women as “whores” and other degrading terms. Bigotry makes people so stupid that they see a person do something, immediately blame it on that person without considering the causes and conditions that person is having to deal with, forget the centuries of exploitation and dehumanization that set the stage and then immediately assuming that all _____ people are inherently flawed in whatever way they disapprove of what they see.
While the women ended up on these films from some degree of their own consent, it's important to recognize that consent was violated during shooting. The acts shown can accurately be described as “forced”. Often, the woman is signaling in multiple ways that she desperately needs a break or a breath of air and is given more violence in response. That is not the fault of the sex worker who ended up in that position, despite it clearly being a bad decision to participate at all. Furthermore, deception and coercion (as shown by several testimonies and the shameless written descriptions on these websites themselves) before and during shooting make the consent that was given inapplicable to a lot of what happens when the violence starts. A great deal of this “porn” can easily be considered sexual assault without consent.
The women who participated in these films did not ask or agree to have legs wrapped around their heads forcing a penis down their throat so they couldn’t breathe. They didn't agree to work on a “porn” film where the urgent needs of the performers are ignored and laughed at. When they signaled with tapping, motion, and sound, they were saying “no” and their consent was forcibly violated. They didn't create the system of exploitation where some resentful lost soul with some money can profit from sexually exploiting people. They didn't agree to be the worker-tools in that system where most people own nothing but their ability to work for somebody else. They didn’t design or invent the past 5 centuries of oppression against people of color that continues to leave wounds. They didn’t ask to be forced by pimps or deceived by porn talent agencies.
Sex work is one form of work among many. Sex workers deserve respect as human beings and solidarity in fighting for their empowerment and safety. The rest of us can reject the idea that the lines of consent and sexual assault don't apply to them as much as everyone else. Let's stop blaming survivors of abuse and listen to them instead.
Speak out! Silence protects the violence. Use text, film, voice, social media etc. Write to influential people regarding this porn that violates all standards of human treatment.
Support women and others who are speaking out and have been fighting for dignity and against racist violence. There are many bloggers and others on Youtube and other places on the internet who have stepped out to write about and demand dignity for their sisters. We can support those, especially women of color, who are speaking out and take forms of organizing, communication, media sharing etc. to empower them and others who will come.
Groups or individuals affected by or concerned with this porn could call for a national day of action against racist/abuse/nonconsensual porn or other forms of organizing.
People across the country could speak out, some would organize public demonstrations, others might take direct action against the production of exploitative films or write an article or letter to the editor, make non-oppressive porn etc. Apparently our culture isn’t shy about looking at online porn (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/03/internet-porn-stats_n_3187682.html), let's not be shy about fighting for dignity and empowerment in porn.
Push for a general boycott by porn talent agencies, other businesses, websites and consumers.
We can all do something from our own information and connections, big or small. One tactic that has apparently been used against the producers of GG/FA/LA/BOBC etc. is refusing to do business with them. There are a lot of places to put pressure in order to isolate and delegitimize the producers in question. Porn talent agencies, porn video databases, websites that sell advertising space to abuse porn, financial institutions, porn site reviewers etc. could all be given numerous letters requesting they cut all ties with porn that uses force, enacts racist violence, etc. Here is one passionate account:
“My company used to process online CC and check/cheque payments for these cunts until the law was changed and we were able to drop their asses without incurring any penalties.
The three main guys who run the majority of the shady disgrace/abuse stuff are all over gfy.com constantly looking for talent and content.
You can also find them at just about any of the Adult Expo's around the World.
They are really scummy people as you would imagine. I can't say they are notoriously scummy in the industry as most other content producers have no idea the extent the abuse is taken to. Everyone just thinks it's the same as public disgrace (who do go through all the legal hurdles to product legal content - outlining what performers are or are not willing to do, how much $, etc). DON'T SIGN ANYTHING UNLESS YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE SIGNING. Some of these assholes will throw a bunch of papers at you to sign and 'make some money', but you're signing your life away to them.
One of the guys got his ass beat by one of the girls' brothers at XBIz 360 a few weeks ago.” (https://www.reddit.com/r/sex/comments/1zn24c/realistically_what_can_be_done_to_take_down/cfv97yc)
One commentator has suggested boycotting their webhosts and the rest of the sites they host. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lXJD8lBaqM). I don’t know about the tech. details, but it seems that some internet research, spreading the word and a campaign writing to the offending webhosts could create some leverage.
I’m typically in favor of protecting people’s privacy when it comes to their sexual preferences and activities. This is not a typical case. I really wonder what would happen in the aftermath if a hacker released a list of the names of the subscribers, who actually materially, economically support racist sexual violence and self-described criminal abuse (besides GG, the other sites are called Facial Abuse, Latina Abuse, Black on Black Crime). Some people would learn that they have friends and loved ones who pay to watch women being sexually tortured.
Help create a new economic and social foundation for solidarity rather than competitive exploitation and privatized insecurity.
This is a huge and all-encompassing project, but to me this is the only way to fundamentally weaken the oppression that inevitably leads to cultural filth like abuse porn. If we really want to empower people we can stop treating ourselves like we are just objects, equal to money as was the law 150 years ago. We can stop being just bodies to be exploited, degraded and humiliated. The private, competitive dog-eat-dog systems we are caught in degrade most of us to the point that the most hard-up will even agree to be abused for money.
The pleasure that they try to stimulate through describing how these individuals will do anything for a bit of money is simply the exposed, rotted glorification of our shared degradation that turns human life into money. The rules of capital quietly turn dignity and values into profit, like gears turned with a crank. Those damaged, white tools who produce this abuse porn think they are justified because they feel they are just turning the crank – if someone technically agrees to an act for whatever sick, desperate or coerced cause, then they think they are totally justified in getting away with whatever they can to exploit that worker’s weak position. It’s no wonder when we step back and see that essentially the same economic relationships that slavery was based on are still grinding people down today. Money, private exploitation of the land, profit for the owning class, humiliating work under coercive conditions etc. The sickness will continue until we respect ourselves enough to resist our own abuse and fight together against our common degradation.
The good news is that we can make a new game where we work together for everyone to thrive, rather than fight for survival like starving beasts. Today, the exploited, the defectors, the visionaries, people of color, white people will have to come together to fight for the ability to share and cooperate, and live on a higher plane than these hierarchical divisions allow. When we are able to do this, the illusions of race, money and authority become much less real in all of our minds.