According to an article published in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Craigslist is under attack by Alanta Mayor Shirley Franklin for its alleged role in promoting child prostitution.
“Children are being marketed through craigslist,” Franklin said during an update on the mayor’s “Dear John” campaign, a crackdown on the city’s child prostitution industry.
The full article can be read at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
What are your thoughts? Do you agree with Mayor Shirley Franklin that the site should do more to safeguard children?
Just under 17 million people visit craiglist per month and not all of them are looking to sell furniture that’s for sure. The amount of people looking for sexual encounters on the service is sickening.
It would be nice if Craigslist rid the site of the casual encounters section, but then again this is the internet and according to statistics the casual encounters section is a high trafficked section of the site.
I know in the past and in recent news teens, men and women have been arrested in relation to Internet prostitution on Craigslist.
This is just one more reason to supervise your children while they are on the internet and hopefully Craiglist will address these issues.
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5 responses so far ↓
Wrote: Aug 24, 2007 at 12:15 am
I think it should be shut down by officials. Leaving it open to catch the bad guys is one thing but what about the ones their not catching.
Isn’t this just contradicting the facts of safety first?
After all users have multiple ways of getting around officials, so in the meantime leaving it open is just putting more users of Craig’s List at risk!
Shawn DesRochers
Wrote: Aug 24, 2007 at 1:33 am
Shawn, though I see your concern, Craigslist has a greater good. Many people are able to find work and help people.
Also, I don’t think we live in a “safety first” world. If that were true, the government would have to stop the use of cars because they can kill people or baseball bats because they can be used as weapons.
Where I do agree is that Craigslist should be forced to clean up their act……
Wrote: Aug 24, 2007 at 11:37 am
I think if they shut down Craigslist there would be a new service opened right up which would have similar troubles. Instead there should be a protocol in place for any service such as this, penny saver, city websites, etc. which have strict enforcement against this kind of this. Of course it wouldn’t stop it all together, but it might lower the incidences by half or more. (just my two cents
)
Wrote: Aug 24, 2007 at 11:41 am
Carl, The personal section on Craigslist is so flooded with those looking for sexual encounters that I don’t understand why they don’t shut that part down. The “erotic services” category on Craigslist is full of prostitution ads. Craiglist is a haven for promoting prostitution. Last year in one sting detectives arrested a 16-year-old girl who was selling sexual services on Craiglist. Just recently news reported that a 13-year-old Livermore girl was prostituted over a three-month period last summer by a San Leandro man through Craiglist. They need to shut that part of the site down. On Craiglist you can flag these posts, but because it takes more than one flag to remove these ads there is no guarantee that your flag will result in the removal.
Wrote: Aug 24, 2007 at 5:59 pm
I have never read the personals of Craigslist. I only read the business sections. Sorry…. I guess I must have been naive.