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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   27761 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 18, 2023

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Continuing on with The Motte's theme of the week, the Australian Federal Government has given the online dating industry a year to implement a 'voluntary' code of conduct in the face of 'online sexual violence' or presumably face regulation.

This ultimatum seems to be motivated by “An investigation by the Australian Institute of Criminology last year found three-quarters of online daters had been subject to some kind of online sexual violence in the past five years.”

Finding the referenced report 'Dating App Facilitated Sexual Violence' (their term, not mine) seems to include amongst other acts:

  • Pressured the respondent to give them information about their location or their schedule
  • Continued to contact the respondent even after they told them they were not interested in having a relationship with them
  • Pressured the respondent verbally to perform unwanted sexual acts (eg making promises, lying, repeatedly asking or insisting etc)
  • Sent the respondent an unwanted sexually explicit message
  • Sent the respondent an unwanted sexually explicit photo or video of themselves
  • Pressured the respondent to meet them in person when they did not want to
This would include dick pics or non-consensual sexually explicit language sent through a dating app, along with other mundane dating activity. The march to broaden the definition of sexual violence to include 'making women uncomfortable' continues.

Australia, is usually a follower of countries like Canada and the UK when it comes to these sorts of policies, but it does occasionally become the first mover when there is the chance of getting a cheap political win (and to seem like it is doing something in the face of more serious issues such as the housing crisis).

The linked news article is kind of buried down the state news media's front page and references the federal government's karen social services minister who has previously worked on 'cyber safety' committees. There is a fair chance this is a complete nothing burger that will blow over and is just the govt making noises rather than actually intending to follow through, but time will tell.

Yeah there's a lot of 'voluntary code of conduct' government-control-laundering going on. They also proposed legislation for social media to come to a voluntary code of conduct on misinformation, without defining misinformation. The social media companies have to decide what to censor. Certain organizations can't be censored, like govt, licensed academic orgs... The whole thing seems like an excuse for govt to say 'oh its nothing to do with us, the companies are censoring' and the companies can say 'oh its the government's laws, out of our hands' and nobody can get to the bottom of the matter without losing 95% of their readers because it's too complicated and boring. I think I might've misremembered some of it already, perhaps some of the companies were already in a code of conduct and this wouldn't affect them. Anyway, a total vacuum of accountability, amongst other problems.

Frankly the notion of online sexual violence is pretty ridiculous. They really mean 'obscenity' but don't want to sound like a fuddy-duddy.

"There could be clearer communication around what happens when you report an unwanted contact or a questionable or threatening contact, and what the app does with that information," Professor Albury said.

"There could also be a clearer sense of how fast you can expect to get feedback or a very personal response from the app if you report an issue.

"One of the things that dating app users are concerned about is the sense that complaints go into the void, or there's a response that feels automated, or not personally responsive in a time when they're feeling quite unsafe or distressed."

But on the other hand, if they put a bunch of onerous penalties and regulations on dating apps, that's not all bad. Maybe it will undo some of the damage to society if it imposes costs on these apps? On the other hand, they might just move towards more aggressive subscriptions, advertising and general pay2win (pay2fuck?) mechanics...

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