Report Labels Habbo a "Pedophile Haven"

[Treblaine]

Did the reporter pretend to be a child? If not, then it seems they have only outlined examples of lechery, not paedophilia. A girl getting hit on when she is 17 is hardly an example of paedophilia and the age of consent in UK (and most US States) is 16 years old.

"Rachel Seifert spent two months playing this seemingly innocent game posing as a young girl."

Hmm, suspiciously vague. And I don't think these games even advertise the user's age. And this is a game mainly for teenagers mainly.

Channel 4 article [//www.channel4.com/news/striptease-and-cyber-sex-my-stay-at-habbo-hotel]: "Rachel Seifert writes for Channel 4 News about her shocking and sometimes sexually-explicit experiences playing the popular online game Habbo Hotel while posing as an 11-year old girl".

There it is, posing as an underage player, cut and dried. Take all that as you will, I guess.

This service IS for teenagers and right away she is breaking the rules in either masquerading as an 11 year old - they are clear that you must be over the age of 13 to join Habbo - or from actually being an adult lying about their age. The very same thing that supposedly allows homosexuals is the very thing that let her conduct this report. She could not do he equivalent in a secondary school (high school) where all the children REALLY ARE 13-18 years old. I remember the lascivious talk amongst students when I was in school that age and from the whiny voices on Xbox live clearly of young teenagers yet the foul, sexual and perverse comments these are most likely all dumb kids on Habbo talking dirty.

And how the hell does one pose as an 11-year old in a game entirely made up of adult looking teenage avatars and where the age/D.O.B is not displayed in vital statistics? Were they targeted only after they stated they were 11?!? Or did they have an interest in her presumably as an adult teenager and probably (rightly) thought they were bullshitting about being 11.

Look, can we accept that teenagers are going to talk about sex to each other or are we going to indulge in some ridiculous delusion that children are completely asexual till suddenly they reach age of majority? Or worse some oppressive idea that it can or even should be forcibly suppressed? We don't hold that dangerous delusions in our schools where 13 year olds are given full sex education, access to condoms and even birth control pills. Schools do not have a zero tolerance policy of forbidding sexual banter between all students. In fact last time I checked UK schools aren't even pushing abstinence for secondary school kids.

ANYWHERE that completely censors teenagers from talking about sex cannot work. There ARE sites for under 13 year olds and parents have a responsibility to make sure they don't go on those sites just like they make sure they don't go on ogrish.

So this journalist is breaking the rules right from the start, not doing anything to report or discourage this and objecting to a lack of regulation. But ANY form of the sexual exploitation of children is totally dependent on the victims reporting, whether it is Habbo or just in a play park or in their own home with male relatives.
Yet the reporter did not take this to Habbo's formal internal polcie force to be immediately followed up on, they instead waited 2 months and wrote a broad and yellow-journalist report to go straight to their investors. THAT is sensationalist bullshit.

Habbo has 3 options, only one of them is practical:
(1) implement a universal absolute censorship system that hold every single comment to be vetted by a human being before being transmitted and file full criminal charges to anyone who says something remotely sexual
(2) shut down completely, and shut down any service from any other company which does not only forbid anyone under the age of 18 interacting online on their site, but actively enforcing this by demanding constant credit card-based agee verification. This includes Facebook, Youtube, Xbox Live and even The Escapist.
(3) continue as they are, being good moderators and acting on everything that is reported and working with the police and social services to educate and empower teenagers to report any harassment and teach them how to cut off unwanted communications.

 

[Treblaine]

I wish people would pay more attention to the places children are actually being harmed -- their homes. We spend so much time afraid of the boogeyman on the internet and in the streets that most of us seem to forget that the vast, vast majority of children that are abused, are abused in their own home by a family member.

Yeah, stranger danger is bad. But odds are a kid is more likely to be molested by their parents than a stranger on the street. Let's drop the scare tactics and focus on the forest fire, not the matchstick.

Family homes have been around since John Snow was a child so he doesn't try to ban families after cases like Baby P, just that there should be better enforcement.

Yet Habbo is new and different, so fuck accountable enforcement, just ban this new stuff and "go outside and play you damn kids" oh wait playing outside in a park the exact same thing could happen only with far worse repercussions and no recording and tracing on IP address of interactions. Habbo is WAY safer place to learn to report unwanted advances and break off communication.

Channel 4 news is being UTTERLY NAIVE saying that every single communication should have a live and instantaneous moderator. That REALLY is the equivalent of a school having a teacher hound every single student throughout the entire school day.

 

[sapphireofthesea]

Just thought. Teenagers and sexual topics...yeah defo only pedos doing the talking there then.

 

[SonicWaffle]

I can't be the only one that finds this comment extremely disturbing? So you are a good pedophile? wtf?!

If he/she hasn't perpetrated, then yeah a good one, it's not exactly something they wish to be/have.
Or are we going to arrest people for thought crimes now and put them in camps?

Arguing that there can be "good pedophiles" is a slippery slope. Unless said pedophile gets help in the form of physical or chemical castration then that person remains a very real risk.

Yeah, like all men. Every man has the potential to be a rapist, and arguing there can be a "good man" is a slippery slope; unless a man gets help via castration to control his sexual urges, he remains a very real risk to the men or women around him.

OT: I don't like the way this report is being used. Read an article in the paper - a decent paper, too, not a red-top - about the Children's Minister (or something) taking this as justification for rampant "They're everywhere! Lock up your kids, paedos are actively hunting them all all times! BE AFRAID OF EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE!" paranoia.

 

[SonicWaffle]

As people pointed out: Who is to say that the people posting explicit/sexual chat were not teens/kids themselves?

That's been acknowledged and bundled part-and-parcel of the same issue, the sexualisation of children either by adults or other children or the sentient pervert monster that men call The Internet.

The article I read was about a government minister using this report as evidence that child sexual activity is everywhere, but also cited several instances of kids sexting, engaging in sexual activity with other another, even taking photos of themselves. Her argument is basically "Children are under constant attack from perversion, from paedophiles, other children and worst of all themselves. Putting safety blocks on their computer isn't enough, don't you know that mobile phones are just porn-laden sex toys these days? No child is safe! Build walls, buy guns, invest in chastity belts and lock your kids in the cellar. That way, even you can't abuse them. IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO BE SAFE! It doesn't matter if you and almost every other human before you learned about sex and other human interaction through experience, kids are thinking about sex and that is EVIL"

Is child sex abuse a problem? Hell yes.

Should all young people be frozen in carbonite to reduce risk of any human contact? I don't think so.

 

[saintdane05]

delete, double post.

 

[saintdane05]

Pete peeve 2213: You can be a pedophile without being a child molester. A pedophile is simply one who is turned on by children. A child molester rapes children. Huge difference.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3rhQc666Sg

Capatcha: Urban myth. You got that right.

 

[Kungfu_Teddybear]

Yeah, didn't most people know this like 8 years ago?

Also, as others have said, it could totally be some horny teenagers.

 

[Malty Milk Whistle]

Ker-SNIP

Ok, I'm not the only one to say this, but actually WATCH the report (It was a good 10 minutes or so long, and had sources for its information, and also, channel 4 is a fairly reputable news reporter.

So yeah.

 

[Treblaine]

Ker-SNIP

Ok, I'm not the only one to say this, but actually WATCH the report (It was a good 10 minutes or so long, and had sources for its information, and also, channel 4 is a fairly reputable news reporter.

So yeah.

Video has almost the exact same content as the written article though I did address the few other things that came up in the video.


See post nuber 62 of this thread of just clock here:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/7.378430.14802217

 

[Malty Milk Whistle]

Ker-SNIP

Ok, I'm not the only one to say this, but actually WATCH the report (It was a good 10 minutes or so long, and had sources for its information, and also, channel 4 is a fairly reputable news reporter.

So yeah.

Video has almost the exact same content as the written article though I did address the few other things that came up in the video.


See post nuber 62 of this thread of just clock here:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/7.378430.14802217

Oh, I wasn't taking issue with that, it's just that i get fairly irked (Good word, that) when people slag off C4, i do generally believe that they put forward some excellent programs and news...well, better than ITV (Though what isn't?)

And to be fair, anyone going on a site primarily aimed at young children and asking for "bewbs" is going to be a little...Abnormal.

Also I agree with your statement about that it might even be other kids doing it, But still.

 

[Xannidel]

Haha, Pool's Closed!

If they lose their investors, it will be more than just AIDS they have to worry about now.

Was starting to worry that no one would get that, lol.

Desu Desu and other such phrases like that.

Good times.

 

[Treblaine]

Ker-SNIP

Ok, I'm not the only one to say this, but actually WATCH the report (It was a good 10 minutes or so long, and had sources for its information, and also, channel 4 is a fairly reputable news reporter.

So yeah.

Video has almost the exact same content as the written article though I did address the few other things that came up in the video.


See post nuber 62 of this thread of just clock here:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/7.378430.14802217

Oh, I wasn't taking issue with that, it's just that i get fairly irked (Good word, that) when people slag off C4, i do generally believe that they put forward some excellent programs and news...well, better than ITV (Though what isn't?)

And to be fair, anyone going on a site primarily aimed at young children and asking for "bewbs" is going to be a little...Abnormal.

Also I agree with your statement about that it might even be other kids doing it, But still.

I am not slagging off Channel 4, I am slagging off this particular report and how reports like this are not even unique in the media. Everywhere I said the report, and the specific people involved in the report.

I hold the BBC in high regard but when they screw up I don't hold them infallible. You should not be irked, you should be glad they are hold to a high standard. If this was fox news it might just be "ah, fox news, who takes them seriously? They are a lost cause"


"site primarily aimed at young children and asking for "bewbs" "

What do you mean by "young children"? Under 13 year olds are explicitly forbidden from even having an account with Habbo and this would be detected as soon as they tried to use any credit card, this is EXPLICITLY a site for teenagers and older children. Are you saying that there is something unnatural about teenage boys being interested in the opposite sex such as "bewbs"? Legally they may be children but they are still teenagers, the government permits that birth control be made available to teenagers as young as 14 year olds without their parent's consent:

http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/ate/birthcontrolandcontraception/207844.html

So it's kind of a double standard enabling then to have sex but can't talk about it to each other.

My main criticism is the utter ignorance of the safety measures the report considers it unacceptable for Habbo should have. That on a website where children access there must be 100% live and vetted moderation of every single line of communication, which is impossible, not any school, not a single government service can provide that level of surveillance and policing to such a large number of communication tracts.
After the reporter established that just as they can pretend to be a child, a child could pretend to be an adult, so every site that didn't want to have a level of moderator surveillance that would make the Stasi look like the Keystone Kops, would have to implement hard age gates before any positing, that means registering an active and reputable credit card that includes a birth date.

You don't realise. This report is expecting the internet as we know it to be chucked in the bin... for the children.

Why? Because parents are't protecting their children in the most fundamental way. Parents who have their children walk to school educate them to not cooperate with those who want to see them naked and to report them, the same applies with Habbo. The EXACT SAME thing that has happened on Habbo can and does happen when children walk to school as the government forces them to by mandating school attendance yet not providing any school buses, this affect the poorest children the most.

The exact same thing could happen to this site.

 

[RvLeshrac]

This so reminds me of this old Brass Eye episode...

Best thing I've seen today. Since Feed Dump, anyway.

 

[Conn1496]

Me and my friend go on Habbo and chat guys up, then turn into a viking, shout "It's a trap!" and run away just to freak people out. It's hilarious. Some of the people really deserve it too. This guy was really going for it, and his reaction afterwards was so funny, we literally ROFLed. Best thing is, we've never been banned, but we've reported over 60 creeps in a year. Vigilante justice at it's funniest, I say (It's like to catch a predator on a minor scale, but with a transexual viking.).

 

[kellyganupa]

There needs to be an update of Habbo.Com, and a prolong investigation because there is enough visual evidence to record ,and snap shot from incidents of cyber bullying, sexual chat , and moderators who reply with no evidence of chat ignoring the real visual evidence. This hotel holds all users hostage from deleting their account if uncomfortable because they don't want to lose your money , their ratings ,and their money! This hotel doesn't believe in visual evidence which is does have!
Also you should read the user voice forms the sexual allegations ,and harassment ,and the asking sulake/habbo to approve that there is nothing wrong with sex in a teen/gaming website.
Please please do an update it is needed. Get the visual evidence ,and it will be easier to slay Habbo.com they're nothing but a gaming website profiting off of sex offenders ,and sexual harassment.
They tell you not to go off from habbo and they have pedophiles , and sex offenders to get you to join fan sites!
Habbo.com is one big sexual soliciting website with obscene chat logs that would blow the minds of all parents in this world!