Not long ago, Tim pointed out the ongoing battle between New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof and Village Voice Media, owner of Backpage.com and the Dallas Observer (and the weekly in South Florida where I worked for three years). The problem: Backpage is used in the sex-trafficking of underage girls. Village Voice Media does not dispute that its site is used in this way, though it has argued that the number of sex slaves trafficked on Backpage is far smaller than reported–as in it’s “only” 827 girls a year, on average. (See comments.)
This weekend Kristof revealed that Goldman Sachs owned a 16-percent stake of VVM–until last Friday anyway. After pressure from Kristof, Goldman Sachs “frantically” sold its shares and went about explaining that the company never had any influence over Backpage operations. Kristof points out a few other companies that have stakes in VVM and some of the other pressure being exerted against Backpage.
UPDATE: Reuters reports that in 2000 Goldman Sachs paid $30 million for what became their share of VVM, and upon last week’s fire sale lost the “vast majority” of its investment.
From Kristof’s editorial: “After my last column on this issue, 19 U.S. senators wrote the company, asking it to stop abetting traffickers. On Thursday, antitrafficking campaigners protested outside the Village Voice newspaper (which is owned by Village Voice Media). A petition on Change.org criticizing the company has gathered 220,000 signatures.”
Kristof rightly points out that, instead of jumping ship, minority stake holders like Goldman Sachs might have come together to force the company out of the prostitution-ad business. Or better yet, into a model that better protects the people being exploited. (This assumes that adult, consensual prostitution might be possible without also allowing for the exploitation of children, and I admit that’s a big assumption.) By simply cashing out, these companies just pass the buck.
The situation is complicated. The anti-prostitution-ad campaign seems noble, but if VVM were to drop the hooker ads completely — which is what it appears Kristof and his supporters want — it might actually hurt the true victims here, the women being sold, more than it would help them. Removing the emporium might take away one of the ways in which pimps peddle people, but it will also remove one of the safest avenues for adult women (and men) who chose to sell themselves.
The right answer probably isn’t a simple boycott. The right answer is accountability. If Kristof and gang think halting these ads will stop sex-trafficking, they are wrong. But if VVM makes $22 million a year from prostitution advertising, as has been reported, the company can afford to hire some of these protesters and put them in charge of cleaning up these problems, whether that means changing the process, working with safety groups, or cutting the ads entirely. First though, executives can admit that the company has enabled horrific tragedy and they can try to make it right.
But VVM has consistently used its substantial journalistic power and whatever integrity it has left to attack the messengers–and to protect VVM’s business interests. (For fun, look up how VVM papers reported stories about Craigslist and Yelp.) So here’s a prediction: Backpage will continue to operate as it has, with at least hundreds of children bought and sold every year. But the Dallas Observer (and every other paper VVM owns) will soon run a cover story about Nicholas Kristof and the unsavory ethics of the New York Times.
