Craigslist cuts 'erotic service' ads; but industry rolls on

Victoria Banks · December 24, 2010

The 18-year-old escort on Ray .....?s couch makes $2,000 a day on the best of days.

The fact she can?t advertise on Craigslist anymore hasn?t slowed business one bit ? for her or ......

Within 24 hours of Craigslist dumping erotic service ads, ..... saw a huge jump in visits to his escort service website.

Though he doesn?t run an escort service himself, ..... is the owner of Ottawa............ ? where for $50 a pop, escort and sex industry service providers, among others, in Ottawa can advertise.

He?s seen a 28% hike in traffic since Craigslist dumped sex-for-sale ads on all 55 of its Canadian sites Saturday. While the move has been good for his business, ..... said it?s having a detrimental effect on smaller operators or independents. He calls it a knock against their ?commercial expression.?

?A lot of Canadians forget that we have the Charter of Rights,? said ...... ?They push so hard to get rid of sexual slavery, but it?s a shame that they think they can solve the problem this way.?

The owner of a local escort agency, who asked not to be named, agreed, adding the Craiglist decision was counter-intuitive. He said the people and agencies that offer under-age girls, immigrants without proper paperwork or girls who were being held against their will won?t be deterred by the Craigslist move.

?Guys who exploit women have lots of money,? he said. ?They can easily afford to pay for ads and will just go elsewhere. If anything, this will only help their business. It?s a very poor move. I don?t see anything positive about this.?

Besides, he pointed out, Craigslist isn?t the only free classified ad site on the net and said others will just become more popular.

?Craigslist always attracted low-end escorts because it was free,? he said. ?Those people might go out of business, the independents. But, it?s counter-productive to what the government wants to do. Besides, as of 8 p.m. Friday night, my phones got busier.

?This business has been around a lot longer than Craigslist. This won?t make any difference.?

..... said the problem with Craigslist is the website has no filters for content. Anyone with just a valid e-mail address can submit an ad, and it?s posted within 15 minutes.

?Although Canada has a Charter of Rights listing commercial expression as a fundamental and guaranteed right, the owner of Craigslist shut down without a fight,? said ...... ?There are millions of sites advertising and offering escort services. Escorts are now trying to find another place to advertise.?