Sextortion - the fault of the man looking for sexual thrills..

[Summerinrome]

I am pretty enraged listening to BBC2 with Jeremy Vine with a police officer (naturally a male police officer) describing the 'brutal' offence of sextortion. Basically when a man gets his bits out on line at the encouragement of an attractive woman on line, and then (surprise surprise) he gets bribed with the footage to stop her showing his family and friends what he is really like.

How is a man who gets his bits out on the internet and conducts grubby sexual acts a 'victim'? I have zero sympathy. It is a ridiculous term for what is basically a dirty man old man using younger women on line.

Rape and murder is 'brutal', assault is 'brutal' but getting your own codger out on line and then expecting public sympathy when it turns bad is deeply unimpressive and insulting to real victims of real crimes.

Why are we wasting tax payers money and police time on issues like this? I don't actually care that they are being bribed, it is their own fault. If you don't want to be in nasty situations keep your penis in your pants online.

The real victims of crime are completely overlooked and underfunded. Womens refuge centres are being closed down, no police officers for the people that are being burgled, a complete lack of policing everywhere and yet incredulously we can find huge amounts of money for this heinous crime against dirty old men?

Thoughts?

I don't think that is very likely in the bad end of the Philippines as you well know Dancing, she has no protection whatsoever.

But hey why would the man care what happens to her?

Well yes because she is live on line usually, so I am assuming it is a real woman and not a mirage.

It's not always a two way connection.

Lots of people defending the dirty men on here, but in real life it is simple if stop conducting grubby sexual acts out on line and save yourself the grief.

You would know nick clearly.

Does it make predatory men on the internet feel better that there is not a 'real' life with real feelings at the end of their sad endeavours.

Maybe if we knew she was someone's child and was being abused it would be acceptable?

Funnily enough, yes I do know about the investigations into these offences and some of the con involved.

nick So do I Nick, so do I. Trust me we have bigger crimes we should be dealing with don't we?

You’re very invested in this Summer.

Some serious victim blaming and whataboutery.

Perhaps describing it as a brutal crime was a bit strong but I’m pretty sure if you spoke to a victim they would describe it as brutal.

I am sure the men did think it brutal to stump up money for simply conducting sexual conduct with strangers on line, but hardly a good use of public money.

Our refuge centre has just been closed down, so yes I am annoyed.

Should the police only investigate murder then and ignore all other offences?

Why do you think it's just men? I've heard of males and females being extorted for money or the footage goes to everyone on their friends list.

The refuge being closed has nothing to do with police investigaton

I'm with you OP.

Oh poor poor men who willingly wank to a camera

Do I think we will always be able to locate the offender and bring them to justice? No.

Do I think that, given the possible repercussions to the victim, we should at least try? Yes. Because in doing so we can signpost them to support, educate them to better protect themselves in the future.

And from what you are saying OP, if you believe somewhere down the line is an abused female, possibly forced into committing the offence, then surely that's even more reason to try.

I don't believe we have the resources currently to investigate every offence. But I believe this is one that we should.

Lots of people defending the dirty men on here, but in real life it is simple if stop conducting grubby sexual acts out on line and save yourself the grief.

Why do you think they're all dirty old men? As long as the sex acts were consensual and the men weren't trying to co-erce the women into doing them what is wrong with it? I don't want to have webcam sex with strangers over the internet but I have no objection to other people doing it.

Your viewpoint seems to be predicated on the idea that this webcam sex is morally or taking dirty pictures etc. is morally wrong in some way. You'd have a point if these men were sending unsolicited pictures but from your own description they're not.

The police do investigate because a) it’s crime and b) as others have said it can be a link to trafficking and prostitution rings.

It’s consenting sexual activity.

I watched the panorama programme on the police last week. All the forces acknowledge they are letting the public down with what they can and can’t do, but they can only do what they can with the resources they have.

They're being blackmailed so it's a crime. It's a hideous crime as it's about sex, some of these teens are just learning about sex and women/men and have raging hormones then have found themselves being blackmailed and shamed

Somoerhaps uou feel that's ok to be blackmailed in that circumstance, which l bel of blackmail would you like to draw the line at? If it was done to a woman? Or if it's when you're unknowingly being filmed? Or if it's carelessness that you get filmed so it's your fault?

What point do you want to draw the line to day what's blackmail and what's a man (or woman?!) performing a sexual act so it's their fault?

Yabu.

We don't only apply the law to protect those you find morally worthy.

We're on a slippery slope if we start defining consent differently according to sex, IMO.

Many people have cybersex. What is 'grubby' about it, if both parties consent, are of legal age, and enjoy it? Just because it's not something you would do personally doesn't make it wrong.

I think the key thing here is consent. The man believed himself to be in an appropriate consensual situation at the time.

What he did not consent to is the other party showing anyone else the footage, or using it to extort money. That is what makes it a criminal act.

We need to take consent - and privacy - seriously on all sides because as soon as we don't, it starts to chip away at some pretty basic rights - for women and for men.

Maybe 'brutal' wasn't the best word to use but the guy's a police officer; he doesn't go on the radio all the time. Vine gets millions of listeners. Maybe he was nervous?

As a listener to that segment of the programme, I don't think you're being asked to feel sorry for the victim, OP. But I think you are being asked to acknowledge that these crimes do get committed and carry awareness of that.

How do you know that the perpetrator, in this particular instance, was coerced? (Just curious as I missed that part of the programme)

I'm getting the impression that your lack of compassion for the victims of this crime is based on whether or not they are 'cheating on their partner' by taking part in the sexual activity - is that the case?

I read about a very young man who killed himself as he was being blackmailed.

As the parent of a young teenager I have massive sympathy for anyone - and it’s usually young people- who is duped and then blackmailed- I think that’s the normal reaction, frankly, unlike yours, op, which is brutal.

Maybe op you should look at the case if Daniel Perry a 17 year old from Dunfermline who killed himself after being tricked into exposes himself online to who he thought was a similarly aged girl. Of course she didn't exist. It was a gang of adult males from the Philippines.

And of course girls and woman can be victims of the same thing. Look at the case of Yohann Ramchelawon who posed as Justin Bieber online to trick girls and women into sending nude photos and performing sex acts online.

Sextortion is cyber enabled blackmail and victims are both male and female as are offenders of the same crime.

bettybear Thank you the voice of reason at last.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10245809/Teenager-commited-suicide-after-being-blackmailed-on-Skype.html

So you don’t believe the people who blackmailed this poor boy did anything wrong?
Interesting.