Doxxing, which originally referred to outing trolls or other online enemies by posting their info online, is increasingly tied to outing people for some political view or activity they’d prefer to keep private. Because political correctness has become so pervasive in American society, a lot of people deeply fear having their private views or activities known, because it has real potential for harm. Compounding the issue is the fact that Americans increasingly lie about their views, particularly in regards to politically correct taboos such as “gender,” race, religion, sexual orientation, etc. For example, the upper middle class white professional who overpays for a house to live in a white school district would never honestly say that he is doing so because he fears that his kid is going to get beat up and exposed to the sort of people he assiduously avoids at a majority minority school.
The manager at a workplace will never admit that he has instituted abusive, intrusive policies at the office to protect the company from sexual harassment lawsuits. Generals will not even come out and say that women can’t fight as well as men, or that the presence of female “soldiers” is disruptive and expensive.
In many parts of the US, Christians are afraid of openly favoring their own religion, of opposing behavior that is plainly proscribed by their faith, and of defending their own interests.
It would be wrong, however, to say that only the majority has to worry about speaking its mind. In fact, we have slowly edged toward the real “pluralistic” society dreamed of by progressives, and instead of tolerance and acceptance of all, we find that nobody trusts their neighbors any longer, and everyone feels oppressed. It may be true that minorities have always felt some pressure to conform and have lived in the shadow of the majority, but instead of liberation from that we now have a society where nobody at all feels comfortable speaking his or her mind.
Although I definitely sympathize with people who want to avoid being outed, and I’d recommend prudence in certain situations, I think this doxxing may be a necessary step for change. While I understand that if, say, a conservative Christian were to openly proclaim his or her faith where I live, opposing gay marriage and the like, he would likely have his tires slashed and windows smashed and might run the risk of assault on the street, we’re getting to the point where people can’t run away any longer.
Story after story is coming out about people being exposed for one thing or another, whether or not they have been convicted of any crimes. A big one recently has a Boy Scouts list of ineligible scout leaders slated for publication online. While a number of these listed men probably are real perverts – perhaps even most – I’d be willing to bet that a lot of them are innocent victims of false accusations, or of accusation for ulterior motives. A majority of sex acts between scout leaders and troops are probably consensual; i.e. both are homosexual and it is a matter of a teen and a young man engaging in consensual relations, which is pretty much standard fare amongst gays. We probably never hear about most of these, and never will, and that’s fine by me. However, where you have sex, you get jealousy, anger, betrayal and all the rest, which could easily lead to accusations (this is why I oppose gays openly serving in the military). Therefore, I bet a lot of the guys who are about to have their lives destroyed committed a pretty negligible sin, and are far from the pedophile perverts everyone will now brand them as.
I have a theory that when you push down natural dislike of something, it comes out in other ways. Banning criticism of homosexuality and pretending that gays are “just like us” causes people to sublimate their distaste for the practice, and it comes out in attacks on Catholic priests, the national hatred of Jerry Sandusky (which was deserved, but a lot stronger than it normally would have been), and now this Boy Scout scandal. Sometimes, you have to wonder whether minorities who thought they were liberating themselves with our new, “tolerant” society aren’t having second thoughts, because as far as I can tell now they may not have to hide as much, but they certainly have to lie more.
The next example is a story from Maine concerning a particular prostitute who clandestinely videotaped her clients – perhaps to sell the videos to pornographers or perhaps for blackmail purposes – and has now been arrested. Police plan to release the names of the clients she has serviced over the years, and publish them online. I very strongly suspect this is a form of legal blackmail; if you say you are going to go public with something without offering a quid pro quo and someone offers you money not to do so, it is not a crime. The police said they’d release a few names a day, and this will ratchet the pressure up enough to get some wealthy clients to cough up some cash.
In the meanwhile, the feminists are happily supporting “doxxing” the johns, and have been trying to push similar measures through elsewhere.
While I’d say that for a single man who hires a hooker it’s entirely between him and his God (if he is religious), it’s understandable why a married man might be worried, but actually his wife is as likely to be ashamed about it. His children perhaps even more. It’s a pretty cruel step to take for a victimless crime (in this case the prostitute was a 29-year-old woman with her own “fitness” business). However, it’s getting to the point where I say “bring it on.” Morally speaking, hiring a hooker is a lot less objectionable than a lot of non-criminal activities, such as sleeping with a married woman. How is it that a man can be arrested and shamed for paying a professional woman for sex, but if he sleeps with another man’s wife it is his legal right to do so? I, for one, would be far more ashamed to be caught and exposed as a home wrecker than as a john. In fact, although I’ve never hired a hooker, I am starting to see it as possibly a more honest and less socially irresponsible way to get it out of one’s system than the wanton fornication too many of us engage in prior to marriage. Not paying for sex in any meaningful way may swell your ego, but does it really make you a better person? And is the young woman who gives it up for free in a gamble that it will pay off with future support really much different from the hooker who takes payment in advance? Actually, the hooker seems rather more responsible and honest than the slut in this scenario.
So, if I were on the list and about to be exposed, I’d simply make no apologies, and repeat something like the above. I think these guys might say something like this:
“I’m not especially ‘proud’ of myself for hiring a hooker, but not only did I pay her for her services, I did not deceive her nor did she deceive me, unlike so many hypocrites who would denounce me. So go on about your lives, cheating on each other, stealing affection, making empty promises and such, but know that I am not ashamed to be condemned by the likes of you.”
If it were me, I’d probably add something along the lines of “prostitution is legal in all but a handful of Western countries, and it is only here that people are such liars and hypocrites about something that has always been a part of human society.”
Aside from the moral implications of our laws, there are practical reasons for people to stop cowering in fear about these exposures. First, finding people’s dirty secrets has never been easier. Combine that with the fact that slander and perjury goes unpunished today, and so many of us could easily be compromised that there’s not much point in worrying about it. It’s getting to the point where the moral risk lies increasingly on the exposer rather than the exposee. For example, one can look up divorce records and use the slander therein to take people down, but is that an appropriate thing to do?
Personally, I’ve chosen to be open about it, because I know that hiding is the worst way to deal with slander and false accusations. At first I used a pseudonym for this site, but that was for purely legal reasons, and fortunately it turned out that as long as I don’t drag the parties in my own cases into the public eye I have every right to voice my opinion without fear of being penalized. More men should do the same, but I doubt they will do so of their own accord. This is why this doxxing could eventually turn out to be a good thing. Our enemies will force the issue in an attempt to double down on shame and control, and before you know it we’ll all be on a list, just like in East Germany before the collapse of the Berlin Wall.
How did that Bolshevik thing turn out, anyway?
