RantsAndRaves

So, I was looking back over my blog posts this semester and I felt that I should talk about one of the first few that I wrote. It was about an article in the New York Times. This September 5th article talked about a new use for Craigslist—selling sex. If you didn’t see it or you forgot it, check it out here.

Now, the internet has been in the business of selling sex for quite some time. If pornography is your cup of tea, that is fine because it is legal; more power to you. What is not legal is prostitution. Well, some prostitutes have not been the sharpest tool in the shed when they decided to advertise on the internet. If you want more of the story and more of my reaction, check out the prior blog post.

Anyway, I am writing this blog post as a sort of retraction. No, I am not retracting my statement about how dumb they are for advertising illegal activity on the internet. They want this illegal activity, for some reason, to be seen by more than the people that they know.
However, the one comment in my blog post made me think a little bit. I had said something about the right to privacy, but that breaking the law may jeopardize that. At the time I wrote that, I had only been in college for about a month. Now, with a little more experience, I have come to second-guess the fairness of that. I won’t lie; I have seen some photos on Facebook that depict something that could be considered only half-legal at best and totally illegal at worst. However, these photos are meant for friends, unlike items placed on Craigslist. I guess what I am saying is that breaking the law may jeopardize your right to privacy, but that there are certain degrees to that. In other words, citations should not be grounds to break a person’s right to privacy (for example: underage drinking). Committing more serious crimes (prostitution for example) may be better grounds for violating a right to privacy.