fix: 💬 update blog post

Expand on the implications of financial institutions being able to censor legal forms of expression of other countries and where this will lead down the road

src/posts/2025-07-28_collective-shout-puritan-agenda.md

@@ -159,7 +159,7 @@ PayPal is of particular mention here, as their controversial business decisions
 
 [paypal-invoices]: https://securepayments.paypal.com/c2/cshelp/article/how-do-i-create-and-send-an-invoice-help319?locale.x=en_C2
 
-*Collective Shout* correctly identified the weak point of every platform, company or individual that wants to do business online: threaten their ability to get paid.
+*Collective Shout* correctly identified the weak point of every platform, company or individual wanting to do business online: threaten their ability to get paid.
 
 > [!note] Update 2025-07-29
 > A friend sent me an article in which NieR: Automata director Yoko Taro rightly notes that the dominance US payment processors have gives them leverage over another country's autonomy.
@@ -318,21 +318,40 @@ Or look at [FOSTA-SESTA], from April 2018 during Trump's first term, which got h
 [Section 230]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230
 [exodus-cry-abortion]: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2020/11/melissa-mccarthy-exodus-cry-apology
 
-FOSTA-SESTA is the nexus point to which you can almost always trace back all of this puritanical scrubbing anything sex-related off the internet. It's why payment processors immediately cut ties with anyone and everyone when these bigots come knocking. There's [legal precedent][visa-pornhub], that when Visa tried to have their inclusion in a case against PornHub's parent company dismissed, a judge denied that motion, on the grounds that cutting ties and later reinstating them, Visa must've known about the contents, thus they're on the hook, too. And it just so happens, that the [open letter][collective-shout-open-letter] from *Collective Shout* uses the same language and playbook to make their case. The ***only*** reason FOSTA-SESTA was enacted was to weaken Section 230 in order to make it easier for these groups to legally prosecute sites on the internet they simply don't like. In all of its existence, it was only used **ONCE** for its stated purpose, according to a [GOA report][fosta-sesta-goa-report] from June 2021:
+FOSTA-SESTA is the nexus point to which you can almost always trace back all of this puritanical scrubbing anything sex-related off the internet. It's why payment processors immediately cut ties with anyone and everyone when these bigots come knocking. There's [legal precedent][visa-pornhub], that when Visa tried to have their inclusion in a case against PornHub's parent company dismissed, a judge denied that motion, on the grounds that cutting ties and later reinstating them, Visa must've known about the contents, thus they're on the hook, regardless. However, in [April 2024](https://www.courthousenews.com/judge-tentatively-dismisses-visa-from-pornhub-sex-trafficking-lawsuits/) another judge tentatively dismissed Visa's involvement in the case, arguing they merely acted as a utility service in this case. That didn't stop *Collective Shout* from claiming they're on the hook for what happens on the platforms they do business with in their [open letter][collective-shout-open-letter] to pressure these companies, threatening the *stability and predictability of their business* instead. The ***only*** reason FOSTA-SESTA was enacted was to weaken Section 230 in order to make it easier for these groups to legally prosecute sites on the internet they simply don't like. In all of its existence, it was only used **ONCE** for its stated purpose, according to a [GOA report][fosta-sesta-goa-report] from June 2021:
 
+[visa-pornhub]: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-62372964
 [fosta-sesta-goa-report]: https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-21-385-highlights.pdf
 
 > In June 2020, DOJ brought one case under the criminal provision established by section 3 of FOSTA for aggravated violations involving the promotion of prostitution of five or more people or acting in reckless disregard of sex trafficking. As of March 2021, restitution had not been sought or awarded. According to DOJ officials, prosecutors have not brought more cases with charges under section 3 of FOSTA because the law is relatively new and prosecutors have had success using other criminal statutes.
 
-They write their own laws, get them passed and then use it to play morality judge!
+The implication here very much is that these puritanical advocacy groups draft their own laws, get them passed when the opportunity presents itself (i.e. when a very litigious executive that's very agreeable to their views is in office) and then go to town with that state sanctioned battering ram.
 
-[visa-pornhub]: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-62372964
+As for the payment processors, they will say this is merely an issue of "risk management." The risk being: getting dragged into court room bouts over fabricated facilitation of sex-trafficing and overblown claims of CSAM material being present on a platform they provide their services to. The risk in this case is very real as the case with Visa shows, but it also implies a very real and powerful lever payment processors can pull. No prior involvements of the courts, no evidence needed, just a bunch of religious nut jobs and they pull it in the name of "brand safety." This is the equivalent of micro-transactions using in-game currency to obfuscate how much you're really spending. Groups like *Collective Shout* can make payment processors say it's about their "brand safety" and "risk compliance"—but the reality is they let themselves get weaponized into making other people's judgement calls over content that doesn't comply with their subjective values and not even a surface-level understanding of the media they seek to have censored or banned. Not courts or elected officials. A private company without any transparency just decided, no, this thing doesn't get to exist because someone ***might*** feel icky about it, hurt their bottom line or make shareholders nervous. Suddenly, the question about morality becomes a matter of *brand management.*
+
+The other uncomfortable truth of this is that one country gets to push their narrative of acceptable forms of expression onto the rest of the world. The fact that Japanese manga sites and indie developers on Steam had their [revenues frozen][japan-investigate-payment-processors] over content that is perfectly legal in their homeland and has been approved of by domestic regulative bodies is proof of that. Once they've scrubbed the media landscape clean of "porn," they'll turn their attention to something else.
+
+[japan-investigate-payment-processors]: https://nichegamer.com/japanese-government-to-investigate-payment-processors-after-withholding-revenue-from-adult-games-on-steam/
+
+Optional story paths in your favorite RPG series with a gay romance option? Banned for pushing "the gay agenda."
+
+Black super hero as the main protagonist? Banned for pushing "the woke mind virus."
+
+Tactical espionage action game that challenges a country's narrative and ethos? Banned for "propaganda."
+
+Hack-and-slash game that is themed around the occult? Banned for "promoting satanism."
+
+Game that makes you come to terms with your own mortality? Banned for "stop making people sad."
+
+The looming threat of losing business by being financially suffocated will inevitably have a chilling effect on game developers going forward if this is allowed to continue. Stories that never get told not because players or middle and upper management rejected them, but because nobody dared to even pitch them. Do you ever wonder why games have felt so lifeless and without teeth in recent years? It's because of this focus on maximum profitability and guaranteed profits, and it's going to get a lot worse if groups like *Collective Shout* get to have a say about what art and fiction are allowed to do.
+
+Censorship will not come with sirens and handcuffs. It will come with a deafening silence of mediocrity that never dares to question, never dares to challenge, never dares to provoke, simply out of fear of being demonetized. If a few financial gatekeepers and religious lobby groups get to decide what's too controversial, across borders, without your input, without transparency and without any sort of accountability, it's no longer in the hands of developers anymore to decide what games get made and we are all going to be poorer for it.
 
 The puritans are well-connected and use pretty euphemisms to mask as charities and organizations advocating for "safety" or "for the children" or "against sexual exploitation" as a thinly veiled cover-up to fool the larger population they're well-intentioned (and shut down anyone challenging them, because "oh, so you're actually *for* sexual exploitation of children?!") but push their puritanical agenda in the shadows until their world views dominate and are enshrined by law. They will not stop at porn, they will not stop at LGBTQ+ people and they will most certainly try to dictate how heterosexual relationships are allowed to exist!
 
 Be ***very*** critical about these kinds of deceitful plays on words and scrutinize their talking points at every step of the way. Don't give them even the slightest benefit of a doubt! Your freedom of expression and everyone's privacy depends on it! If it's not *Collective Shout* celebrating victories over this, then it's going to be another group claiming to "protect children."
 
-**This is first and foremost a political problem,** not a technical one. If you're pissed off that Australian puritans feel emboldened to dictate what you can do with your own money, I need the technologists, gamers and queer activists in my audience to rise up! An attack on one of us is an attack on all of us!
+**This is first and foremost a cultural and political problem,** not a technical one. If you're pissed off that Australian puritans feel emboldened to dictate what you can do with your own money, I need the technologists, gamers and queer activists in my audience to rise up! An attack on one of us is an attack on all of us!
 
 Finally, I want to leave you with this evergreen quote by Tumblr user [genderkoolaid]: