This message was self-deleted by its author

[Agschmid]

This message was self-deleted by its author (Agschmid) on Fri Aug 21, 2015, 11:19 PM. When the original post in a discussion thread is self-deleted, the entire discussion thread is automatically locked so new replies cannot be posted.

[seaotter]

1. I'll tell you how I feel....

Any one who willingly gave their personal info to "blackmailme.com ,aka Ashleymadison.com" should have seen this coming.

[HFRN]

2. '"blackmailme.com'-> indeed nt

[get the red out]

4. I agree

My outrage account is maxed out on real injustices and problems right now.

[RufusTFirefly]

53. Indeed. And these are the only electrons I intend to waste on this particular story. n/t

[smirkymonkey]

54. Yeah, I agree. This doesn't really register on my outrage meter.

Dishonest people outing dishonest people. Meh.

[Blue_Tires]

22. You know this isn't the only website

(or even the biggest) that caters to the casual sex/swinging scene, right?

[Nuclear Unicorn]

34. I'm sure seaotter's comment still applies.

[Blue_Tires]

39. which means pretty much every

sex-related site requiring registration could be a "blackmail" site...

[Nuclear Unicorn]

50. Seems that way.

[seaotter]

37. Yes, I am rather "worldly".

Have you a point?

[Blue_Tires]

40. My point is if AM is a "blackmail" site as you say

then so are all their competitors...


Welcome to the site, btw... I can tell you'll have a bright future here...

[seaotter]

42. Yes, yes they are.

And thank you for the "welcome".

[seaotter]

61. You mean , "Go catch a METEOR with your face"

A meteorite has already landed on the earth.

[BlueJazz]

51. Welcome to DU.

[seaotter]

60. Thank you

[Marr]

63. Welcome. Pardon the bizarre, free floating rage.

[seaotter]

64. Thank you.

[Lyric]

49. Swinging is not the same thing.

Swinging is when couples have sex with other couples or swap spouses for sex. Ashley Madison is a site that facilitates extramarital affairs--the kind that your spouse doesn't know about.

Swingers aren't hurting anyone. Cheaters are. Big difference.

[laundry_queen]

57. +1

try going to the doctor to get an std screen after you find out about cheating, being a nervous wreck waiting for the results wondering what if you ever tested positive for something like HIV or Hepatitis and if it's possible to pass those unknowingly to your nursing baby.

No sympathy here.

Have lots of swinging and poly friends though. They can do whatever they want as long as every consents. When someone cheats, there is someone who is affected who is NOT consenting. And yes, that's what it felt like...worse than the time I was date raped - at least that asshole put on a condom so I didn't have to worry about getting a deadly disease.

[Lancero]

56. Bit of a diffrence between casual sex/swinging and affairs.

Casual - one night stands - are more often done through Tinder anyway, and the swinger label is generally applied to couples.

[N_E_1 for Tennis]

3. Great time to be a divorce lawyer...eom

[PufPuf23]

5. I had never even heard about Ashley Madison until now.

Admittedly I am somewhat socially isolated.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

35. "Admittedly I am somewhat socially isolated."

Well, if you're interested in meeting more people I suggest you not use ashleymadison.com

[PufPuf23]

36. Had I known would not have been interested.

lololol

"Socially isolated" meaning live in a very rural area and an older person not very electronically connected nor adept.

Thanks for the giggle (and attention).

[BuelahWitch]

41. Neither had I, PufPuf23 n/t

[hrmjustin]

6. People stealing other peoples info and putting it on the internet is an outrage.

[CTyankee]

11. this thing looks ugly all the way around...

[msongs]

26. yes but people using stolen information are making $ from doing so. it's the american way, anything

for a buck...until their information is stolen and used against them, when it becomes an outrage

[Vinca]

7. Suppose any presidential candidates will turn up on the list?

[Brickbat]

8. It's possible to condemn the hack and still indulge in schadenfreude, particularly in the cases of

people who make it their career to scold others for moral failings. As far as private couples go, though -- none of my business.

[hifiguy]

48. pretty much this,

especially when it looks like another sleaze merchant trying to take down its competition.

But people sure are dumb about where they leave their personal information.

[Matariki]

9. Yet another interweb 'moral' pile on

I make it a point to avoid internet public shaming of people for their sex lives - even when it involves hypocritical republicans or fundamental christians.

[Syzygy321]

59. +1

[hobbit709]

10. Highly amused is my reaction.

[Blue_Tires]

21. +1000

If this was a website for homosexual trysts that had all its users outed, everybody would be singing a much different tune...

[Behind the Aegis]

66. To answer your question...

I May Get Stoned to Death for Gay Sex (Gay Man from Saudi Arabia Who Used Ashley Madison for Hookups)

I am from a country where homosexuality carries the death penalty. I studied in America the last several years and used Ashley Madison during that time. (For those of you who haven't been following the story, Ashley Madison has been hacked and its users' names and addresses are on the verge of being exposed.) I was single, but used it because I am gay; gay sex is punishable by death in my home country so I wanted to keep my hookups extremely discreet.

I only used AM to hook up with single guys. Most of you are Westerners in countries that are relatively liberal on LGBT issues.For those of you who are older--try to think back to a time 10 or 20 years again when homosexuality was intensely stigmatized. Multiply that horrible feeling of stigma by a million, and add the threat of beheading/stoning. That's why I used AM to have discreet encounters...

The idiots who claim I'm lying are projecting from personal experience, and forgetting that, for many gay people around the world, being outed is a life-threatening experience. The risks for us are greater than the risks for married Westerners cheating on their spouses. That's why AM's promise of discretion appeals to us. (Seriously, you think that there are no gay Muslims on there out of 37 million users?)

Why the Ashley Madison Leak Puts Thousands of Women & LGBT Lives at Risk in Intolerant Countries

Now, I wonder if "shit just got real" for some of the folks who think this hacking was a good idea or "inconsequential." Adultery does not rank up there with crimes against humanity, or even the "little person" so I fail to see the reason as to why such a hack was needed or even being applauded. Some of the same people shit their pants when NSA is hacking their phone or library cards, and yes, I know that is governmental, but what in the Sam Hill is the purpose of hacking a site like AM serve?! What's worse than just the personal information, is the financial information being exposed.

As for "Men who cheat are scum, but women who cheat get a pass?",...we both know the answer to that question! Almost everyone wants their sex lives to be private, but doesn't want the same for others!

[Behind the Aegis]

70. "Someone done did me wrong!"

Yeah, that may explain some responses; others are more the "voyeur" types, enjoying, feeding off the misery of others.

I dont personally believe it is ok, in that I think any good relationship or marriage needs honesty and mutually accepted ground rules to survive, but I also dont believe it is intrinsically anyone's business but those directly involved.

I agree. This is about "shaming" sexually consensual activity. One doesn't have to agree with it in order to see it doesn't concern them and this type of behavior (hacking) serves absolutely no viable purpose other than enforcing one's own sexual mores on others.

[Agschmid]

80. As usual a voice of reason.

[Behind the Aegis]

65. Not so sure.

There are plenty of people who wouldn't make the distinction and even a few more who really don't give two shits about gay people or our equality; we are simply "play things" for their needs.

[kcr]

71. But there are plenty of people it does concern

And they don't know it concerns them until they find out. That's the problem with cheating. It leaves a member of the party involved in the dark. It isn't just consensual activity between adults. There is at least one member who isn't consenting and it's because this isn't moral or ethical activity we're talking about. Part of the appeal of the hacked information isn't just prurient curiosity. Many people wonder if they're actually personally involved. The media bombards us with statistics about infidelity and yet other articles about how the internet and social media make infidelity easier. And then all of a sudden we have this Ashley Madison leak. How on earth are people not supposed to be curious? I find the finger wagging at people who want to check to be just as bad as anything else. There are innocent victims in this and they deserve to know, and this might have well been the only way they were ever going to find out. Does that make hacking okay? No, but it doesn't make their curiosity bad either.

[Behind the Aegis]

72. It is consensual.

The two parties having sex is all the consent needed in order for the action to be consensual. And if it "concern" specific people, then release the pertinent information to that party, not a data dump. As immoral/unethical as you may find cheating, this hacking is just as immoral/unethical.

[kcr]

73. How is a person being cheated on consenting to it?

It is not consensual for all invovled. I would have no problem releasing the info only to the parties involved. I'm only arguing how cheating is being defined and the tendency to dismiss the victims.

[Behind the Aegis]

74. They aren't part of the sexual equation.

Their part comes with the marital equation, otherwise, your characterization leads to adultery being akin to rape...it isn't.

[kcr]

75. They most certainly are.

You even immediately admitted it yourself. They can even acquire STDs from their partner's behavior. They're being lied to and told they're in a monogamous relationship when they aren't. How is that not part of the equation?

[kcr]

77. And it may not be violent like rape. But it does take away a person's autonomy

People have a right to make the choice whether they want to be monogamous, and cheating on a partner and lying to them deceives them so they can't make that informed choice. People who want to downplay cheating want to ignore that. But ignoring it doesn't change it. Just because it isn't violent like rape doesn't make it okay.

[Whiskeytide]

13. I agree that it's difficult to muster...

... much sympathy for the exposed users. It was foolish to expect this secret to be kept.

But I have always considered someone else's marital relationship to fall into the category of none of my business. Who am I to judge someone's reasons or rationalizations for infidelity? I really have no idea what their deal is. I would be concerned if a family member or close friend was getting hurt, but otherwise I try to butt out.

What troubles me about this data dump, however, is that I understand AM charged a fee for a user to have their information deleted from their servers. I seem to recall that this program arose a few years back from threats by divorce lawyers trying to subpoena their records, and the fight over whether or not AM had to produce them. AM probably made a lot of money on the delete for $ program (I mean, who WOULDN'T use that feature?) - but, it seems they didn't do what they were paid to do.

And while I'm sure most people used a fake username, you apparently still had to pay with an actual credit card that was probably not in your fake name - and that is the information that has been dumped. We all understand that AM kept that information because it was worth something to them - that's a pretty unique and highly valuable data base. They lied to their users, they lied to their users purely for monetary gain, and now their users have been compromised in the worst way - exactly as they had been promised they wouldn't be compromised.

So - not too heartbroken over the exposed users, but I think AM is by far the biggest piece of deuce in the bowl. JMO.

[Capt. Obvious]

14. "but one of them did send me a photograph of his penis"

The only shock in this part of the story is that the reportr only received one of these photos.

[randome]

15. Tired? Hungry? Ticklish?

[hr][font color="blue"][center]All things in moderation, including moderation.[/center][/font][hr]

[Xithras]

16. Keep in mind that not all AM users were "cheaters"

The site was also used by people in open marriages, and MANY single people simply looking for a hookup. All of those people are now going to be publicly smeared along with the "cheaters".

On edit: Just looked it up. According to the leaked data, 40% of the AM users were single. Up to 3% were closeted LGBT who just got forcibly outed.

[Xithras]

25. Except that there are plenty of people aside from the spouse who will have that information.

I've never used Ashley Madison, but I've had an open marriage for many years (both my wife and I are bisexual, so we have a fairly non-traditional marriage). I'm not ashamed of my marriage, but at the same time it's not something that I want to discuss with everyone I meet. If I HAD been on Ashley Madison and my co-workers had found out, I can't even imagine the humiliation of having to explain to them that I wasn't a cheater, but that I simply had an open marriage. I'd guess than a third of them would simply assume that I was an untrustworthy cheater who was lying to cover himself, and another third would make an entirely different set of moral judgments about me because of my sexual orientation or non-traditional marriage. Either way, my reputation would be harmed with some and forever altered with the rest.

The entire point of the leak is to socially shame people who have different moral worldviews than the hackers. That's never OK. Your personal, private relationship and sexual information should never be open to public scrutiny.

[randome]

17. Amanda Marcotte of TPM calls it right.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/ashley-madison-josh-duggar

So maybe I’m the one who needs a lecture about not throwing stones. But maybe not. True, Josh Duggar absolutely deserves what’s coming to him after he has spent his entire adult life fighting the rights of gay people and women to choose how to live their own lives. But it’s also true that nearly everyone whose personal data was leaked is a private citizen whose choices aren’t the world’s business. Adultery — or, in many of these cases, attempted adultery — matters to your partner, your family, your friends, maybe to people in your direct community. But it shouldn’t matter to anyone else.

The hacker who stole this data is likely an insider from the company who has some weird, garbled excuse about this being a protest against company abuses against its users. The hacker or hackers argue that the company is harming customers by not having a functional “full delete” option that is supposed to be there for people who decide, for obvious reasons, to abruptly get rid of their account with no traces of it left. But if user privacy were really a concern, it’s hard to imagine that the best way to address it is by putting user information out in public for everyone to read.

[hr][font color="blue"][center]All things in moderation, including moderation.[/center][/font][hr]

[Warren DeMontague]

19. I agree with Amanda Marcotte.

We shouldn't pick and choose about who it's okay to unwillingly "out" or publicly morals-shame. It sets a bad precedent.

[Blue_Tires]

18. Actually put up a personal profile just to interview people?

She's part of the problem...

[melman]

24. There's some question about how to feel about hacking?

Crazy. But then, I'm not a prude or a moralizer.

[HFRN]

29. hacking is electronic breaking and entering

same as breaking into an office, and breaking into a filing cabinet


i've never understood how it could be viewed as anything else

[Travis_0004]

28. I find it interesting which sites they went after

They went after Ashleymadison.com, and Estabishledmen.com (which connects older men with younger women).

Yet they did not go after Cougarlife.com, which connects older women with younger men.

All 3 are owned by Avid life media, yet the initial demand was only that Ashley Madison and established men should be shut down.

I get the beef with Ashley Madison, but it is somewhat sexist to insist that established men should be shut down, (and user info hacked), but ignore cougarlife.com (and not hack any of that info)

[roody]

30. I honestly don't care about it. nt

[Blue_Adept]

32. You should. It's about the digital lives and security/privacy we want to have online.

You can ignore it based on the morality side of it, but this combined with other digital life aspects for people is critical in our lives, whether from shopping at target to where our medical information is stored.

This is a part of a much bigger issue.

[Rex]

31. How do you want to feel about it?

What was your first impression?

[Behind the Aegis]

67. +1

It is different because...because...bec....CLENIS!! Bobba booie bobba boooie!

[alarimer]

38. This website is and has always been a scam.

There are plenty of places to meet others online, if that's your thing, that don't scam people and who will, when asked, delete your account. I'm sure that a website catering to cheaters is not the most above-board to begin with, so I wonder why anyone would trust it. I'm hoping the fallout includes the death of this website.

Personally, I think cheaters are scum, and a lot of these cheaters are idiots for using their work emails (that may be a firing offense and justifiably so), but I don't think identity theft is the appropriate punishment.

Yet, I'm sure there are more than a few moral scolds on that website who tell the rest of us how we're supposed to live, but they don't think they have to live by their own rules. So, for those people, I say

[Go Vols]

43. Do people not go to the bar anymore for this?

[DefenseLawyer]

44. None of it is any of my business.

My level of concern about the site or who uses it or if it was hacked or if its users are revealed is zero. But that's just one guy's opinion.

[Deadshot]

46. I am against putting people's personal information online.

I don't care if it's from a cheating website, a retailer, or this website. Everyone's info should be private.

[brooklynite]

47. Dan Savage had some thoughtful points on this a few weeks ago...

1) what other people do consensually is none of his business...

2) while AM markets itself as a place to "cheat", you have no idea what the participant's spouse has permitted him/her to do, or whether he/she cares.

[taught_me_patience]

52. Run around DU proclaiming your moral indignation

Then shout from the rooftops that you'd never hide anything from your spouse.

[libodem]

55. .

[img][/img]

[Ruby the Liberal]

58. I'm a *meh*

But don't want none, don't start none.

If those involved are into it, and their partners are OK with it, then it shouldn't be a problem. If not, then they were exposed as who they really are and just need to own that and live with it. Someone somewhere will be OK with it - so its all good. If involved and acting like a douche, then own that and let the chips fall where they may. Who knows - the latter may find themselves in a relationship that better suits their options.

[U4ikLefty]

62. I hope they don't leak my support for Deez Nuts.

Deez Nuts have served my interests for years.

I can't imagine an America without Deez Nuts.

[Initech]

69. I say pass the popcorn. There's going to be a lot of interesting info coming in the next few weeks.

Josh Duggar was just the first.

[still_one]

76. if you are a client, perhaps nervous, if not who cares

[RufusTFirefly]

78. You shouldn't give a shit. That's how you should feel.

This is yet another example, ad nauseam, of corporate media distraction.

Yes, I realize that as humans we can focus on more than one topic at once (well, technically we can't, but whatever), but this is just another sensationalized story designed to get you to look over there while your pocket is being picked over here.

Unfortunately, it's undeniably titillating, which means that lots of people whose brains could be put to far better use, are drawn to it.

[cyberswede]

79. Well, I didn't know the site existed before, and I don't care any more about it now.

I don't give a shit about peoples' private lives.

"Is my husband on there? What about my ex-boyfriend? And my dad?"

I can't even conceive of wanting to look that shit up. Weird.

[MicaelS]

81. You should be really worried.

Let's see... There's A*S*H*M*I*D commonality between your name and Ashley Madison.

I'd say your GUILTY!!! GUILTY!!! GUILTY!!!