Why This Woman is On a Mission to Stop Pornhub
Movieguide® Contributor
Laila Mickelwait is on a mission to shut down the world’s largest, problem-filled pornography site, Pornhub.
Her crusade started when she met 19-year-old- Serena, who at 14, sent nudes to a boy that she liked. He took those images and shared them with classmates. They were then uploaded to Pornhub.
“She fell into depression and attempted suicide several times after the content was viewed on Pornhub and uploaded to the site again and again,” The Christian Post reported. “When she was 19, Serena connected with…Mickelwait after she saw the girl’s abuse video online. Mickelwait put out an alert video featuring the girl’s face, which allowed the two to connect for help in taking the content off Pornhub.”
“[Serena’s story] could be the story of anybody’s child, and just realizing that was a horrifying thought, but it really fueled my fight even more,” Mickelwait told The Christian Post.
Pornhub gets 3.5 billion visits each month, which is more than Netflix, Amazon or Yahoo. It’s the tenth most-visited website on the globe, and its ads bring in 3 billion impressions every day.
The New York Times said the “site is infested with rape videos. It monetizes child rapes, revenge pornography, spy cam videos of women showering, racist and misogynist content, and footage of women being asphyxiated in plastic bags. A search for ‘girls under18′ (no space) or ’14yo’ leads in each case to more than 100,000 videos. Most aren’t of children being assaulted, but too many are.”
Mickelwait has fought against the site by getting credit card companies to cut ties with Pornhub. She is the president of the Justice Defense Fund, which engages in “public pressure campaigns” and provides litigation support for abuse survivors.
Mickelwait has also written a book, Takedown: Inside the Fight to Shut Down Pornhub for Child Abuse, Rape, and Sex Trafficking, which recounts the horrors that people have experienced from being abused and exposed on the site.
A “case cited in the book is that of a 15-year-old girl who had been missing for over a year before a Pornhub user told the girl’s mother that he recognized the woman’s daughter on the site,” The Christian Post said. “The mother discovered over 50 videos uploaded to Pornhub by a user named ‘Daddy’s_Slut’ that showed her daughter being raped. As Mickelwait recounted in the book, the minor’s assaults were monetized with advertisements, and over 100 million users could pay to download the content.”
Mickelwait has been immersed in the fight against sex trafficking for over 15 years. She wants her voice and victims’ voices to be heard.
“The journey of discovery, to meet the victims, the whistleblowers, to understand how this company works and the devastating trauma that it causes victims,” she said. “Hopefully, by the end of the story, they can be as passionate about ending this as I am, and we can mobilize an army of activists to take this to the next level.”
“Her efforts to mobilize the public against sex crimes have resulted in a movement comprised of a diverse group of people, including those who work in the porn industry,” The Christian Post noted. “Mickelwait said she is in touch with porn producers and performers on a regular basis, people she credited with helping her uncover abuse in the industry.”
Mickelwait asks for age and consent verification on every user-generated porn site, which is supported by even those who work in the porn industry.
“When we’re taking on abuse and criminal organizations this big, it’s important for people to come together and set aside their differences, whether it’s their religion or lack of religion, whether it’s their political ideology,” Mickelwait said. “Because this is a human rights issue. It’s not a right or left issue; it’s not an issue that’s only for Christians.”
Movieguide® reported Mickelwait’s view that Google helps porn sites:
“The porn tube sites are obsessed with their Google rankings because Google is their lifeline,” Laila Mickelwait, the president of the Justice Defense Fund, said. “Google is the primary means by which they drive traffic to their sites.”
“Google is a pillar of this sleazy ecosystem, for roughly half the traffic reaching XVideos and XNXX appears to come from Google searches,” journalist Nicholas Kristof writes. “Most of the people in the videos are probably 18 or over, but who knows?”
When Mickelwait became a mother, her compassion for sexually abused minors only grew.
“I think it really took it to another level when I thought about the fact that these children who have been exploited could be my children in a few years because the things that were happening to them could happen to anyone’s child in the digital age,” she said.
Attacking a major industry does have its consequences, but Mickelwait hands her afflictions over to God.
“I do have a strong faith and belief in God,” she said. “My spiritual side has played an important role in keeping me grounded and helping me to just keep going forward.”
“Another inspiration for Mickelwait that uplifted her in times of need was her late father, who she references frequently in the book. Her dad was a general and vascular surgeon and passed away in 2014 after suffering a heart attack,” The Christian Post said.
Mickelwait recounts standing at her father’s grave following his funeral and vowing to bring justice to abuse victims.
“He was just an amazing father and the reason why I am doing this work today,” Mickelwait said.
