Blog #28 - Is It Unethical To Blackmail a Paedophile?
As you may or may not know I’m on a quest to earn big bucks right now. To become debt-free and achieve my travel plans next year I need a lot more money than I’m currently bringing in. Whilst this is exciting, I’m now finished with my studies and free to focus on making money and achieving my goals; it’s also very intimidating. My intimidating goal has meant I’m more and more thinking of “Schemes”, “Grifts”, and “Hustles” to make the money I need in time. Yesterday I began considering a particular grift.
Yesterday Morning I was going about my normal business when I saw a meme sent to me by my first University roommate. Tobi sends me a lot of Memes and Reels but this one inspired me. The meme in question was simply a clip of Matthew McConaughy in Wolf of Wall Street shocked as the caption reads “When the Pedo we catfished sent us $800 for a shopping spree”. All pretty standard for Instagram and depending on who you ask possibly even offensive. I was not thinking of the humour or the ethics of the meme, but I was seeing dollar signs.
I of course had seen similar memes and heard of the basic “idea” before but this time I was actually considering it. I need a lot of money and what better way to easily come across that money whilst also punishing and embarrassing some of the worst society has to offer?
I quickly called Tobi and asked if he would be on board. If he was interested in finding some truly sick fuckers online, letting them get themselves into incriminating or embarrassing scenarios and then requesting large amounts of money in exchange for not making their activity public. Tobi was not so on board with the idea. The biggest roadblock for him was the legality of the whole operation, whilst being a paedo is certainly illegal it turns out blackmail is as well. After doing some research it looks like doing such a thing could land you some serious time behind bars which makes sense. I found a lot of articles reporting on people doing similar things and them being prosecuted to the full extent of the law. This unfortunately kinda killed the grift for me. I knew the legality was sketchy at best but I was not aware of the severity of this crime.
What I’m keen to discuss though is the ethics of the situation. Tobi also shared with me that even if the legal situation was different he would still feel uneasy about the whole thing. I understand him completely this grift moves into some really murky and uncomfortable areas for anyone but I’m still curious. Is it unethical to blackmail a paedophile?
I’m really quite torn. On one hand, you are potentially ruining someone’s; who knows what they might do after being confronted? On the other hand, these people constantly dehumanise and ruin the lives of innocent children. The subject is certainly difficult, are you profiteering off something awful or are you being a vigilante? As much as I’m all for punishing pieces of shit…. like paedophiles. I think the ethics depend on where your intentions lie. If you are looking to protect children and reduce the efforts of these dangerous people then I think your intentions are good. Blackmail on the other hand is pretty much motivated by money and greed and as much as I still don’t hate the idea I have realised it is probably not the best way to make money.
Tobi and I went on to debate several grifts, their feasibility and ethics but ultimately landed on something that would be positive and completely legal. I’m planning on starting a dog-walking business. I need to get my car fixed but I realised as a Petbarn employee, with a marketing degree who lives near lots of wealthy people and parks I’m in the perfect position to make money this way. I’m now really excited to get this new venture started, Im in the process of working on a business plan and some marketing plans, I think I could make a lot of money.
I’m really excited to develop this new business and I’ll be sure to share the journey online when I have updates. In the meantime though I would love to hear some opinions on the question asked in the title. Do you think it is unethical to blackmail a paedophile? These are truly shitty people so an argument could be made in either direction as far as I’m concerned. Please let me know what you think below and thanks for reading!
