The definitional creep: Payment processing and the moral ordering of sexual content

Abstract

Discussions of online content moderation often focus on the platform, however credit card networks and payment processors determine what content can be monetized and therefore placed on adult platforms. Through fieldwork and interviews among adult industry stakeholders and a survey of adult content creators, this paper demonstrates how these financial actors impose a moral ordering of sexuality that prioritizes credit card brand reputation and optics over the autonomy and integrity of sexual subjects. Visa and Mastercard, via payment processors, suppresses kink content in the name of ensuring consent and safety. This process inappropriately broadens the definition of ‘harmful’ sexual content—what we call ‘definitional creep’—such that private financial entities can effectively create de facto global obscenity law that suits corporate rather than collective interests.

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