Of all the criticisms that could be leveled at Pornhub, the lack of subtitles seems like the least of them, but one deaf man says otherwise, and has filed a lawsuit against the popular porn site for that very reason.
“A deaf man has reportedly filed a lawsuit against a popular adult video website for alleged rights violations because he says it doesn’t provide closed captioning on its videos,” reports Fox News. “Yaroslav Suris is suing Pornhub, which hosts millions of adult videos, claiming the site’s lack of subtitles violates the rights of deaf and hearing impaired under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).”
“In the court documents, Suris listed numerous titles that he watched, such as ‘Sexy Cop Gets Witness to Talk,’ but he was completely lost when it came to the dialogue,” the report continued. “He also claimed that it’s pointless for him or others in a similar situation to purchase a premium subscription to the website without the subtitles.”
“Hot Step Aunt Babysits Disobedient Nephew” and “Daddy 4K” were some of the other titles listed in the court documents that Suris says he had trouble watching due to lack of closed captioning.
Given the nature of the lawsuit, Corey Price, Pornhub vice president, commented on the situation even though the site rarely discusses current litigation. The site, Price said in a statement, in fact, offers closed captions.
“We understand that Yaroslav Suris is suing Pornhub for claiming we’ve denied the deaf and hearing-impaired access to our videos,” Price told TMZ. “While we do not generally comment on active lawsuits, we’d like to take this opportunity to point out that we do have a closed captions category.”
Does Suris have an actual case? According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the ADA prohibits the discrimination of people in areas of “employment, transportation, public accommodations, communications and access to state and local government programs and services.”
The story has since sparked a great deal of laughter on social media as people wondered aloud how subtitles in porn would look and if it should be taken with any degree of seriousness.
“Pure laziness by Pornhub. How difficult can it be to put Uuuuurgggggaaaaaahhhh… along the bottom of every video?” said one Twitter user.
“Lmao closed captioning on porn ‘Loud moaning Oh baby harder Slapping noises.’ It’s almost poetic like a haiku,” tweeted another user.
“Here u go buddy. Eeeehhhh uuuuhhhh oh yeah harder harder eeeehhhh uuuuhhhh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah uuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhh ‘end of scene,'” said another.
Other Twitter users seemed perplexed why one would need subtitles to watch porn when most people allegedly watch it muted anyway.
“Nobody watches porn with the volume turned up so WHY does he need Closed Captioning?” said one Twitter user.
“Most of the time I watch porn with the volume turned down because I don’t want the person in the next room knowing I got porn on,” said another.