Tony Ortega and The Underground Bunker

Tony Ortega is a former employee of the Village Voice—a publication which found itself in hot water when it was revealed they’d been advertising the services of known sex-traffickers in their seedy ‘Backpage’ section.

Ortega now runs the Underground Bunker blog. Billing itself as the go-to zone for (eye-rolling sensationalized, bigoted, anti-religious) rants, it gives away Ortega’s game. How much clearer can it be that this supposedly “legitimate” blog is nothing but a bully pulpit from which Ortega can indulge his intolerance disguised as social outrage and foist off entirely fabricated nonsense as “breaking news”?

Sources in the journalist community consider Tony Ortega a developer of false leads, and let’s be clear Ortega is not a real journalist and here is why. When evaluating information, we are often admonished to “consider the source.” In the case of Tony Ortega, the warning applies not only to the content of his blogs but also to Ortega personally and the “publications” for which he worked.

Alternative papers are free weekly publications that earn revenue most often through the sale of the kind of advertising that reputable newspapers won’t permit – adult bookstores, strip clubs, classifieds with strong sexual content, etc. In between the trash, they slip in tabloid-style articles, promoted as “edgy” or “daring” when, in truth, they are simply fabrications sensationalized by low credibility writers like Ortega. While some of these “papers” make an effort to rise above the rest, most are gutter rags that all too often define “alternative news” as a slanderous substitution of the facts.

Ortega has spent his life practicing this excuse for journalism within the New Times Media and the Village Voice Media franchise of alternative papers. This platform has suited him well, for Ortega wrote for sleazy tabloids like he was born to it, a disposition that was in evidence as far back as high school.

[Header image: John Rickard]

New Suit Against Backpage Bosses Could Be Game Changer

Readers of this blog will need no reminding that Backpage was seized by the US Justice Department in April of 2018. It was then that Carl Ferrer flipped on his associates and pleaded guilty to conspiracy and money laundering, agreeing to cooperate with the ongoing federal investigation.

Readers will also remember that Jim

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When It Comes to Tony Ortega, We’ve Seen Enough

“Harvey Weinstein is on trial. Jeffery Epstein is no longer with us,” she said. “Dr. Larry Nassar is in prison and on one is selling children on Backpage.com. I know we as a community have done what we needed to do but I know there is more to do.”

These were the

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Tony Ortega’s Con Convention

Hindsight may be 20/20 they say, but it’s clear Tony Ortega and his crackpot critic friends simply haven’t learned a thing. Recently, Tony Ortega and his misfit co-conspirators announced the sad crowd who gave us the 2019 ‘critics convention’ — which in reality was little more than a parade of basement-dwelling incels looking to

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Hate Conquers Nothing

The whole story could make quite a movie – a Saudi Arabian woman + practising [sic] Muslim marries a Jewish congerssman [sic] who turns out to be a major dick. hehehe.

Kind of Love Conquers All, just the opposite. – Arielle Silverstein, aka Bozuri

It’s not often we read

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Without Tony Ortega

It’s interesting sometimes to note how with the trial against the crime syndicate that ran Backpage once more in the headlines, other folks have started refocusing their examination of the problem as well. Take for example the Justice Department, which just held a “summit” on Tuesday of this week, where officials touted convictions of

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Arielle Silverstein: “It’s Just He Has No Dignity”

Yeah, I forgot, the conservative media has always had it against the Democrats.

I understand why he is not likeable [sic] – he didn’t take the whole story as a man. First he denied the whole thing, but unconvinsingly [sic]; he then went on the attack when he gave Blitzer interview talking

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Backpage Trial Watch: A Taste Of What’s to Come

It wasn’t that long ago that Backpage.com was considered something akin to the Walmart or Amazon of the sex industry, where people could find thousands of sex services listed on the classified ad website.

Previously we’ve told the story of how the site rocketed to popularity in 2010, around the time when Craigslist

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Arielle Silverstein, Sticking Her Nose In Where It Doesn’t Belong

But you’ve seen the crowds on 42nd street – lots of working class people, lots of immigrants, big masses of people who are just too busy to do anything but work. I bet Scientology is the last thing on their mind and they’ve never heard of it. And those nice red tables and

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The President Declares War on Backpage-style Sex Trafficking

On the last day of 2019, the President proclaimed January to be “National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month,” calling the crime of trafficking an “affront to humanity that tragically reaches all parts of the world.” And having seen the mess Tony Ortega made of his so-called career while shilling for Backpage,

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Arielle Silverstein Wants Help Committing Crimes

Isn’t it time we had a loud campaign [attacking Scientology]? I’m not a hacker and have no idea how to do spectacular things, but wouldn’t it be amazing if on many major website a banner would appear saying [critical things about Scientology]? That way the media might pick up the story.

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