Canada's 'nuclear weapon' in Trump trade war could leave 3,000,000 users unable to access PornHub
Some have suggested that Canada's 'secret weapon' of sorts when battling it out against US President Donald Trump's aggressive tariffs is the popular adult website Pornhub, as it's based in Montreal.
Since taking office for the second time, President Trump has moved aggressively towards Canada, seemingly in an effort to merge the neighboring nation into the United States as a '51st state'.
Understandably the Canadian government and it's citizens aren't exactly too happy about this move, having pushed back significantly against Trump's bizarre plans.
This has led to a trade war on both sides, which has involved the placing of tariffs in both directions alongside the breakdown of business relations that even affected key government member Elon Musk.
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Tensions continue now with seemingly no end in sight, yet one comedian on Instagram has proposed an unlikely 'nuclear weapon' that Canada could employ to win the war outright, as reported by the New York Post.
In the now-viral video, Matt Puzhitsky proposes a conversation in the Canadian government where certain companies based in the country are proposed to be shut down in America.
Tim Hortons is immediately shot down, and Lululemon is a potential option - but one major business quickly emerges as the ideal option: Pornhub.
"You're telling me we had a nuke this whole time and no one told me about it," Puzhitsky's character hilariously remarks, and he might be on to something here.
Launching nearly two decades ago in Montreal, Pornhub is not only the most popular adult video site around, but it's also the 19th-most-visited website across the entire internet, so cutting access from what is most likely it's biggest visitors would certainly make an impact.
It currently sits just a couple of places behind Netflix and LinkedIn, whereas it has more visitors than Outlook, Twitch, and the New York Times.
Whether Pornhub would agree to be part of an international trade war is still up in the air, but it wouldn't be the first time that certain parts of the US have seen a blackout from adult content.
One report from the Independent outlines that more than a third of US states have some form of restrictions on adult content, including Pornhub, with areas like Texas, Utah, and Florida having blocked sites due to age verification laws put in place.
While nothing then would necessarily change in these specific states, many have argued that banning Pornhub exclusively wouldn't affect the browsing habits of pornography-seeking individuals that much.
"It's not like there are bazillions [of] options to jerk off elsewhere my god what a terrible tariff," argues one user in response to the news, with another adding:
"Isn't Pornhub already limited in a good portion of states that require ID verification? Also wouldn't that just push people to use their competitor sites instead? It's not like they hold a monopoly on the market."
It remains true that Pornhub is the most popular adult site around, but competitor options are indeed close behind when looking at the rankings. XVIDEOS (29th), xHamster (31st), and XNXX (44th) are all on the heels of Pornhub, so it's not clear that banning the Canadian site would have that much of a retaliatory effect as it would initially seem.