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So CL are bullies for dictating what people can do with their data?

The idea that Craigslist owns their posts is ridiculous. It may be true from a legal point of view, but from a moral point of view they're just the custodian of that data for the people posting it, and they should act as such.

If Craigslist doesn't own the posts, then that means the users own their own posts, and you don't have their permission to re-use their posts.

This just puts you back where you started.

Not really - the users own the posts and put them up in order to get publicity. It's like claiming 'I republished your classified ad for you in 6 papers' is a problem - virtually every classified ad would be pleased that they had more coverage.

I don't want my classified ads republished because I've chosen to publish the advertisement in places that target specific types of people.

It's incredibly naive to assume you know best.

We have our job ads republished by job sites with user bases that are far outside what we're interested in, and it results in a massive waste of our time in filtering those candidates.

There is no morality in business. You can try to be as philosophical as you like about it, but it's all your imagination that morals play any role at all. In fact, your morals are entirely your own and only yours.

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