Prostitution

Lukus

Lukus

Testament to the ghoul lifespan
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I mean, come on, what's the big deal? I seriously think it should be a legitimate profession; that pimps should be able to hire prostitutes under the same terms as you can hire someone to carry out a 'normal' profession, that prostitutes should be able to form unions, etc.

"Dude, prostitution is just wrong - no one should have to spread their legs in order to get food on the table", you say? That argument really doesn't bite on me. For one, there are tons of professions out there, paying far less than prostitution does, that make people utterly miserable. Whiping someones butt, stamping papers all day or cleaning some fat boss' office is to me not much better than spreading your legs for cash - as long as you choose to do so. I mean, what made the act of mating so damn sacred? And by 'choose' I mean that you are not brutally being taken by force and can in no way resist - that's not prostitution; rape and trafficing are completely different. Naturally, being forced to have sex with someone is one thing, but in my opinion anyone who isn't taken by force chooses to have sex. I'm not saying they have all the options in the world; some choose to prostitute themselves because they would starve if they didn't - but that's to me still a choice. Prostitution can be very lucrative; I have far more sympathy for someone working his/her ass off with two jobs, making almost nothing, than I do for some 150$/30 min 'ho (figure randomly stipulated).

Naturally, all prostitution does not occur in gentlemens clubs, there is very filthy and ugly gypsy-prostitution out in bushes and public toilets. If they could at least gather together and start up "Discount Gypsy Sex" clubs they would be able to get a much higher standard of living, and could practice their profession in a better environment. Being against prostitution is not only working against the act of someone selling her body, but it's working against the prostitutes, IMO.

Discuss.
 
Dude, prostitution is legal.

Oh wait, I forgot. Yeah. Holland.

The Netherlands is a good example of why prostitution should be legal. The legal licensed prostitution is well-spread, safe and monitored and hardly ever causes any trouble. Illegal prostitution is easily recognisably. The only thing we do wrong is not hunt illegal prostitution enough, those heroine-hookers have terrible lives.
 
I often think it's the criminal nature of prostitution that causes many of the problems.

Legalize and tax it.

In a world in which labor is increasingly commodified and where women have equal rights, how can you limit what a woman wants to do for her body.

Besides, prostitution takes so many forms. A rich guys mistress who sticks around because the rich guy supports her- is that not a prostitute?

Nevada has legal prostitutes, and when the business is regulated it is usually more controlled and more safe.
 
Prostitution is legal in Belgium too, I think.

Doesn't really bother me much, nor anyone else for that matter.
It's kinda fun to walk through the 'glass street' at night, too.
 
you don't think people don't have inherently less respect for prostitutes? sex is best seen as the culmination of love. money could be considered an illegitemate means of reaching that end. there's nothing degrading about the sex act being morphed from a love transcation into a business transaction? i guess many americans (where prostitution is illegal) have it all wrong, need to change their brains. it's more 'enlightened' to not attach such classic morality to prostitution.

you could argue then that any form of sexual arousal commercially distributed, such as movies, trashy love novels, porn, etc are just as bad, then. but there's a big gap between being aroused and feeling the warmth of another human being. (which i've never experienced).
 
I don't see the problem, if it's legal you can control it much better... also, if someone wants to spread their legs for money, why stop them?...
Besides, there are lots of less ethical professions out there, like phone sellers...
 
The problem though is that the sex trade often is connected to other illegal trades.

Mafia controlled prostitution, use of prostitution for the spread of illegal substances, the fact that much of this is cash based can be kept out of taxing authorities reach.

But these are things that could be dealt with more effectively. Plus there is the danger of public health- in that sense where prostitution is controlled it's much safer.

(Did a paper on this in college).
 
Jabbapop said:
you don't think people don't have inherently less respect for prostitutes? sex is best seen as the culmination of love. money could be considered an illegitemate means of reaching that end. there's nothing degrading about the sex act being morphed from a love transcation into a business transaction? i guess many americans (where prostitution is illegal) have it all wrong, need to change their brains. it's more 'enlightened' to not attach such classic morality to prostitution.

you could argue then that any form of sexual arousal commercially distributed, such as movies, trashy love novels, porn, etc are just as bad, then. but there's a big gap between being aroused and feeling the warmth of another human being. (which i've never experienced).
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So, basically, you are arguing that people who go to prostitutes are morally completely wrong (okay, so that could be defended, though poorly), but you are also arguing that if you illegalize prostitution they are somehow suddenly morally better.
Things don't work that way.
 
welsh said:
The problem though is that the sex trade often is connected to other illegal trades.

Mafia controlled prostitution, use of prostitution for the spread of illegal substances, the fact that much of this is cash based can be kept out of taxing authorities reach.

But these are things that could be dealt with more effectively. Plus there is the danger of public health- in that sense where prostitution is controlled it's much safer.

(Did a paper on this in college).
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Don't you think that because it's illegal that it often gets associated with other illegal activities? Alcohol was connected to the mafia back when Al Capone ruled Chicago, and the only that it continued to thrive was because it was illegal. Legality isn't going to stop things from happening if people continue to desire it; it'll just flow from legitimate businessmen to underground lords.

As for my stance, I don't care what other people do. America is just about the only developed country that calls for abstinence in the public eye (and yet in private nobody really cares any more). Look at Sweden's lax approach at sex, and yet they have fewer STDs running rampant and less teenage pregnancies.
 
I've long been an advocate of the brothel system in Nevada. It keeps whores in one location, and the brothels make it easier to enforce health standards.
 
Bradylama said:
I've long been an advocate of the brothel system in Nevada. It keeps whores in one location, and the brothels make it easier to enforce health standards.
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No prostitute in a Nevada brothel has ever come down with AIDS due to her profession. A fact.
 
Is it? Can we see some proof? Unless they require testing for all customers, I don't see how so. Even testing isn't completely reliable, there is a margin of error.
 
Kotario said:
Is it? Can we see some proof? Unless they require testing for all customers, I don't see how so. Even testing isn't completely reliable, there is a margin of error.
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They require condom usage.

Since 1986, when mandatory testing began, not a single brothel prostitute has ever tested positive for HIV. The mandatory condom law was passed in 1988.

A study conducted 1995 in two brothels found that condom use in the brothels is consistent and sexually transmitted diseases are accordingly absent. The study also found that few of the prostitutes use condoms in their private lives.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Nevada

Interesting article on the subject in Germany.

'If you don't take a job as a prostitute, we can stop your benefits'
By Clare Chapman
(Filed: 30/01/2005)

A 25-year-old waitress who turned down a job providing "sexual services'' at a brothel in Berlin faces possible cuts to her unemployment benefit under laws introduced this year.

Prostitution was legalised in Germany just over two years ago and brothel owners – who must pay tax and employee health insurance – were granted access to official databases of jobseekers.

The waitress, an unemployed information technology professional, had said that she was willing to work in a bar at night and had worked in a cafe.

She received a letter from the job centre telling her that an employer was interested in her "profile'' and that she should ring them. Only on doing so did the woman, who has not been identified for legal reasons, realise that she was calling a brothel.

Under Germany's welfare reforms, any woman under 55 who has been out of work for more than a year can be forced to take an available job – including in the sex industry – or lose her unemployment benefit. Last month German unemployment rose for the 11th consecutive month to 4.5 million, taking the number out of work to its highest since reunification in 1990.

The government had considered making brothels an exception on moral grounds, but decided that it would be too difficult to distinguish them from bars. As a result, job centres must treat employers looking for a prostitute in the same way as those looking for a dental nurse.

When the waitress looked into suing the job centre, she found out that it had not broken the law. Job centres that refuse to penalise people who turn down a job by cutting their benefits face legal action from the potential employer.

"There is now nothing in the law to stop women from being sent into the sex industry," said Merchthild Garweg, a lawyer from Hamburg who specialises in such cases. "The new regulations say that working in the sex industry is not immoral any more, and so jobs cannot be turned down without a risk to benefits."

Miss Garweg said that women who had worked in call centres had been offered jobs on telephone sex lines. At one job centre in the city of Gotha, a 23-year-old woman was told that she had to attend an interview as a "nude model", and should report back on the meeting. Employers in the sex industry can also advertise in job centres, a move that came into force this month. A job centre that refuses to accept the advertisement can be sued.

Tatiana Ulyanova, who owns a brothel in central Berlin, has been searching the online database of her local job centre for recruits.

"Why shouldn't I look for employees through the job centre when I pay my taxes just like anybody else?" said Miss Ulyanova.

Ulrich Kueperkoch wanted to open a brothel in Goerlitz, in former East Germany, but his local job centre withdrew his advertisement for 12 prostitutes, saying it would be impossible to find them.

Mr Kueperkoch said that he was confident of demand for a brothel in the area and planned to take a claim for compensation to the highest court. Prostitution was legalised in Germany in 2002 because the government believed that this would help to combat trafficking in women and cut links to organised crime.

Miss Garweg believes that pressure on job centres to meet employment targets will soon result in them using their powers to cut the benefits of women who refuse jobs providing sexual services.

"They are already prepared to push women into jobs related to sexual services, but which don't count as prostitution,'' she said.

"Now that prostitution is no longer considered by the law to be immoral, there is really nothing but the goodwill of the job centres to stop them from pushing women into jobs they don't want to do."
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml.../30/wgerm30.xml
 
Kotario said:
Is it? Can we see some proof? Unless they require testing for all customers, I don't see how so. Even testing isn't completely reliable, there is a margin of error.
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Defining what is 'fact' and what is not is a completely other thread. Still, isn't it obvious that legalizing prostitution would create a market for controlled brothels, in which health standards for the prostitutes and their customers would be way higher than they are in underground brothels and on the streets?

Jabbapop said:
I thought this article was kind of interesting:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/01/30/wgerm30.xml
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Meh - the unemployed. I don't know how it is over in your country, but in Sweden there are always jobs avalible if you just search and don't get too picky. I am confident that most people without a job do not want to work (unless it is completely by their terms) - at least not if they've been without a job for more than three months so they've had the opportunity to find something new. I know of several people who are on welfare even though I know they could easily get a job if they truly wanted to, and accepted that they can not choose any job they want.

Jabbapop said:
Even if prostitution is legal, do most women (and men) want to be prostitutes? should the state be able to force you to? it's just another job, right?
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Err... Force you to? Who is forced to take a job as a prostitute - the woman in that article? So maybe she would have to step back in living standard if she chooses not to prostitute herself, but I don't see anything wrong with that. Prostitution = Money. Laying around on the couch all day = Not money.

Jabbapop said:
you don't think people don't have inherently less respect for prostitutes?
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So?

Jabbapop said:
sex is best seen as the culmination of love. money could be considered an illegitemate means of reaching that end. there's nothing degrading about the sex act being morphed from a love transcation into a business transaction?
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You might as well argue "True happyness can not be bought for money, hence should it be illegal to satisfy oneself with means that money can buy". Naturally, it could be considered 'illegitimate' to get laid by paying for it up front. But do you really think that the argument "paying for sex can be considered as an illegitimate way of getting some" outweighs the arguments for legalized prostitution? Making prostitution illegal does not make it go away, as others have stated, It only makes it creep deeper into the sewers.

welsh said:
A rich guys mistress who sticks around because the rich guy supports her - is that not a prostitute?
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Exactly. Not everyone have sex because they see it as practicing the ultimate culmination of love.
 
Luke said:
Defining what is 'fact' and what is not is a completely other thread. Still, isn't it obvious that legalizing prostitution would create a market for controlled brothels, in which health standards for the prostitutes and their customers would be way higher than they are in underground brothels and on the streets?
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That has nothing to do with what I asked. I found CCR's statement to be highly questionable (it's a little better, now that he's added modifiers to it, "since 1986").
 
I think we went over the subject in a thread not too long ago.

Yes...legalize it...tax it...control it. It will go on, but under rules to keep it safe for those involved. The idea that sex = love is also an opinion. If you can only "love" by marrying first then whats with "marriage" based on social status? Thats not love...

Sincerely,
The Vault Dweller
 
Err... Force you to? Who is forced to take a job as a prostitute - the woman in that article? So maybe she would have to step back in living standard if she chooses not to prostitute herself, but I don't see anything wrong with that. Prostitution = Money. Laying around on the couch all day = Not money.
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You really think that that's OK?
I believe you wold have a different opinion on this if the woman in the article was a close friend of yours, your girlfriend or your sister.
Or how about if you were looking for a job, and your local job centre sent you a letter, telling you to apply for a job at a gay bar, and warning that they'll cut your "unemployment benefit" if you don't.
Yes, how about it? Would you really think that would be OK?
 
master_of_flamaster said:
You really think that that's OK?
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Obviously, I don't think it's all fine and dandy, but to answer your question: Yes, I don't think it's that big of a problem considering my experiences with the unemployed couch lying people in Sweden.

master_of_flamaster said:
I believe you wold have a different opinion on this if the woman in the article was a close friend of yours, your girlfriend or your sister.
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To clarify my stance in this matter, I said: "I know of several people who are on welfare even though I know they could easily get a job if they truly wanted to, and accepted that they can not choose any job they want.". Now, I didn't only mean that I 'know of' people in this situation, but rather that I know people in this situation; people who are my friends. If prostitution was legal in Sweden, and if these friends were told to either get their asses off their chairs and get a job, whatever that job may be, or they would loose their welfare - I might express my sympathies to them, sure, but I am confident that I wouldn't view the situation differently. For the record, I offered these friends jobs as telemarketers when I was a working man (My firm was constantly emplying new telemarketers, and even though they had interviews and requirements, when I asked the bosses about referring new people, they told me that since I was one of the top salesemen at my firm I was free to refer anyone I wished to them for certain employement. Despite that, the requirements for becoming a telemarketer are way low.) My friends declined because of various reasons. "I wouldn't be able to sell very well", "I don't think it's morally defendable to be a telemarketer", or whatever. Doesn't matter, in my opinion they had the opportunity to work but preferred to lie on the couch and collect welfare from the government. Of course, if they think they would be unhappy or that it is not morally defendable to be a telemarketer, a prostitute or whatever, they should not take such a job. But you know what? If you don't work, I don't think you shouldn't get any fucking money. An unemployed person in Sweden get's almost as much money as an employed person on minimum wage per month - for free.

It's easy for you to say that "If your circumstances were different, you would think different". Duh, gypsy; If I had been born in a muslim household by muslim parents (however unilkely, since they could not possibly produce a cool white guy like me) I would probably have been a muslim by now.

master_of_flamaster said:
Or how about if you were looking for a job, and your local job centre sent you a letter, telling you to apply for a job at a gay bar, and warning that they'll cut your "unemployment benefit" if you don't.
Yes, how about it? Would you really think that would be OK?
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Hell yeah. For one, you mentioned nothing about me prostituting my ass; just working in a 'gay bar' is to me not different from working in a regular bar, a restuarant or an office in that sense. However, even if I was required to whore my ass, I would personally not be bothered by this since I would find a way. If I would want a job back in Sweden, I could get easily get one within a month - without having to utilize any personal contacts, but strictly going on references. And you know what? My grades generally suck, and the only work references I have are from the previously mentioned telemarketing company.

People are "forced" to do things they don't want to all the time, this is nothing new under the sun.
 
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