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Why, when even you have nothing more to say?
From the previous thread-
Thanks for your question, p-sto. I find it interesting and somewhat confusing that those who don't support full decriminalization are seen as somehow are not in support of improving the lives of women who are working in prostitution. I'm not aware of anyone here who is defending the status quo. I've said this a number of times.
Complete decriminalization, as I understand it based on what susan davis is presenting here, is a vision of commerce unfettered. The idea that most women working in prostitution have that kind of autonomy over their work life is romantic but I don't believe is reality. When the overwhelming majority of women working as prostitutes are doing so in the absence of choices, this is not about freedom. So, to me fully decriminalizing means that we say it's OK for women to be forced into this work for survival. Instead, we need to stop the reversal of gains made by the women's movement, reverse the cuts to social programs, and provide those who are marginalized with opportunities for a better life.
Sadly, the gathering of support for the Conservatives means that more and more women (and men) are finding themselves without adequate supports, which puts many at risk. We ring our hands around this sociological problem -- I don't think it's that at all. It's a political problem. We elect those people who shape the legislation and policies that determine how we live. It's a frickin' shame that we continue to elect people who would promote treating anyone in this way. This, to me, goes against a collective response for the well-being of all.
There are also statistics that claim strong conclusions based on weak relationships between numbers. I wouldn't call them lies because I'm sure often time the parties providing them believe in the results. However, these numbers are just as misleading. Statistics can be surprisingly inexact.
What if, for the purpose of discussion, we just took sex out of the equation, and looked at labour sectors dominated by women? Are there any traditionally female-dominated employment sectors that aren't - now or in the past - in some way devalued and debasing to women?
Take early childhood education. A woman can earn better wages and benefits working for Tim Hortons or Walmart than caring for our children. The work requires significant education, responsibility, is under-compensated and under-recognized.
Midwifery. Inroads have been made, but the profession is still denegrated and undervalued by a persistently patriarchal medical model for childbirth.
Administrative Assistants. Just because they aren't called secretaries doesn't mean their work is valued or fairly compensated.
Sex trade. Potential for good pay and considerable autonomy and self-determination, but all too often dominated by organized crime, drug trafficking, exploitation and dangerous working conditions due to criminalization and lack of protective regulation through labour legislation.
There remain many many outstanding equity issues in gendered work that go beyond what the work actually is. Why does working in the sex trade pay better than working as an admin assistant in an office? Because the compensation is equal to the value of the work established by the dominant culture, which still happens to be heterosexual and male. Bickering about whether sex trade workers can be feminist is completely counterproductive and leads us away from the core issues at hand - inequity, non-representative balance of power, and class warfare through economics.
That was a quote my stats professor used to say all the time. Stats are and can be faulty, along with the methodology behind them. We have no real idea in most cases what types of questions were asked (open ended? Closed ended?) nor the way the data itself was gathered - through a survey, through mailing lists?Nor who the target market r sample was, how much this sample represents the real world etc. all I'm sure you know.
The thing with stats is you can pretty much make them show whatever it is you wish, but that doesn't mean the stats are correct or are free of methodological problems.
Haha, I think I've heard that line before, seemed familiar. Given the recent sensitivity about accusations of lying I thought I'd err on the safe side.
I figured as much p-sto
Which is exactly why I have not used these kinds of figures. Also, regarding whether sex trade workers can be feminist is not a statement I have made. I have questioned promoting an argument based on feminist ideals when the arguments being presented aren't necessarily reflective of that (such as making men feel good, etc).
Sorry others have, while others have expressed discomfort with the idea. The question is pretty much open to anyone though.
Ultimately, no. Not in this culture, and cultures take a long time to evolve. I think that this is part of the crux of the dispute and not something that it is going to be possible to resolve.
Great exchange!
No I do not think it is logical/ethical or wise to permit a man to buy sex from a woman and then expect him to see her or other women as equal members of society
No I think it is not possible that society permits a man to pay for sex without society degrading the woman he is buying and all women
Do you really think that men who pay for sex end up owning the women afterwards? If you buy sex from a woman, you've bought the woman herself?
I consider the essence of myself as a person to be more than my sexual actions, personally. So if I were to sell a sexual service, I would not consider myself to then be the property of the person who pays for that service.
How about renting? Yours for the period agreed upon?
What about the word "hired"? Seems sufficient for pretty much all other work. Mind you, it's not "loaded" language or anything -- all it does is describe the situation accurately.
I am tempted to try a word change but I think it is more to the point to say that I believe we have no permanent essence that is I do not have an essentialist view. Rather I believe that what we do and what is done to us and the context in which both happens and how we and others think about that shapes who we are and that combination accumulates over time.
So I do not think society can permit men to buy sex without degrading both the women they claim to buy it from and all women.
But my point really was that there are two acts: the buying and the permission giving which are degrading
"Hiring" is of course as loaded as "slavery" but in my opinion less accurrate
Most other forms of labour do not involve invasive access to your body.
It still remain that:
Very well. But how does that translate into "bought"? You've noted a difference, but how is it significant to the choice of the word "bought" over "hired"?
Is a surrogate mother also bought? If a friend were to be a surrogate, would you say to her "way to rent out your uterus!"?
What about an egg donor? That's also a pretty invasive procedure, but it doesn't seem to carry the same loaded perception of "selling your eggs".
Access for a price = commodification. It has an effect on how women's bodies and access to them is regarded in our culture.
IIRC, there have been concerns voiced by a number of groups regarding payment for donation of eggs for fertility treatment as well. However, that doesn't have quite the same connotation and resultant objectification of women in general that sex for payment does.
Does it seem to you that choosing terms like "bought" or "rented" supports and helps foster those connotations and the resultant objectification? I guess that's what I'm responding to here -- the sense that these terms are being chosen to actually create the context of an object for sale, and not the other way around.
I also noted on another similar thread that there seems to be a lot of discussion of sex in terms of "ejaculation response" and sex workers "selling their vaginas", and it really seems to me that this serves only to try to frame it with as little dignity and agency as possible. Do you have kids? Would you be offended if I repeatedly chose to refer to them as your "spawn" and you as a "breeder"? This feels like the same kind of thing to me. Unnecessary, if nothing else.
There once was a time where within dating, marriage and casual sex where men coerced women and degraded them. Though the situation may be some what improved from then there are still frequent instances where women are not treated with dignity within these institutions.
Timebandit admitted that a respectful exchange of sex for money can conceptually happen but not within our society because the exchange will ultimately become degrading based on how our society is structured. Why are the above mentioned instutions worth fighting for to be made respectful towards women but the sex trade is not and should be abolished? If you can, please go beyond objectification as that can occur without money as well.
Firstly, if you have a problem with someone's choice of words, take it up with them. I didn't phrase anything that way and I'm not going to be drawn into a big discussion about it.
I'm not creating the context, either. It's there already and it is what it is. And I'm reacting to the objectification that sex work reinforces in the first place. It's not going to evaporate by opening the doors wider.
Which is not to say I don't support most aspects of decriminalization. I do. I don't like it, but it seems like making the best of a nasty situation. Personally, I'd prefer sex work didn't exist at all.
Our vaginas are our vaginas, how would you like us to refer to them?
I would hope that you as a man would not be trying to tell us how to frame our vagina talk, snert.
There is a distinct difference between an orgasm, and an ejaculatory response and I use the phrase to distinguish the difference between the 2.
A man is not purchasing "sex" when he is having a 2 min ejaculatory response in the car or bathroom from a hand job, or blow job.
He has purchased an ejaculatory response and nothing more.
This topic does not need fancy terms to dress up what is going on in the vast majority of cases.
The sex trade has an inherent power imbalance between customer and worker. This is something we frown on in terms of other sexual relationships, ie: professor and student, even where there is consent. I'm not sure that can be made respectful without removing the monetary aspect. Certainly, changing such things as resources considered held in common within marriage and division of assets in divorce has made marriage a more equitable institution. I don't see how that can be remedied in sex work. He has something she needs (money), she gets it only if she performs to his satisfaction. It's a transaction, not a partnership.
I don't think you can actually go beyond objectification. Or perhaps you can, but I can't. Again, it is what it is. You can call a duck a swan but it won't make it so.
ETA: Now that I think of it, I don't think I admitted anything. I said that it was not possible within our current culture and pointed out that cultures are very slow to change - ie: not in this lifetime.
Not in this life time was implied by what I typed, I hope you don't think I was trying to twist your words. My argument was, perhaps clumsily, attempting to point out that there are many women who did not/will not see a respectful marriage in ther life. The struggle continues.
I think the power differential aspect you pointed out is something distinct from objectification. A healthy sex relationship requires the partners to be equal. Something worth reflecting on.
The power differential results in objectification. One doesn't objectify an equal.
Might I add that to objectify a woman who has the inborn right and social potential to take her place as your equal is to recreate inequality or to worsen the inequality already being experienced by both of you. And for any of us to witness it and not object is to collude with that oppression
Going to come back to this, as I do not believe I addressed it enough...
If you call a child/kid a "spawn", you are not insulting the mother or father.
...indeed you are insulting a person, as in the child itself, thus making them less human, so for me I find it a bit icky of you to compare a child, to a vagina, or indeed even worse, ejaculatory fluid, that is just a hazardous waste by product, at that point. It is also a very patriarchial notion to diminsh humanity in order to satisfy notions of male privilege.
I would hope it's evident to others that my point had nothing to do with telling women how they should refer to their body parts.
At no point did I say "a child is like a vagina, or semen, because...". Or really, anything that compared an actual child to anything.
How so, exactly. You would have to prove that slavery is taking place, that the exchange of money means the buyer can take the entire person home with him for life. That is the definition of slavery after all, and the connotation of "bought" and "sell". It is to imply that this is not a service, or a temporary activity, but that something beyond a service is exchanged, in which case someone at some time is going to have to explain just what "item" the client (not man, don't oversimplify it and assume there are no women please) is able to take away with them. A tomato, as indicated somewhere else? From where? Out of the vagina? It is very confusing and a little disconcerting to imagine that my clients are leaving with tomatoes that I don't know about. Especially those who don't even get access to my vagina.
I don't even like tomatoes. Something should be done about this.