The case for decrim in canada

exactly. it's contradictory and makes no sense. there are many things children are 'exposed' to that they don't immediately and uncritically internalize. but we can be sure that the things we try to hide from children or refuse to discuss with them are the ones they will be most curious about!

so true, sheltering children does nothing to give them the tools to make safe decisions in their lives. people should talk to children about everything, so they are armed with the knowledge to protect themselves.

Here are children's rights being marshalled into the defense of pimps and johns. You heard it on Babble first, folks...

excuse me martin?that was no the point at all. i was extremely sheltered and not given the facts about the real world.in my mind it is important to give children tools to defend themselves, do you not agree?

oh yes, let's think of the poor pimps, john's and the children.....they need rescuing from  feminists....oh goodnes....had to go dashing to the po....was laughing too hard.

remind, you don't think that children and youth need to be educated on how to protect themselves?

if you can't engage in reasonable conversations in this regard, please refrain from doing so. you and martin high jacking and derailing threads is only serving to confuse the issues.

instead of discussing how we could educate children and youth, you go back to slinging shit. it's pathetic. do you have anything meaningful to contribute? a plan for protecting youth? a way we could arm our children with the facts?

are you so at a loss for arguements you must reduce yourself to this type of statement?

no comments in the policy and procedure  thread....

no comments in the PTSD thread.....

no comments in the by law thread....

after all, that would be the hard work, we would have to really find some solutions.....

are you afraid that the gaps in your proposed canada/swedish model will begin to emerge?

come on.....

what exactly are you proposing as far as a plan for the swedish/canadian model?

or are you so blind with your own ego and rage that you can not see that far ahead?

maybe you could convince us sweden was tey way to go? if you had a plan....of any description....at all.......

http://www.plusnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=86667

The woman at the centre of the debate is Senator Thuli Mswane, who is also director of Hospice at Home, a local home-based care organization headquartered in Matsapha, between the capital, Mbabane, and the country's industrial centre, Manzini.

Mswane's call to legalize the sex trade has been welcomed by some NGOs. "If we don't legalize sex work, women will continue to be exploited and violated, so legalizing it would mean their protection is guaranteed," said Cebile Henwood, director of the Manzini-based Swaziland Action Group against Abuse (SWAGAA).

"These people [sex workers] have rights, and deserve to be protected just like anyone else ... If sex work is legalized then women will have access to services such as health ... they will be able to insist on protection such as ensuring clients use condoms."

http://www.thebody.com/content/art66.html#rights

Bardhan was attacked with bombs and badly burnt last year after launching a campaign to popularize the use of condoms in Calcutta's red light area of Sonagachi.

"How can we fight against the oppression by the politicians, the police and the criminals if our profession is not legalized?" asked a middle-aged prostitute. "We too want our rights to put an end to harassment by police and criminals," said Netai Giri, a male prostitute from Calcutta.

and we are expected to believe we will be treated well by the system at large while still classified as criminals....

http://www.groupnewsblog.net/2007/10/judge-screws-sex-worker-in-court.html

Deni told me she based her decision on the fact that the prostitute consented to have sex with the defendant.

"She consented and she didn't get paid . . . I thought it was a robbery."

The prostitute, a 20-year-old single mother, agreed to $150 for an hour of oral and vaginal sex on Sept. 20, according to assistant district attorney Rich DeSipio. The arrangements were made through her posting on Craigslist.

She met the defendant, Dominique Gindraw, 19, at what she thought was his house, but which turned out to be an abandoned property in North Philadelphia.

He asked if she'd have sex with his friend, too, and she agreed for another $100.

The friend showed up without money, the gun was pulled and more men arrived.

When a fifth man arrived and was invited to join, DeSipio said, he asked why the girl was crying - and declined. He helped her get dressed so she could leave.

It's true the prostitute negotiated sex with the defendant - but not unprotected gang sex at gunpoint.

"The Legislature has defined sex by force as rape," said DeSipio, accusing the judge of "rewriting her own laws."

DeSipio said Judge Deni's ruling was based, not on the law, but on moral contempt.

"Certainly if a jury wants to make that judgment, they're entitled to. But for a judge to make a judgment on a human being - I've never seen that before."

Deni did seem contemptuous of the victim:

"Did she tell you she had another client before she went to report it?" Deni asked me yesterday when we met at a coffee shop.

"I thought rape was a terrible trauma."

Thanks for sharing that article with us. It's unfortunate that our laws actually create many of the problems they are meant to solve.

About the challenge, from various sources:

http://osgoodechallenge.blogspot.com/

From the blog:

"We call it the world's oldest profession for a reason. It's time to get out of the world of political denial and take care of these people," said Toronto law professor Alan Young, who leads the challenge.

Under the convoluted Canadian law, buying or selling sex is legal, but it is illegal to communicate about it beforehand, live off its avails, or run a private bawdy house.

The group of lawyers and law students -- representing three current and former prostitutes -- will argue in Ontario Superior Court, likely in August, that these three provisions are unconstitutional in that they endanger the lives of sex trade workers.

If you can't talk with a prospective client before entering the client's vehicle, "how do you expect someone on the street to screen a client to know whether it's Robert Pickton or not?" Young said in an interview.

"We've been seeing an escalating murder rate for a couple decades now..." Young said.

"The bigger problem is everyday violence because people have nonsecure settings and no personnel to work with."
© Reuters 2007

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just to be clear, Young doesn’t want to strike down the pimping provisions that deal with procuring, exploitation and control, wrote Jacobs. He just wants the section that bans living on the avails of prostitution repealed. Young would like to see the current laws overturned so the provinces and municipalities can step in and regulate what will, hopefully, be a legal activity. “You have murder on one side of the ledger and a big question mark on the government side,” he says. “I’m not saying [the Robert Pickton murder case] wouldn’t happen if these provisions were repealed. But you have to give a sex-trade worker on the street who is exposed to violence...legal options. And there are no legal options.”

------------------------------------------------------------------

While there is no wording in the Criminal Code specifically outlawing prostitution, nearly all aspects of a transaction - including hiring a prostitute, scouting potential customers and making money from sex - are made illegal by those three provisions.

Young said because those laws make it illegal for prostitutes to work in their own homes or hire a bodyguard for protection, women are deprived of their right to liberty and security - a violation of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

"There is nothing inherently dangerous about prostitution," said former prostitute Valerie Scott, who is executive director of Sex Professionals of Canada, an advocacy group for sex workers.

"What makes it so dangerous is the way it is currently set up in this country. It's the way the laws force us to operate in totally unsafe conditions."

The situation is so dire that the laws amount to an "official death penalty" for prostitutes, Scott said.

Lawmakers and the general public must remember that prostitutes are human beings who should have equal rights under Canadian law, she said.

"So what if most of these women are drug-addicted street girls?" Scott said. "They are A, human, and B, Canadian.

"We are humans. We are part of the community. We don't come in on a shuttle from Mars every night and leave before sunrise."

Young said he felt compelled to launch the challenge and stand up for those women's rights after watching media coverage of the investigation into the disappearances of more than 60 women - mostly sex-trade workers - from Vancouver's troubled Downtown Eastside.

"As the body count was mounting, I thought, 'Somebody has to do something to stop this urban genocide,"' Young said.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

From the following site:

http://www.homelessnation.org/node/6273 [13]

The Charter challenge is being brought by a registered non-profit society called Sex Workers United Against Violence (SWUAV), a group of current and former female sex workers from the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver. The group has been meeting since 2005 and one aspect of their mandate is to lobby for law and policy reforms to improve the lives and working conditions of women involved in sex work.

The Statement of Claim, filed today in BC Supreme Court, states that the current criminal laws expose sex workers to significant harm – physical and sexual violence, lack of access to police protection, social stigma and inequality, exploitation and murder. SWUAV will argue that the current criminal laws violate the security, liberty, equality and expression rights of sex workers, as set out in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The following sections of the Criminal Code will be challenged:
Sections 210-211, 212(1)(a),(b),(c),(d),(e),(f),(h) and (j) and (3), and 213 of the Criminal Code of Canada

The Plaintiff will argue that these sections violate the following sections of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms:
Section 7: life, liberty and security of the person
Section 15(1): equality
Section 2(b): freedom of expression

------------------------------------------------------

From this blog:

http://osgoode.yorku.ca/media2.nsf/5457ed39bc56dbfd852571e900728656/699ac332777cb8b58525746400515e67!OpenDocument [14]

“Regardless of what you think of selling sex, the premise of the case is it is a legal business and anyone conducting a legal business should not be exposed to the risk of violence,” Young said yesterday. “The law has to protect you as much as any other person in this country.”

Young said that while prostitution is not illegal, communicating for the purposes of it is, which leaves women vulnerable because they are unable to screen clients. He said provisions in the Criminal Code against operating a bawdy house or living off the proceeds of prostitution force women to work on the streets and prevent them from hiring drivers or bodyguards for security.

------------------------------------------------------

From here:

http://cybersmokeblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/charter-challenge-like-no-oth... [15]

But the women are battling a fortress of opposition from the federal government, as well as religious and conservative groups intervening in the case.

The intervenors contend that loosening restrictions on the sex trade would be out of step with Canadian moral values.

The federal government, meanwhile, argues that prostitution is inherently dangerous, regardless of where it is practised. As part of their case, lawyers for the Attorney General of Canada are also relying on affidavits from police experts, who predict Canada will become a "sex tourism" destination if prostitution-related offences are decriminalized.

The one thing I can tell you from looking at this, both as an academic and as a person constructing a case, is that we have not had a really rational discourse on this topic because political ideology, emotional reactions and stereotypical thinking have dominated," said Alan Young, an Osgoode Hall Law School professor who is Bedford's lawyer.

------------------------------------------------------

The court dismissed a challenge to the bawdy house provision and ruled the "communications" prohibition was a justifiable limit on freedom of expression, since it is meant to discourage the nuisances of street prostitution and related activities, such as drug trafficking.

But Bedford, Scott and Lebovitch argue that evidence never considered by the Supreme Court, including the work of a 2006 Parliamentary committee, shows the law has done little more than shift prostitution from one neighbourhood to another, in response to police sweeps. In recent years, the industry has been transformed, with technologies such as cellphones and Craigslist leading to a massive increase in indoor prostitution, Crown counsel Michael Morris and a team of federal lawyers note in their material.

Most charges, they say, are laid in connection with street soliciting. Over a one-year period ending in March 2006, there were 659 convictions in Canada for communicating for the purposes of prostitution, but just 114 bawdy house convictions and 14 convictions for living on the avails of prostitution, an offence meant to target pimps.

------------------------------------

From this site:

http://www.anticorruption.ca/forum/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=8597&sid=f73f9... [16]

Ms. Casey said that prostitutes constantly compromise their safety to
avoid running afoul of the law. She worked recently with a
prostitutes' outreach team that encountered a frightened streetwalker
who had leapt from a moving vehicle to escape a “creepy” john.

“We said that we had to call the police to report it,” Ms. Casey
said. “The woman was saying: ‘If you are going to report it, I'm
out of here.'”

Simon Fraser University criminologist John Lowman said that,
according to public opinion polls and research, a majority of
Canadians believe that prostitution between consenting adults should
be legal.

So do the Bloc, Liberals and NDP, according to the 2006
parliamentary report of the Subcommittee on Solicitation Laws,” he
said. “Clearly, Canadians are ready to end what one judge has
characterized as the ‘Alice in Wonderland' state of Canadian
prostitution law.”

------------------------------------------

And where does REAL Women of Canada stand? Have a look.

http://www.montrealmirror.com/2009/102209/sasha.html

“Why they have the right to interfere is a really good question,” says sex worker rights activist Jenn Clamen. “When the case is based on a human rights issue, where does a moral argument have any place? For sex workers, this is not a debate. The violence that sex workers experience is real and the way sex workers have to do acrobatics around the laws in order to avoid police and incarceration actually does put sex workers’ lives in danger. What these groups are debating are their own issues of whether or not they would do sex work themselves. They need to start thinking about the realities for those that are actually doing it and ways to make it safer. More than 60 sex workers murdered in Canada should really have raised the alarm bells around that, but they’ve got their hands in their pants and prefer to claim the entire industry is violent rather than to listen when sex workers say that the laws are.”

If distance or prior obligation does not permit you to be present at the courthouse, you are free to contact these organizations yourself and express your displeasure at their attempt to stop women from making decisions that offer them security at work. As REAL Women of Canada’s website itself declares, “REAL Women believes that women should have career choices which include the financial option of remaining at home, if they choose…this dedication to the role of motherhood should be encouraged, not discouraged, by our tax laws and legislation. At the very least, government policies should remain neutral on the issue of career choice for women.”

I couldn’t agree more.

Keep up with the challenge here: spoc.ca [18].

thanks for pulling all of this together stargazer!!

No problem. The spoc.ca link is gold. Here are the court decisions:

http://spoc.ca/courtdecisions.html

From the Intervener Judgement:

Para [15]

It is equally significant that the moving parties themselves have not been able to identify any specific issues on which they wish to make arguments except in very general terms. See, for example, the following:

i. in paragraph 13 of the affidavit filed, the despondent states that the moving parties, where appropriate, intervene "in court cases intervene in support of Christian values, principles and freedoms";

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The moving parties are Christian Fellowship, Catholic Church and REAL Women of Canada. REAL has a membership of 55,000 people. Do they represent the majority? I think not. So what is REAL Women doing here, along with these two big religious groups, short of pretending this is about the safety of the workers. We all know this is not about the saftey of the workers (and yes, sex work is work!) but about these groups seeking to ensure women are second class citizens accoring to the bible and their own morals. They are not interested in human rights. Not one person can say that any of these groups have an interest in human rights. It was these groups who fought tooth and nail to keep women subserviant to men, prevent access to abortions, prevent women from working outside the home and at the very least dehumanizing those who chose to work outside the home. 

Know thy enemy.

You can see what they are up to by referring to para 15 in this judgement:

http://spoc.ca/Intervenor%20Judgment.pdf

A parallel case. Read below. This is what severe penalties for women look like, at least in the US. Mybe coming to a city/town near you.

http://bccec.wordpress.com/

From the site above:

Marcia Powell died after being left in an outdoor holding cell in triple-digit heat for more than four hours. She had a history of mental problems and was serving a 27-month sentence for prostitution—a crime for which we can assume none of her clients were prosecuted.

For women and girls at the margins, sexual violence too often starts a cycle of drug use, delinquency, and despair that eventually lands them in the criminal justice system. And along the way, many become mothers.

Yet they were not usually perceived as victims. Instead they were cast as “hos,” prostitutes, or “cracked out” mothers, and dispatched to youth detention centers and prisons. Nobody was talking about educational initiatives, micro-loans, psychiatric services, or human rights for them. I also discovered that few people were aware of the barbaric conditions the U.S. justice system inflicted on pregnant women, forcing them to be shackled during labor and delivery (even for a C-section birth) and whisking away the newborn child a few minutes after delivery, with only single Polaroid for the mother to keep.

----------------------------------------------------

We decide on which society we want to live in. One in which women are thrown in jail for victimless crimes (drugs, prostitution) or one in which we continue to see sex workers/prostitutes as humans, with the Charter behind them. A society in which children are not removed from mothers after giving birth, or removed because the Xain right is in a moral panic. One in which women, regardless of indoor/outdoor sex work, are treated with respect, decency and any violations against them are punishable by the law. We cannot do this in a society in which sex workers/prostitutes are criminalized. You chose.

"Sex worker Val Scott isn’t very happy these days. On Friday November 13th she tells @issue host Kevin O’Keefe that Canadian law makes prostitution a dangerous profession and perpetuates violence against women. Scott, executive director of Sex Professionals of Canada, along with sex workers Terri-Jean Bedford and Amy Lebovitch are fighting in Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice to strike down Canada’s laws around prostitution.   Friday November 13th at 8PM & 11PM ET/PT. It repeats on Sunday November 15th at 9PM ET/PT."

http://www.channelcanada.com/Article3813.html

Thanks fortunate. I'll have to tape that. I'm very interested in how this challenge will go down but given we have the Cons running this country I think any advance made for women will be rolled right back. Funny enough I am sure many of those same Conservatives enjoy evenings with a lovely lady. In fact, I know that some do. How hypocritical of them. Typical but still hypocritical.

It's sad that our existing laws are being filtered and used in such a way as to make life harder for many who are marginalized. I agree that as long as the Cons are running the country, advances made by women ARE being rolled back -- this is already happening. For the record, it doesn't hold that those who oppose full decriminalization or legalization are in support of the status quo.

here,here loretta

thanks for the link fortunate!youse guys rock!

love susie

It is funny how many politicians do seem to partake, especially more so in countries where it is illegal like the US.  You would think that they would know that that is a bad idea?  You might think that, given conditions for both client and service provider in other countries, that there would be no prostitution due to no clients.   Must be very discouraging for some to see that not only does it not eliminate it, it almost seems to promote it.  In the US, rates are significantly higher than here, so that alone is pretty good incentive. 

Also interestingly enough, the rates for non-genital contact (?) work like pro-domme is significantly higher than contact work, fwiw.    There are those who charge 300/hr to leave a guy alone in a room, blindfold him and not even talk to him for a couple of hours.  Now how can that be criminalized, and/or decriminalized, and/or regulated, etc.   (fyi, pro-dommes rarely work without training with another experienced dom for a year or so, if they are specializing in this area).

I think that 50 years ago or so that the knowledge of sexuality and experiences were so vanilla and limited that regulating and coming up with policies, etc regarding prostitution would have been difficult.  But the past couple of decades have been very open and informative.  New Zealand, and other countries, did not seem to have a hard time coming up with contingencies and procedures for most or all of the issues that revolve around sex work.  Also legal brothels have procedures in place that are pretty easy to adhere to, including onsite health nurse & doctors available and std testing weekly, a safe and comfortable place to work out of with other people around, and the potential for a steady clientele. 

Alot of sex workers would probably get Escort licenses, but not every city issues them.  Some that do make them prohibitively costly, usually 10x the cost of any other business license.    And by prohibitively, I mean that independent licenses could cost over two thousand in some cities (Edmonton, for example).  The number one sting in Edmonton is to setup and fine unlicensed sex workers, btw.   Interesting loophole, because everything else these particular escorts do is legal:  outcall to a hotel, discussion of rates and services done in private, legal prostitution.   But Edmonton has figured out a way to collect $$ for this legal activity.  Also, massage parlours are understandably more popular places to work, and not bothered.  MP workers still have to pay for a license, but if they work thru agencies or mps, the cost for this is under $200.   The business owner of course has already paid the city tens of thousands of dollars for their business license.  

This whole thing is fascinating, because the true conspiracy theorist would suggest that it is in the best interests of Albertan politicians to keep the criminalization of solicitation and so on status quo since the benefits they reap thru fines and licenses is huge.   The regulations of mps in Edmonton actually permit sex work on site, oddly enough, and it does seem to be stated quite clearly.  As well as permit discussion in the private rooms.  

There are huge assumptions made about this business.  Hey, go ahead and campaign for abolishing prostitution, but don't attempt to try to tell people it is illegal right now.  And don't suggest these laws make things safer, they don't.  Heck if a bunch of independent sex workers who have to deal with these laws are saying that they are doing more harm, and no good, then can't anyone just deal with that?   No one here has yet to prove that prostitution in and of itself causes the damage that is being attributed to it.  How can they?   The exchange of $ for consensual sexual activity is not in and of itself evil, unless you think sexual activity is damaging?

i love it!!albertans profiting from criminalization!!sweet!

www.thefword.org.uk/features/2008/03/how_to_get_an_a_1

More quotes, clearly whooshed over the head of the interviewer, who still insists on reinterpreting what they see and hear into what they believe is there, instead of what they are being told:

“If you think that’s what it is, yes, you could. Now I just don’t happen to see it that way. In this case it’s about calling things by their right name. Talking about ‘prostitutes’ and ‘whores’ boxes people into one group, when what we’re really talking about is a bunch of people with all kinds of diversities. It’s a collective of people, a collective of differences. We try to see the individual person. The word prostitute is a derogatory word. It’s just as our founder Merce says, if it were men who sold themselves, they would be called gigolos and be surrounded by praise. Prostitute is a word that alienates and oppresses.”

Isn’t it rather existence as a prostitute and the things you’re subjected to that alienate and oppress?

“No. It’s the word. Changing language also changes the way we see things. When we call it sex work, then it becomes equal to other kinds of work. If someone wants to put a price on their sex instead of their arms or whatever else, then that’s their problem. And those who do it want it to be seen as a real job. That’s what we’re campaigning for at the moment, that sex work gets work status.”

When you say they want it to be considered a real job, who do you speak for? Are you speaking for everyone?

“The majority want that, yes. Whores are not stupid, even if lots of people would like to believe that - she pauses to look at me - they know what they’re doing, what’s invested in it.”

Do you help girls get out of prostitution?

“Unfortunately we haven’t got enough resources. Sometimes people come to us asking for help to quit, but we have no possibility to help. The only thing we can do is make it easier for them while they’re doing the work. And the biggest problem they have is the police, not the punters. There are some girls who have customers for life; good, decent guys that they’ve got a good relationship with. There are very few who beat them up or force them to have anal sex.”

www.gov.edmonton.ab.ca/bylaws_licences/licences_permits/escort-licence.aspx

• Escort agency fee is $4,879 per year.
• Independent escort agency fee is $1,830 per year.
• Escort Licence fee is $121 per year.    <<  this is only available to a sex worker who is connected with an agency or mp

Enforcement action can and will be taken if a business is found to be operating without a licence. A person who contravenes or does not comply with a provision of this Bylaw may be issued a fine between $500 and $7,500 depending on the infraction.  In addition to any fine and penalty imposed, the Court shall provide for imprisonment of not less than 12 days and not more than one year for non-payment of a fine or penalty.

Below, are the biz license fees for straight massage clinics and workers:

• A massage centre licence is $72 per year (as of January 1, 2009).
• A massage practitioner licence is $72 per year (as of January 1, 2009).
• The administration fee of $35 is charged per occurance for any changes that are made to the licence issued or to the information on file.

talk about pimps!!!!HA!!!

I have read the entire article elsewhere, but found it thru a google link below.   The writer has his facts straight (20% of sex workers are street workers) which makes him unique when reporting on sex work, imo.

www.missingpeople.net/how_cities_'license'_off-street_hookers-june_16,_2002.htm

How cities 'license' off-street hookers

Licensed municipal escort agencies are supposed to keep prostitutes from working the streets. But the licences are so expensive few women can afford them and are forced to earn their living on the stroll.

In general, cities require licences to ensure businesses obey health and safety regulations. Licence fees pay for inspectors who enforce both provincial laws and municipal bylaws.

The City of Vancouver has five relevant licence categories in its bylaws: escort services, dating services, massage parlours, "body-rub parlours," and "health enhancement centres." The regulations are clearly designed so that sex-for-money is restricted to two types of businesses: escort services and body-rub parlours.

A number of provisions make this clear. First, health enhancement centres (such as aromatherapy or reflexology businesses) are explicitly forbidden from engaging in or offering "an act of prostitution." And massage parlours are barred from allowing members of the opposite sex to attend on customers. But body-rub parlours face neither restriction.

The definition of a "body-rub" makes the reality clearer still: It "includes the manipulating, touching or stimulating by any means, of a person's body or part thereof, but does not include medical, therapeutic or cosmetic treatment given by a person duly licensed."

The telling difference between "dating" and "escort" services in the Vancouver by-law is the information they must record: Dating services are required to keep the names and addresses of both people they are introducing, while escort services are only required to record the names of service providers. That means only customers of escort services can remain anonymous.

Licence costs further expose the reality. A dating service licence is $104 a year; massage parlours, $172; health enhancement centres, $160. But an escort service licence is $802 a year and a body-rub licence is $6,527. In fact, the body-rub licence is the third-most expensive in Vancouver, after those for the horse track and the Pacific National Exhibition.

Victoria, Edmonton, Calgary and Winnipeg all regulate and licence escort agencies, massage parlours or both, and all charge licensing fees far in excess of those levied on other businesses.

In Toronto, escort agencies are not licensed but "body rub parlours" are. Business licences cost $6,700 initially and $6,500 on renewal each year. All employees must also be licensed, starting at $192 each and $100 on renewal. By comparison, a taxi licence renewal is $870, while both pawnbrokers and "holistic centres" (such as aromatherapy spas) renew their licences for $100. There are currently 19 licensed body-rub parlours in Toronto employing 211 people. The city receives $162,000 a year on renewal fees alone.

But in reality, charges against off-street prostitution are rarely laid. In 2000, roughly 93 per cent of all prostitution-related incidents reported by police involved street activity, despite the fact that the street trade accounts for only about 20 per cent of all commercial sex.

Even if police did want to pursue unusual charges that technically fit Criminal Code requirements, they aren't likely to stick. Where charges against off-street, consensual prostitution do result in convictions, punishments are typically just light fines. "We've actually run some stings on some of these massage parlours as far as bawdy houses and everything else," says Aurel Leblanc of the Edmonton vice unit, "and we've gone through the courts and what the courts have given for sentences and what we gather from the court is they're not interested in seeing any of these charges coming through. It's consensual sex between two adults in a private place."

In most cities, regulation begins as soon as an application is made for a municipal licence. Not only must applicants satisfy all the usual requirements, including zoning, but in most cities the police also screen owners and employees for criminal records.  Licensed establishments are also subject to inspection. In Edmonton, says Aurel Leblanc, "I've got three teams of detectives and usually about once a month we try to do an inspection on these massage parlours.Everything changes, however, if the police discover that the employees of an off-street sex business are not consenting adults. Foreign women brought into Canada illegally and coerced into prostitution are a particular concern. So are women under the control of pimps. In addition, says Mr. Gillespie, the involvement of anyone younger than 18 "is a major priority with us no matter what the crime is."

http://www.utas.edu.au/government/APSA/BSullivanfinal.pdf

Until recently, there were other major barriers that prevented sex workers using the

legal system to achieve redress for sexual assault. In common law jurisdictions like

the United Kingdom - and consequently in Australia, New Zealand and Canada -

evidentiary rules severely limited the likelihood of a sexual assault prosecution

where the complainant was a prostitute, had been a prostitute, was rumoured to be a

prostitute or was otherwise behaving 'like a prostitute' (Edwards 1981; Strange

1995:66). Women in these categories were widely regarded as 'commonly available'

to men, as always consenting to sexual activity, and thus as incapable of being raped.

They were also regarded as inherently untrustworthy women who posed a real

danger both to individual men and the social order (Sullivan 1997). These social

beliefs about prostitutes (and other sexually promiscuous women) entered the law

via evidentiary rules that determined the type of evidence that could be admitted

into a rape prosecution. Evidentiary rules made it possible for even vague evidence

of a woman's activity in prostitution (or of behaviour that looked like prostitution) to

be admitted to court proceedings. Consequently, men accused of sexual assault were

able to use this evidence of prostitution to defend themselves, to successfully

undermine the credibility of the rape complainants and to avoid conviction.

Double post

Great article thanks Susan. I find it incredibly offensive and troubling that when a sex worker is killed or abused badly she is referred to as a "prostitute". Not a wife, or a sister, or a kind friend - a prostitute. As if her life was nothing but pulling tricks. The media like to do this. They put women in little boxes. Good girls and bad girls. Good girls are usually white, middle to upper class, under the age of 25 from a "good" home. bad girls are usually FN, POC and/or prostitutes, drunks, drug addicts and therefore not deserving of much more than a shrug "oh another hooker was killed today".

IMO it is a way for the public to easily deal with these killings. As long as they were not white and middle class then hey, who really cares right?

It sets up a false dichotomy of those who "may have deserved it" and those who didn't. The reality is that the white middle class girl could have been a sex worker, and the lower class FN woman could have been a social worker. Stereotypes - we have to fight every day until we can finally become full citizens recognized as diverse human beings.

From here:

www.thebody.com/content/whatis/art14140.html

Most countries, however, deal with sex work by legislating against it. This forces sex workers to hide, which has the effect of cutting them off from society and keeping them from prevention and/or care services.

There is little evidence that prohibitive legislation affects the amount of commercial sex available. But it does affect the health, welfare, and self-esteem of sex workers, which are in inverse proportion to the legal sanctions against them.

Prostitution law reform is good for health -- and its beneficial effects could be considerably accelerated by giving sex workers the information, the international connections, the support, and the resources they need. Perhaps one day the word "prostitute" can become synonymous with "safer-sex educator."

The more control sex workers have over their lives, the more likely they are to develop self-esteem and the responsibility that comes with it. If they do not, they are more likely to be careless and risk being infected or infecting their partners with HIV. This doesn't mean that sex workers are not exposing themselves to HIV, but we need to stay aware that the issue is the risk behavior, whether through unprotected sex or IV drug use. Therefore it is important to provide public health policies that will allow sex workers to have just access to health care and prevention services.