Prostitution - Framing the Debate for Decriminalization Part IV

Well, that pretty well frames it I think.

AW, I see. No men's rights, no women's rights (unless we all state that all sex workers are prostituted people and that all men buying sex, including the disabled, are horrible people exploiting a woman's vagina).

The vagina must at all times be kept morally clean. Even if it means personal choice is gone.

And let's forget about all the men who do sex work - out of the debate.

Heterosexist, anti-disability and full on moral control. Yay!!! What's next? War on Drugs? How about the War on Terrorism? I'm ready.

You know, I am pretty glad I threw my hat down into the camp I did because there is no chance in hell I would even assume it is my right to tell anyone who freely does sex work what to do with their vaginas. (Since no abolutionists have even mentioned men's agency - the right to sell their sex - I guess men aren't involved in sex work). Next!

So the frame is set. Vagina's used to procure money in exchange for sex = very very bad. Horrible women really. The men who visit them, all horrible exploiters, just one step away from piling people with GHB for cheap thrills. 

No such thing as women who wish to do this work. No men who are in the work, unless they are johns and never forget the vagina must remain closed unless it is for procreation or recreational sex with strangers and boy-girl friends. Otherwise you sex workers, well, you better repent and confess that you really are exploited and need to be saved from that behaviour, Stat!

Got it.

yo star checc ya inbox dont even reply to the older msg jus the newer one

edit - sry for offtopic post

No, but control over women's bodies is remind.

CMOT Dibbler wrote:

There's  something  I don't  get.  Women  and  girls  are  trafficked  into  this  country  all the  time  for non sexual  purposes (sewing  buttons  onto  designer  jeans, cleaning  toilets)  but for  some  reason  mainstream  feminists only  pay  attention  to this  kind of crime when it  involves  sex.  Why is that?

That isn't true.  The issue of domestic workers has been a feminist issue for a long time. There are laws concerning it and people do get charged in court for it.  There is no case of domestic workers trying to change the law to make it easier for them to be exploited.

Infosaturated wrote:

There is no case of domestic workers trying to change the law to make it easier for them to be exploited.

Well, except for the numerous attempts by undocumented workers to stay in Canada and the US to work below the North American market value. For example, from 2006:

Quote:

Angry about recent deportations and afraid they may be next, about 1,000 Portuguese workers and their family members converged on Queen's Park for a rally Friday morning.

Waving Canadian flags, they tried to send a message to provincial and federal government officials that they want to stay and work in this country.

An estimated 10,000 Portuguese workers, mostly in the construction industry, live illegally in Toronto. Federal immigration officials have been deporting planeloads of undocumented workers recently.

Friday's rally was organized by the Universal Workers Union Local 183. The union is calling on the federal government to "stop the deportation of skilled workers."

They brought their protest to provincial government buildings to say deportations will hurt the local economy.

"I think it will have a domino effect in the future," union representative Andy Manahan said. "Because if they go back to their home country, workers will likely not come back."

Manahan worries that the shortage of workers will get worse in the future, leaving Toronto's construction industry in a difficult situation.

The federal government has said there are no plans to provide amnesty to undocumented workers, regardless of their skills.

Catchfire, I don't think migrants who resist deportation are "trying to change the law to make it easier for them to be exploited."

Quote:

Catchfire, I don't think migrants who resist deportation are "trying to change the law to make it easier for them to be exploited."

Wow, that is some good sleight-of-hand, martin. But, I can see you've had some practice in these threads. It shouldn't need to be pointed out that "exploited" is how Info and remind defined the vocabulary, and I was reusing it ironically, since rationality departed these threads long ago. As Ghislaine points out, sex workers are more than capable of determining their own level of exploitation. The point is that under a capitalist system all labour is "exploited" but the major reason sex work is a touchstone for these sorts of dicussions is because it has to do with people fucking. And that gets all sorts of moral outrage a-huffin'.

I think in terms of the thread title, it needs to be pointed out that men's and women's rights ARE part of the framework of this debate. All of these threads started b/c of the Charter challenge, which by its very definition deals with the rights of men and women (and those who self-identify otherwise). As stargazer pointed out, male and transexual sex workers are being completely ignored in this discussion for some reason. Their rights are at stake as well. 

remind wrote:

Ghislaine, and catchfire, but yet we have  seen just as many prostitutes  here, or more, state they were exploited, and that the majority are exploited, but I guess that is not convenient  to note.

I have addressed non-consensual actions, underage and trafficking many times - this is a red herring. There are many industries were some people are exploited and some aren't. Porn is one more relevant example. Should porn be illegal because some are exploited?

remind wrote:

people can "fuck" all they want in their leisure time,  but I as citizen am not going to condone a public industry without regulations.

I think there should be regulations. I support legalizations, with strict regulation, zoning, etc. Porn and strip clubs have this.

As well, there are people who quite honestly cannot find anyone willing to "fuck" them without money involved. This is not meant as an offense to anyone, it is just a reality.

As long as a sex worker is willing to have a business relationship to fulfill their needs in this way and both parties are consensual and not exploiting each other - what is the problem?

[url=http://www.cupidsescorts.ca/welcome.html] Here is a Toronto "escort" [/url] agency that obviously engages in prostitution/sex work etc. There are testimonials of staff and clients - are they all being exploited? It is owned by a woman who seems committed to providing a safe environment for staff. Do you think they should be shut down?

Ghislaine wrote:

I think there should be regulations. I support legalizations, with strict regulation, zoning, etc.

It has been clearly illustrated in other countries that what you are suggesting doesn't work in the case of prostitution.

Ghislaine wrote:

As well, there are people who quite honestly cannot find anyone willing to "fuck" them without money involved. This is not meant as an offense to anyone, it is just a reality.

My brother-in-law is a quadraplegic and still married twice. If people are unable to find a sexual partner they may need help with interpersonal relationships or they may have to adjust their expectations. There is no shortage of women with the same strengths and weaknesses as men have.

Many pros have stated that 60 to 75% of their clientele is happily married.

Ghislaine wrote:

As long as a sex worker is willing to have a business relationship to fulfill their needs in this way and both parties are consensual and not exploiting each other - what is the problem?

The problem is that organized crime, the trafficking of women and children, underage prostitution, have all been shown to rise when prostitution is fully decriminalized. Police are unable to stop it from happening.  The laws and regulations etc. can't be enforced. 

You seem to think that there is some means of separating the women and children who are exploited or damaged by the industry from the ones who aren't. In practice that is not the outcome of decriminalization.

If there were no real life examples to then I would go for the logic being presented but the logic has been tested and has been shown to fail when applied to real-life.

Ghislaine wrote:

remind wrote:

 

Quote:

There is no case of domestic workers trying to change the law to make it easier for them to be exploited.

 

Good analogy!

So, susan, annie, cookiesnscream and all the other sex workers posting here are ignorant about their own exploitation? How many gazillion threads on this issue have we had and yet info, remind, martin, etc. have still been unable to show them/convince them of their own exploitation.  Strange. They must really, really be brainwashed. 

Info: yes there are no strip clubs on PEI. I believe it is a zoning-type rationale. I am not that familiar with it, I just know that there none allowed at all. About 10 yrs ago, one attempted to open in  Chtown and was raided and closed on the same night. 

I suppose the intent is that if they say it enough, considering we are so easily brainwashable, we will eventually believe it lol.  Sometimes people simply don't like being shown the errors of their ways but I am happy that many of you are ready to hear from the silent majority.  No, you can't see us everyday when you drive to work, but we are here, happily going about our day, pursuing our livelihood and hopefully our dreams.  We don't all have traumatic childhoods, or evil pimps, or sinister brothel owners, and therefore don't need or want anyone's help and sympathy.  It would be nice, as I see through many other posters, to see a willingness to listen and accept, and see why what seems like helpful little laws actually disempower us, not help.

The Poster Child, New Zealand

http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/727258

 The only winners from the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 are men, says the National Council of Women of New Zealand.

The council supported the law change in order to validate and protect human rights -- not to condone prostitution, she said.

"The law was meant to give protection to those over the age of 18.

"And along with that, was the belief that the reform would see prostitution practised only by those 18 and over, but we are still seeing girls as young as 13 and 14 on the streets selling their bodies."

The council was disturbed there appeared to be no disincentive for men for their actions when they were getting name suppression and light sentences for buying sexual services from underage girls, Mrs Bang said.

Normalizing prostitution turns rape into theft and sends the message that prostitution is not particularly harmful. After all, if if was that harmful it wouldn't be legal.

Ghislaine, I really am curious. Do you or do you not support PEI's refusal to allow strip clubs?

Daniela had written: Using the same criteria developed by scientists who study long-term health in the military, researchers concluded that 2 out of 3 women in the sex industry suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs)

fortunate wrote: The study is flawed due to the fact that it uses data only from street workers, and does not include the majority of sex workers. Hopefully, when referring to any statistics we can keep that in mind.

Unfortunately, this can be verified. I looked it up and oops!, it seems that fortunate lied.

The study quoted by Levy is "Prostitution & Trafficking in Nine Countries: An Update on Violence and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder", Melissa Farley, Ann Cotton, Jacqueline Lynne, Sybille Zumbeck, Frida Spiwak, Maria E. Reyes, Dinorah Alvarez, Ufuk Sezgin. In Prostitution, Trafficking and Traumatic Stress. M. Farley (ed.) (2003) Binghamton, NY: Haworth.

It included women in strip club prostitution, escort prostitution, massage prostitution as well as street. Also included men and transgendered people. 854 people in all.

Tsk, tsk. And only a minute ago, she was sermoning us about "the truth" and "the facts"... Babble policy is clear about such tricks: "You agree, through your use of this service, that you will not use this discussion board to post any material that is knowingly false and/or defamatory."

martin dufresne wrote:

Daniela had written: Using the same criteria developed by scientists who study long-term health in the military, researchers concluded that 2 out of 3 women in the sex industry suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs)

fortunate wrote: The study is flawed due to the fact that it uses data only from street workers, and does not include the majority of sex workers. Hopefully, when referring to any statistics we can keep that in mind.

Unfortunately, this can be verified. I looked it up and oops!, it seems that fortunate lied.

The study quoted by Levy is "Prostitution & Trafficking in Nine Countries: An Update on Violence and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder", Melissa Farley, Ann Cotton, Jacqueline Lynne, Sybille Zumbeck, Frida Spiwak, Maria E. Reyes, Dinorah Alvarez, Ufuk Sezgin. In Prostitution, Trafficking and Traumatic Stress. M. Farley (ed.) (2003) Binghamton, NY: Haworth.

It included women in strip club prostitution, escort prostitution, massage prostitution as well as street. Also included men and transgendered people. 854 people in all.

Tsk, tsk. Babble policy is clear about such tricks: "You agree, through your use of this service, that you will not use this discussion board to post any material that is knowingly false and/or defamatory."

Since the stats provided cited no source, impossible for you to accuse me of that since the original post was implying it applied to Canada, the topic of our discussion. I have seen these outrageous "statistics" created elsewhere, and I think we all know that anything with Farley's name on it can be automaticaly discounted as inflammatory and exaggerated lol.
I know already, through other studies, mostly peer reviewed and reputable university based ones, that the statistics shown apply primarily to street workers, and skewing the results by making a token effort at "including" indoor workers cannot be supported by reality.
When you wish to view real statistics simply view the information gathered by actual sex workers, instead of abolitionists.
Why would you try to continue a debate on this matter, then choose to use something associated with a known "embellisher" like this Farley person.
I have seen her site, and frankly this is the sort of person every free-thinking individual should steer clear of. Myths have been debunked all over these threads, with valid reports from reputable associations. You can ignore them, try to discredit them, but you cannot change the facts.

fortunate wrote:

Is the National Council of Women similar to our Real Women?

Not unless REAL women supported the decriminalization of prostitution.

The council supported the law change in order to validate and protect human rights -- not to condone prostitution, she said.

fortunate wrote:

New Zealand... an exhaustively researched government report was issued.

The report has been accused of bias however it can be read online so people can draw their own conclusions. Yes I "cherry-picked" the parts I felt make my point.  This is one of those super long posts but it is a tiny fraction of the information on the site.

http://tinyurl.com/yj79xb5

One strength the study has is that it surveys the full range of types of prostitution which is often difficult to find. But, it also has a lot of weaknesses.

"...we did not have the funds to employ translators. Thirdly, foreign sex workers are especially vulnerable and some may not be working legally."

I find it weird that they couldn't afford translators. There is no mention of what percentage of workers are foreign, 10%? 70%? Also, some brothel owners refused access for the quantitative portion. I'm guessing places that refused access are more likely to be treating their workers badly.

New Zealand Prostitutes’ Collective selected the 58 participants for the qualitative from their membership and were the interviewers.  NZPC is an industry stakeholder. Their membership is not necessarily representative of the average worker (although they may be).

The total number of prostitutes interviewed on health was only 58 and that was spread over 5 cities, representing street, brothel, escort and independent, male, female and transgendered.

This is the page that focuses on health:

http://tinyurl.com/yl8mru7

Of the 58 in the qualitative study, 77.8 always use condoms for vaginal, anal and oral sex.  That means 22% don't! Outdoor workers were at 71.4, so 29% had worked without protection, indoor is 80.5 but that is still 20% that don't always use protection.

Yet in the conclusion they state:

6.5.4 Safer sex practices

Sex workers are very conscious of their health needs and the majority do take precautions to reduce the risk of contracting sexually transmitted infections . Research looking at the safer sex practices of sex workers consistently reports high levels of condom use, especially for vaginal and anal sex, but less often for oral sex .

While the "majority" do take precautions 20 to 30% don't aways use protection. I find their conclusion misleading.

They give some interesting anecdotes:

 we started going and um he took his condom off. I actually, to actually grab him, I actually didn’t realize, I grabbed his finger and I actually broke his finger to get him off me.

No, but I make sure, even for a blow job, you know, sometimes if they stink, I put the condom on them.

"Oh I can’t get it up in a condom, blah blah blah… I learnt to put condoms on with my mouth. I can put a condom on now without a client ever noticing I’ve got a condom in my mouth. But I think that’s just experience. I can get a condom on and off and (.) that before they even realize I’ve done it.

Some participants did stress that they had always taken safer sex precautions and the law had not changed this:

I still practise what I practised pre the reform… See, um the law reform bill didn’t make accessibility to condoms and lubes and things like that, um the tools of the trade. You didn’t make accessibility to them any easier. It actually, if you go to mainstream places you have to pay an arm and a leg… Whereas um places like NZPC have made it more accessible for those in the industry, but not the law reform bill. Oh no, it hasn’t changed the way, how I practise, to what I do with my clients.

Yeah I think…one of the big things for me that made me really struggle was the length of the shifts. They make you work like 11 hour shifts.

Refusal of client to pay - 12.6

Money stolen - 8.3

Physically assaulted - street 13.4 managed 10.4 private 12.6  (19.2% percent reported to police)

Threatened with physical violence 15.9

Held somewhere against will street 10.2 managed 4.2 private 3.2 (21.1% reported to police)

raped by a client street 5.3 managed 3.3 private 1.5 (32.1% reported to police)

Even in legal managed indoor work 10.4% experienced physical violence. Do cops even face that rate of violence?

Some participants had not had any bad experiences, but were aware that they had to always be prepared for any eventuality:

Um I haven’t had the bad experiences, no, but um (.) I personally don’t like out-calls at all because I feel superior in the building… And this is my territory. If you’re going to go on an out-call, that’s his territory and I feel so inferior. And I’ve got to always practice to not look it, and feel relaxed and try to and keep the situation calm, even though I’m screaming inside.

Screaming inside

That doesn't sound healthy to me.

There are other numbers that show improvement but not significantly in my view. For example, in 1999 58% of managed workers felt they had to accept a customer they didn't want. In 2006, that dropped to 44%. That's a significant drop but it's still outrageously high given that we are talking about having sex with someone.

There is another part of the study that is quantitative and many more sections and not all the news is necessarily bad. Workers do make positive comments concerning decriminalization.  Nevertheless in my opinion the working conditions are unacceptable.

Would this be tolerated in any other industry? 

fortunate wrote:

Only if you ignore the report copied in #31.   The only thing that statement illustrates is clinging to myths and misconceptions, in spite of all contradictory evidence.

Fortunate, I'm not ignoring anything.  I chose to go to the horses mouth and examine the actual report rather than an article on the report. Sometimes it's not possible but in this case it is.

Thanks for the huge work you've put into this, Infosaturated. Despite the abuse and the lies, some of us insist on the facts before sacrificing human rights to industry interests.

fortunate, don't get too upset. these guys simply refuse to acknowledge the truth. they will not be happy until all sex work is eliminated and our culture along with it. so nice to be in such insightful and inclusive company.

the selctive reading, quoting and minimal research links posted only linking to the same researchers over and over....never mind what the government of new zealand say...or the government of sweden either....they are reviewing that model but yet it is toted as this great success and the "only "solution for canada.

also, proponents of the swedish model here on babble and indeed else where in canada, have not a clue how they would implement decrim of sex workers in canada. they know how they will criminalize business owners and customers but have no plan for any infrastructure for decriming workers.

and when asked to contribute to something we all have consensus on- decriming workers- they don't take part, make no comment and contribute nothing.they talk of support services and drug treatment and housing for workers affected by criminalization and working on the street as if those services exist. they don't. the places that do exist are judgemental and demand a worker renounce sex work in order to access services and supports. talk about barriers. in vancouver at least weare working with the health authority and some of those barriers are being adressed. great projects for housing which are zero barrier have been extremely successful in housiong some of vancouvers most vulnerable and hard to house women. they are allowed to use drugs on premises, are allowed to bring customers into their residence and are not forced to make choices between income and housing.

in other words abolitionists have no plan.and will not, it seems engage with active sex workers in designing one. luckily the abolitionists are not in charge and we are engaged with people wo will be able to make a difference on a systematic level.

they are so caught up in , as stargazer said, keeping our vaginas clean no matter the cost- fuck the international charter of human rights- that they haven't even begun to think that far ahead.

the decrim movement in canada is leaps and bounds in front and we are realizing our strategic plan one piece at a time. we will gain control of our rights, our bodies and our collective destinies in spite of assertions here to the contrary.

the movement supporting the swedish model have no plan for protection of workers and are engaged no where with the systems responsible for our protection....except maybe at john school....

lol love how they are taking sex workers money!$500 for john scool attendance and a clean record. talk about undermining sex workers incomes.....

remind wrote:

BTW, women's rights are not part of this either.

okey dokey then.......round up all sex workers and let's get them into the "camps" we must immediatley begin medical testing and experiment with emotional responses to exclusion and oppression. we will allow carefully screened men to access the bodies of workers as per government protocal and finally we will never have to look at a sex worker again.let's begin planning how we will trasport all sex workers to these camps. come on, it will take a bit of work but....

it is about rights and to say anything else if absolutely outrageous, have you lost your mind?