can someone explain the 'harm reduction' approach to prostitution

Whilst I'm glad that some punters have alerted the police to trafficking, I'm doubtful that punters will bring about the end of trafficking - what with them being partly responsible for it existing and all.

I said the vast majority of punters don't care about the circumstances of the women they masturbate in - seems logical to me otherwise they wouldn't do it, would they?

Is this going to turn into a punter appreciation thread?

Actually I said I volunteer in a drop-in centre for prostitutes. I didn't say 'prostituted' women, so no need for any sarky speech marks.

The centre is state funded - I already said that the emphasis is on safety for the women (free needles, condoms, medical check-ups, free meals, showers, dental check-ups, etc). There is a safe house and a paid employee whose job is to help the women access benefits and an eventual route out of prostitution should they so wish. There is no pressure on the women to take up any of the services. They drop in, use what they need and then go off again. The centre also has a drop-in facility for homeless people - the philosophy is the same. There is potentially help for anyone who wishes to leave the streets, but most of the people don't choose this route.

We just try to listen and provide the help requested.

this should work correlation-net.org/correlation_conference/images/Presentations/MS4_Levy.pdf

grimbletart - depends who is doing the research, if it's Melissa Farley and co., have anything to do with it, I'd presume they'd manage to make punters contribution to punters rescuing trafficked prostitutes as insignificant.

Somebody mentioned earlier in this topic Sweden and how significant progress had been made. Forgot I had been given this correlation-net.org/correlation_conference/images/Presentations/MS4_Levy.pdfLINK .

More to read (looks worksafe to me)

Thank you.

At least it seems a few handfuls of punters have the approximation of something that passes for a conscience. Wonder how many reported their worries before they had sex with the trafficked woman.......

Though I wonder whether "significant" numbers would actually reach statistical significance in any research considering the thousands of women and punters involved. I suppose we have to be grateful for the rescue of even a small handful of these women and the imprisonment of their traffickers even if the gap in the market is rapidly filled.

And of course if there were no punters ' even "good" ones then there would be no trafficked women as there would be no market to be exploited.

I don't think there is such a thing as a "good" punter - only a slightly less bad one.

You could start with this link, I can try and retrieve more lwhen I'm not pushed for time.

LINK

As far as I'm aware a significant number of women who have been rescued from trafficking have done so with the aid of a punter.

Could you give us your source for that statement please?

Beachcomber, where do you arrive at such a statement -

The vast majority of punters don't care if they are masturbating into a pimped trafficked woman (ie they are raping her) or a woman coerced by poverty and a history of sexual abuse (ie they are raping her). ?

As far as I'm aware a significant number of women who have been rescued from trafficking have done so with the aid of a punter. If you are about to mention the research undertaken by Julie Bindel, Melissa Farley and Jan MacCloed can I point out the research was trashed by 18 highly regarded acedemics who in a nutshell said it wasn't worth the paper it was printed on.

You also mention being a volunteer at a drop in centre for 'prostituted' women, can I ask, does their funding rely on being of a prohibitionist stance ?
Reason I ask is so many appear to receive their funding on the back of VAW ie. you have to see prostitution as violence in order to receive any.

Well exactly.

The vast majority of punters don't care if they are masturbating into a pimped trafficked woman (ie they are raping her) or a woman coerced by poverty and a history of sexual abuse (ie they are raping her).

Of course lots of them like to delude themselves that they are with a happy hooker - but they quite obviously don't give a shit whether they are or not, otherwise there wouldn't be so many trafficked and pimped women.

There are no good punters

I would imagine that the vast majority of people who pay for sex would be likely to hear " it's ok to pay for sex when the sex worker is making a free choice in a career move with good pay / working condition " but would stop listening at "it's ok to pay for sex ". Thin edge of a particularly nasty wedge. :shudder:

And I do absolutely think that everyone should be able to work in safety and be treated with respect no matter what work they do.

Like I said, I volunteer in a drop-in centre for prostitutes - the emphasis is very much on safety, and if we weren't respectful the director would tell us to piss off and take our volunteering elsewhere.

No. It isn't about ideology, it is about reality.

It isn't 'men shouldn't be allowed to have too much sex' (what is 'too much sex' anyway?).

It is that one gender does not have the right to think that they are entitled to be sexually serviced by another gender (particularly within a society which co-opts and fetishizes the sexuality of an oppressed group which is both defined and oppressed by its sex.)

Paid sex is not always rape. Rape is rape whether or not money changes hands. Insisting that paid sex is rape even though the person who was paid insists that s/he consented is not helpful to anyone.

So your view's about ideology - 'men shouldn't be allowed to have too much sex' rather than 'everyone should be able to work in safety and be treated with respect no matter what job they choose to do'.

Well, we'll agree to differ, then.

Because patriarchy.

Because sex work, as you term it, is about one gender having entitlement to sexual access to another gender. And the gender that is entitled to the access, is the gender that dominates society and oppresses the other gender primarily through sexualized violence. And because that gender co-opts the sexuality of the oppressed gender.

If we didn't live in a male supremacy I would be much more open to your view. But we do.

What I don't get is why it is so fucking difficult for some people to understand that you don't improve the lives of the enslaved and exploited by trashing the lives and livelihoods of those working in the same industry by choice.
Think of the clothing industry. A lot of fashion clothing is made by slave labour, including child labour and including trafficked people. This is of course a Bad Thing and efforts are being made to help those who suffer this exploitation. But no one holds the independent tailor responsible for the plight of the people in sweatshops. No one says that the whole clothing industry should be abolished because of the cruelty and exploitation that goes in within it, the calls are for fair wages, worker protection and all the rest of it.

Yet sex work is always seen as waa, waaa, such a horrible special case, as though sexual activity is totally unlike any other human activity. It may be the most special (or the most horrifying, YMMV) activity in the worl to you (generic, hypothetical 'you') but not everyone feels the same way about it. To some people it's an ordinary bodily function like going to the loo, to others it's a pleasant enough way of passing the time, or it could be an addictive delight, or something that other people make too much fuss about, or the meaning of the universe, or a way to earn some money. All of these people have the right to their different feelings about sex, none of them are wrong.

And, I wanted to add that I don't mean to suggest your motives for defending the choice to sell sex are aligned with the motives of those historical revisionists in America, most of whom are closely linked with the leadership of far right, white supremacist organisations.

However, there were and still are many well-meaning people who want to believe that slavery wasn't as bad as conventional historical accounts tell us. They want to believe that at least some slaves were well treated, were allowed an education, had a happier life under slavery or later "indentured servitude" than those who ended up exploited as sharecroppers or factory workers in the North.

That they miss is that if African Americans had been afforded genuine equality with non white citizens, given compensation for their losses under slavery, if racist practices like segregation, refusal to hire or rent to people because of skin colour, lynching even were severely punished, that former slaves wouldn't have necessarily remained exploited and in poverty.

Yes, imho it comes across as disingenuous to suggest that feminists oppose sexual exploitation of prostitutes on grounds of immorality. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is possible to deplore the misogynist prescribing and policing of women's sexual 'reputations' at the same time as deploring the misogynist practice of prostituting women and girls.

In short, your argument is a red herring. Like Beachcomber, I'm struggling to understand your vociferous defense of the rights of the few women who make the genuine, free choice to sell sex and experience no physical or psychological harm. For them to have that 'right,' far more must be denied their basic right to self-determination, personal safety and well-being. And, why the assumption that feminists want women to exit prostitution and only take jobs on the lowest pay with the worst conditions? I want all women everywhere to be able to access the same economic opportunities as men, to be able to work in safe conditions.

In America, there are revisionist historians who try to argue that the enslavement of African Americans wasn't actually as bad as we're all led to believe. They insist that it meant the decendents of those kidnapped and transported from Africa has the prospect of a better life in America than they'd have ever had if they'd been born in Africa. They also point to testimonies from some slaves, citing how happy and content their lives were, that they had food, shelter and generous, kind masters. They remind us that after abolition, many slaves stayed on the plantations in conditions not dissimilar to those in slavery. They insist this shows that slavery wasn't so bad for some slaves (nothing to do with the paucity of other economic opportunities and continued racism in society.)

I'm just feeling reminded of those arguments when I try and get my head round your position on prostitution SGB.

about the misery of a vast majority at the hands of gender inequality

It comes from the same deepdown place, the idea that to have a lot of sex with a lot of different men is inherently harmful to women and 'degrading' in that it reduces their property-value.

Not in my case it doesn't.

It comes from having eyes in my head and being able to see the suffering of these women.

(I volunteer in a drop in centre for prostitutes.)

SGB I respect you a lot, but when you start calling my views stupid, I kind of stop hearing you.

You seem determined that views like mine are all about stopping the laydeez from doing the dirty sex.

They're not.

Sorry, but I think pontificating about the rights of a tiny minority to profit from gender inequality, rather than being realistic about the misery of a vast majority at the hands of gender equality, is misogynistic.