proposed legislation in scotland - licensed saunas and legalised prostitution

So what can these women do then green tomato? They're obviously doing it bcos they have no choice, just like sweatshop workers, so if you take away that income how is that helping? Surely ithe needs to be a case of adding options and choices not taking whatever options thy have left away from them?

That's the point Green tomato, you may well feel it's not a choice if they're financially coerced, I completely agree, but that is the position they're in.
Disliking that situation and lessening options for them is not going to help them

To me, that's like saying, "surely you all accept that sweat shops are here to stay" or that racism or homophobia is here to stay.

If you think a practice or circumstance is harmful, the fact that it's been around for centuries doesn't stop you speaking out.

By that theory then green tomato any businesss that doesnt seek all that you stated (some beauticians, any job working from home) is not a legitimate business

I don't think women in poverty should consider prostitution their only way out - if you don't feel you have any other choice, then it's not a choice.

Just as I don't think they should sell blood, a kidney, or rent out their womb.

I think women in poverty should be helped, not encouraged to rent their bodies to men.

Without errors:

Playswell I can get what you're saying regarding choice/kids going hungry. But with all these constraints you want to bring to these women without options are you leaving them with? Even less by the looks of it

Green tomato that is simply not going to help women who do this to feed their kids and are in a bad place

I am not one, but despite what others say I do care.
How can you think that's a good thing for women in poverty with a lack of options to have them further reduced?

• can get what you're saying

You pay tax - but you have clients at your house - do you have all the other insurances and assessments? Do you pay business rates? Is your landlord aware that you are conducting a business from your house? The council? In my area, if you were running a business from your home which had visiting clients you would have had to have registered, and proven that you had adequate parking etc.

Those are the realities of a legitimate business. If regulation comes, it's going to seriously affect you too you will need all these things. Until you have them, it's not a job like any other.

"Surely you all must be aware that prostitution is here to stay,"

Yeah. We don't accept that thesis.

Playswell I u can't get what you're saying regarding choice/kids going hungry. But with all these constraints you want to bring to these women whato options are you leaving them with? Even less by the looks of it

I can't understand your constantly saying I don't care about trafficking victim's pkayswell, I seem to be the only one here concerned with having a ficus on that

Vestal I think you're right that the sex industry can't go on like this . It's just a shame you can't see the difference between prostitutes and trafficked women though.

Surely you all must be aware that prostitution is here to stay, so why not focus energies on helping actual victim's instead of a futile attempt to abolish something that you as an outsider are against but for many it's a happy way of life.
But of course trafficking is a portion of the industry so why not tackle that and help people who need and the most important thing 'want' help

Calling posters a load of useless fools is a personal attack. I'm not going to report it because but it would be deleted if reported.

Anyway I imagine this shouting down sex workers has probably been done many times on this forum

And you'd be horribly wrong. I doubt you'd want to hear about that though.

Playswell that is disgusting. I have known women forced into prostitution, they are certainly not in the same job as me

I'm sorry the truth disgusts you. Can be hard when you first try and understand how your actions impact others, but it's never not useful in the end. Your choices adversely affect other women. You don't give a shit about those women right now because you're ok.

If only my knowledge came from Hollywood films, but it doesn't. Hollywood films rarely show even a small part of how awful the majority of prostituted women's lives are. It's something you would do well to look at, but you won't, because, as I said, you simply don't care about those women.

Luckily, we're having a huge impact on the pimping industry. I look forward to many more victories to come. None of which will affect your money making ability, so don't you fret, but should hopefully help women who have no choices.

When your choice is to allow men you'd never choose to have sex with fuck you or to watch your kids go hungry it's not choice. It's not trafficking either, it's much more insidious than that. It looks like choice though, and that seems to be enough for the type of men who rent womens orifices. It means that they don't have to look at what present social policy is doing to women. It means they don't have to look at what foreign policy is doing to women abroad.

While this thread is about the situation in Scotland, it has to been seen as part of a global issue. There are women all over the world who, for whatever reason, have chosen to prostitute themselves. To a limited extent, good for them, although their choices adversely affect the women and children around them, their choice is a real choice. However, in this country and elsewhere, the majority of women involved are women who have no real choices.

Where the rich West leads, the world sadly tends to follow. If we decide that women's bodies are commodities here, where we have access to good health services, sexual health services and some form of justice system, we are throwing women under the bus in countries where that simply isn't that case. It is facile and ridiculous to suggest otherwise and no amount of insults to the women on this forum will change that.

I'm saying that it's a foolish misguided opinion.
I have views on other things as you said and if someone who has direct experience in dealing with or being involved in that situation tried to explain to me ways in which I was ignorant I would certainly not be pompous enough to shout them down and behave in a pig headed manner and claim they were incapable of making their own choices and that theyou were wrong.

It's a shame people can't take a back step and actually look at things from another's point of view, one based in reality. Anyway I imagine this shouting down sex workers has probably been done many times on this forum as the pig headedness is astonishing

I don't want another job.

You will want another job if/when buying women is outlawed, because by then, you will need another job. And I am all for you being able to get another job then.

However, I do very much not care whether you don't want another job.

When the Spinning Jenny was invented, lots and lots of spinsters lost their livelihoods.

Would you happily pay thousand times as much for your clothes, just so that spinners and weavers can have jobs?

No?

Then don't complain that other people don't want you to do what you do for a living.

I'm attacking people?! Wow, just been told I am responsible for trafficking victim's getting awful men visiting them, questioned on my taxes and told I get my orifices raped multiple times a day.
You're not feminists, simply an extremely misguided bunch with no real lifew experience or understandingof what you claim to care about.
Your attitudes are damaging to society

I pay tax yes as I work from home and hope to get a mortgage in the future.

Personal attacks aren't allowed on MN, Sapphire.

We are absolutely entitled to have an opinion on a social issue about whether sex should be a sellable commodity .

No doubt you have a view on paid surrogacy, say, or paying for blood donations or kidney donors, even if none of those things are in your personal future. But do you want to live in a society where those things can be sold... Yes, of course you have an opinion on that and no one would call you a fool for holding it.

Tell me Sapphire - if this is a normal job, I'm assuming you pay your tax and NI, that you have personal liability insurance, pay business rates on your place of business (and meet all appropriate fire and health regulations), that all activities you perform have written risk assessments? Frequent assessments and certifications of your services/ability by your governing professional body?

That is the reality of what you would need if what you were doing if this was a profession.

Not that I would support it anyway. Just because you're happy doing it, doesn't mean it's not harmful to society. I'm pretty happy in my job, and I can reasonably say that there aren't any people trafficked to do it. You can't say the same thing at all - your job promotes a culture that encourages human trafficking, and I just can't get on board with that.

As someone who reads graduate application CVs I expect to see evidence of work experience and work history.

What are you going to say on yours? Will there be a blank or will you explain how you earned your money?

If you explain then, in my particular case, I might wonder if you have a rather casual concern for money laundering and the black economy, which would probably mean you won't make any short lists of candidates.

OK I can't try any more to have a serious discussion.

I wish you all the best of luck in your noble efforts to save prostitutes.

Luckily you won't impact the sex industry, and hopefully those of us sensible enough to see the distinction between prostitutes and trafficked women can do something to help this situation. You lot are clearly useless fools watching way too many Hollywood films

Sapphire- Yes they are. The "consent" you think you are giving is not meaningful. I can see I'm wasting my time even replying to you but maybe one day you will understand.