Why is the BBC Promoting Sex Work?

I haven’t seen a single poster here argue that prostitution is icky, or take any kind of authoritarian stand, butter.

On the contrary, it seems to be only you who believes that humans can be compelled to behave morally only by state intervention. I myself believe that discarding the commodification of women’s bodies happens as part of discarding patriarchal structures and thinking, not by more man-made laws. And the mechanism for that to happen is feminism, for my money.

I prefer individual liberty and will choose the rights of the individual over the 'protection' of the group in most cases.

@Butters0123 so I guess you will be sunbathing in the park, having a house party and driving to the beach this weekend - because your liberty is paramount. And fuck everyone else.

If anything good can come out of this pandemic, I pray it’s the acknowledgement that we live together in society and sometimes must temper our behaviours for the greater good, even when that goes against our individual wishes.

Which is why - even if they want to - I believe individuals should not be legally allowed to buy and sell sex. Because sometimes, Butters, it’s not just about you.

Wtf are you talking about Butters?! Of course prostitution increases the risk of male violence to all women, that's already been born out in practice many many times. It isn't "hysteria" (more casual mysogyny from you) it's just reality. Women being afraid about real events that threaten them isn't "hysteria". If you don't think that prostitution makes the world more dangerous for all women then you're dangerously naive. As for it being the first wrung on an authoritarian ladder, you wouldn't argue that for anything else. Let's take literally any other example of an oppressed group "choosing" something which caused more harm to that whole group. Let's say some white people still wanted to buy black slaves, and some black people decided this was a great economic choice for them and the whole group started lobbying in favour of legalising slavery, would you be in favour of that? What if they trialed the idea in certain areas and it resulted in a massive increase in racially motivated violence against other black people in the area, would you call anyone who opposed that "authoritarian and hysterical" ? Would you tell them that black people were just always going to be oppressed and banning slavery wouldn't change that so stop being hysterical and let the people who want to be slaves get on with it? Of course you wouldn't. You would recognise, I hope, that such a system would result in the abuse and comodification of some back people, increase the risk to all black people, and reinforce a culture of white supremacy. So why are you making that same argument for an industry that serves to abuse and comodify some women, endanger all women, and reinforce a culture of male supremacy?

"Omg butters. I have not really understood much of your argument as you don’t use clear language."

I fail to see how much clearer I could be.

"But I do understand when someone uses the word hysteria. As an insult. Towards women"

I am a woman myself and when I see something hysterical I will call it out regardless of my sex or the sex of who wrote it.

Or do you think no woman is capable of being hysterical simply because it has been used as an insult against women making legitimate arguments? Or should we just ignore it when they are to be politically expedient? Or wasn't I clear enough for you in my language?

But why in this case, butter, is it because you don’t think sex work harms society? Or so just not think that society is as important as individual liberty? Are you a libertarian?

I listened to someone advocating for legalisation of drugs on Triggernometry at one point, except that when you listened to him he wasn’t actually advocating for legalisation of all drugs or total legalisation.

Decriminalisation rather than legalisation of Sex work is interesting because it recognises that so much of the trade would not be possible if it were legalised, as regulation would necessarily follow. The result would be that much if the trade would remain in the criminal sphere.

There is a point where we as a society say that something is not acceptable. I think that buying sex has been and for many still Is, one of those things. Whatever your position on the legalities of sex work, I am interested to know why you consider buying sex to be OK and whether you do not think there are harms to society or whether you think those harms are acceptable collateral damage?

@ RuffleCrow I take it you're not familiar with the research behind Nordic Model Now? I am actually very familiar with that site-and also the supposed statistics it cites.

What they do is never go back to the original source articles of those so called statistics to check that they actually say they what they claim they do-nor do they add any qualifications present in the originals. Their statistics are culled from secondary sources and taken out of context and misrepresented or overgeneralised. So for instance they may take a small scale study on street prostitutes and then extrapolate it to all prostitutes.

I also know that when I write to them to point out their errors they always delete my posts. They are not really interested in having a proper evidence based debate-just pushing their abolitionist line.

"(commercial sex - is that what they call it now..)

You can see above that the writer thinks that someone's body is just like other commodities - to be bought and sold."

It is selling a sexual service. Selling is commercial. It is an accurate description of what is happening. I suppose you would prefer slavery or rape to describe it.

A sex worker's body isn't bought or sold. They use their body or voice in various ways but still retain it at the end of the job just as other people who do jobs in which they use their bodies primarily, such as sportsmen and women, stuntmen and women, massage therapists, dancers etc. And no, none of those jobs is exactly the same as being a sex worker.

Using over emotional and inaccurate language doesn't strengthen your argument which boils down to, "I think it's icky so every woman must and we should ban it because of that."

Omg butters. I have not really understood much of your argument as you don’t use clear language.

But I do understand when someone uses the word hysteria. As an insult. Towards women

🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️

@DidoLamenting, sorry the looking down was in answer to wheetos, not your post. I should have highlighted what he said before replying.

when the evidence tends to suggest what they're saying is bollocks (e.g. women not only selling sex in Holbeck for 2 months then skipping off into the sunset with their 40k

Now it's you that's talking bollocks. The woman who made the £20k a month claim wasn't walking the streets. She was selling nude pictures/videos that she made from the safety of her own home. Didn't need to go anywhere near a man. You might still disagree with the work but it's not remotely comparable with street prostitution

"So thanks but no thanks, the choices of some women are not worth more than the rights of all women to live safe from male violence."

But banning it doesn't stop the trade, nothing has or will and it increases not decreases the violence.

The rest of your screed is a perfect illustration of the hysteria some feminists have around this issue and highly authoritarian in approach. Tarts and punters must behave themselves for the good of the state (or womankind in this case) is the gist of your argument.

I prefer individual liberty and will choose the rights of the individual over the 'protection' of the group in most cases. The latter is the first rung on a very ugly ladder.

That’s a great piece from it below

In terms of current UK policy on prostitution, Matthews' main bugbear is the widespread acceptance of harm-reduction measures, such as health professionals visiting women in street prostitution areas to give out refreshments and condoms. "I believe that this is a deeply conservative approach," he says, "which is more about keeping women in prostitution rather than helping them out." Indeed, one of the areas of prostitution policy now under scrutiny by feminist MPs such as Vera Baird and Barbara Follett, is how to move away from what Matthews thinks of as "sticking plaster" half-measures in dealing with the women on the streets in favour of a long-term plan to eradicate prostitution altogether.
"The Ipswich murders have exposed the reality of prostitution - that it is abuse and a life of hell for these women," says Matthews. "It is high time to expose and challenge the liberal consensus"·

Sorry, Julie Bindel hasn’t died from Covid but Roger Matthews has who she interviews for the piece.

The problem with prohibition, of alcohol, drugs and commercial sex is that it doesn't make the demand go away..

(commercial sex - is that what they call it now..)

You can see above that the writer thinks that someone's body is just like other commodities - to be bought and sold.

Yeuch!

Interesting piece here:

t.co/gImBe71m00?amp=1

Sadly the author has died from Covid-19

Brilliant points @gwynfluff.

Evidence or it's fake news. If women in sex work made that kind of money, they'd only work for a couple of months a year. Most people don't do it because they like it - if they could make 40k and then not work for 10 months they would.

How many women in Holbeck leave after one or two months with all their hard earned cash? Yeah, didn't think so.

YY. And even if one person does, at one time, that doesn't mean it's the norm or a reasonable aspiration for most.

Sigh. Believing women in general doesn't mean believing every single thing every single woman actually says, especially when the evidence tends to suggest what they're saying is bollocks (e.g. women not only selling sex in Holbeck for 2 months then skipping off into the sunset with their 40k). That's an unbelievably childish argument.

I believe women are actual individual human beings, not commodities and not lesser than men, not a monolith that all have the same point of view. That means that I believe they are capable of lying and making things up on occasion - like the rest of humanity. Or the journalist could have made it up - based on the quality of the rest of the article that is entirely possible.

Said it before: ready to discuss all of this once we have eliminated from the industry trafficked women, underage women, traumatised women, women doing it to fund an addiction and women in extreme poverty. The last 2, even more so as men in these situations don’t sell sex (so there’s definitely an underlying structure that makes this a pathway for women that men would never be expected to undertake - let’s call it ‘patriarchy’ for want of a better term).

Then I’d be delighted to discuss how it’s a free choice and enjoyed by so many women. But we all know, that in these conditions, there would be no industry. It’s also only in the developed West as well that this is about predominantly adolescent and adult women - in many areas of the world, the market has lots of children. Because, it’s not about the free will of the seller, it’s an exploitative system that privileges the buyer to purchase a body.

I don't believe anyone makes 20k a month selling nudes or sex. I think it's lies.

It was the woman in the story who made that claim. Why don't you believe women?

And also what ByGrabthar said. The wider societal impacts - particularly on women and girls - are bad enough that I would oppose it and fight against it even if all women who did it loved it.

Which they don't - fake news.

Maybe there are people who really want someone to repeatedly shoot them. Probably there are. Doesn't mean it should be legal.

Exactly, grabthar. It’s every woman who is affected and that’s why I care.

If I hadn’t been abused and made homeless I wouldn’t have been in the industry

it’s basically been rendered my only choice

The harm would probably be that I feel like damaged goods now

There were many points we had to choose between her abusive behaviour (threats, mind games, expensive fines etc.) or walk out and lose a lot of money. I personally had a lot of debt and this felt like a difficult choice to make, so I stayed

Every escort will tell you they love what they do, but they are slowly dying inside

Some quotes from the report you linked to, exponential. An odd choice to link to to convince women here that prostitution is freely chosen from a smorgasbord of other options, and that participants love it. I think we’ve drawn very different conclusions from it.

@exponential I take it you're not familiar with the research behind Nordic Model Now? Or you're pretending not to be? Just because you haven't researched it yourself, don't assume the statistics don't exist! Your ignorance is not the sum total of human knowledge.Thank goddess.

I think the 20k bit is obvious propaganda and yes, really really irresponsible journalism.

I don't believe anyone makes 20k a month selling nudes or sex. I think it's lies.

Evidence or it's fake news. If women in sex work made that kind of money, they'd only work for a couple of months a year. Most people don't do it because they like it - if they could make 40k and then not work for 10 months they would.

How many women in Holbeck leave after one or two months with all their hard earned cash? Yeah, didn't think so.