Nordic model demand in Daily Mail

"This is why there is vocal backing for decriminalisation from er, pimps and brothel owners."

Have you had a look at the list of signatures on the DecrimNow letter which is agains the Nordic Model and in favour of decriminalisation?

I'm not convinced decriminalisation is the answer. I have felt for a long time that more support groups to help women out of prostitution should be the biggest step. Which includes more funding for women's refuges.

Decriminalising prostitution so that there are no laws pertaining to it other than those that apply to other businesses a) does not reduce prostitution but instead creates a bigger market for it b) acts as approval of prostitution as a legitimate trade (which lets face it the sex work is work mantra was designed to do) which generates money from the sale of women's bodies, lowering the status of ALL women in society c) In practice benefits from pimps and brothels above all, as New Zealand demonstrates. This is why there is vocal backing for decriminalisation from er, pimps and brothel owners.

"The application form for opening a brothel in New Zealand is just two pages long: three pages shorter than the form needed to adopt a dog or cat from Battersea Dogs & Cats Home...

... One of the many survivors of the sex trade I met during my research is Sabrinna Valisce, who volunteered with the NZPC over a 25-year period. Valisce campaigned alongside her colleagues for blanket decriminalisation, but now regrets doing so. “I thought it would give more power and rights to the women,” she told me, “but I soon realised the opposite was true.”
According to Valisce, decriminalisation benefitted the punters and brothel owners rather than those selling sex within them."

www.independent.co.uk/voices/prostitution-decriminalisation-new-zealand-holland-abuse-harm-commercialisation-a7878586.html

"Suppose both women have a punter, one of whom becomes aggressive. Even if the other woman hears, what is she supposed to do? When prostitution is liberalised, the policing of it is generally deprioritised, meaning the police are likely to take even longer to respond to a call for help."

The whole point of two women working together is that they only let one man into the flat at a time. Obviously if they let two men in there would be no point. He is outnumbered if anything happens.

www.hivlawandpolicy.org/sites/default/files/FinalReport-Risks%2CRights%26Health-EN.pdf page 38

That isn't what this is saying re Sweden at least:

"Sex trade estimated to be the same as pre-law levels".

"The Swedish State Criminal Department warns that the sex trade may now be more violent"

"Despite over 2,000 arrest, only 2 client convictions in 13 years who received just low fines."

"Sweden’s Alliance of Counties says that resources for social work are scarce, as the money has been siphoned to policing"

So in Sweden it's business as usual for prostitution, except it may now be more violent. Clients can pay for sex rest assured that it's practically impossible to get convicted for it. Sex workers are still criminalised for working together, they may also be made homeless because of the part which makes it illegal to rent to a prostitute, and there's also less funding for support services because the money goes towards trying to enforce all this.

Sound good? Or could this be why so many are supporting decrim instead?

The Nordic Model helps to reduce prostitution (as seen in Norway) and therefore the number of women subjected to violent men.

Working together can help keep women safe. The Nordic Model makes this illegal, decriminalisation does not. Removing this "legal check" would make it safer, as well as stopping giving women criminal records.

To even more women.

How can you argue that removing all legal checks on prostitution will make women safer and reduce violence when it is coming into contact with pimps and punters that puts them at risk of violence in the first place? Making it more widespread increases the risk.

"Just being involved in prostitution puts women at greater risk of violence."

Regardless what exactly the risk is, why would you make it even riskier with criminalisation? In Nordic Model France, 10 sex workers were murdered in 6 months. And why would you push for a model like the Nordic Model which criminalises women for working together?

www.pion-norge.no/aktuelt/more-than-10-sex-workers-have-been-killed-in-6-months/

Since violence is illegal, you would call the police if a client is being aggressive or abusive, and at least under complete decriminalisation sex workers in a brothel would be able to call the police if needed without worrying if they will be arrested themselves for working together.

Just being involved in prostitution puts women at greater risk of violence.

nordicmodelnow.org/2017/09/07/the-problem-with-safety-in-numbers

I see a lot of unsourced speculation thrown around on some articles from this site.

"Suppose both women have a punter, one of whom becomes aggressive. Even if the other woman hears, what is she supposed to do? When prostitution is liberalised, the policing of it is generally deprioritised, meaning the police are likely to take even longer to respond to a call for help."

Since violence is illegal, you would call the police if a client is being aggressive or abusive, and at least under complete decriminalisation sex workers in a brothel would be able to call the police if needed without worrying if they will be arrested themselves for working together.

The article doesn't give any source for its claim that "police will take longer to respond to call a for help from a sex worker who has an abusive/aggressive client under 'liberalised' laws'. Just seems complete speculation. Violence is violence and I find it very hard to believe the police would not grant such calls the priority they merit if sexwork was legalised or decriminalised.

"Some people argue that the Nordic Model does not fully decriminalise prostituted women in Sweden, because the police pursue them for sharing flats under laws prohibiting procuring. This article, based on information from legal scholar, Gunilla S. Ekberg,[1] explains why this line of argument is erroneous."

https://nordicmodelnow.org/myths-about-prostitution/myth-police-prosecute-prostituted-women-for-sharing-flats-in-sweden/

The problem with “safety in numbers”

"This means that in reality renting and maintaining a business premises is unlikely to be within the reach of the majority of independent prostituted women. So in practice, it would generally only be possible for a group of them to operate from a business premises if someone put up the money for the purchase or lease.
Typically this would be done by someone for profit, meaning they would be profiting from the prostitution of the women operating from the premises – which is abhorrent when we consider the damagee it causes. Moreover, it would contravene Article 6 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAWW), a UN treaty that the UK has ratified and is bound by."

https://nordicmodelnow.org/2017/09/07/the-problem-with-safety-in-numbers/

Trafficking is also illegal under decriminalisation. Pimping is currently illegal in all parts of Britain and as shown in Sweden enforcing the law against paying for sex part of the Nordic Model is basically impossible and hasn't been shown to reduce the sex trade at all. Any comment on that?

Under decrim, sex workers aren't criminalised for working together unlike the Nordic Model.

I have said previously that the Nordic Model is the least worst option because it doesn't give the green light to traffickers, pimps and punters to view prostitution - the sale of women's bodies - as just another trade. All women suffer as a result of the objectification and commodification of women that is involved in the sex trade.

Read these vile comments from punter.net and tell me that these men then look at other women who aren't prostitutes with respect, they're describing the object they bought:

‘I travelled to see Sinead. Who wouldn’t? Size 6, 18 years old!!!’

‘Her body isn’t as firm and tight and trim as it should be for a 22 yr old, no chance, more like 32.’

‘This lady has reached her sell-by date.’ [Written by ‘Granddad’.]

‘Over [size 12] and I would feel like I was wrestling with a sumo.’

‘Not fat ones…would feel cheated to pay for one.’

‘Describes herself as…size 14.. she must be a size 18.. All I wanted to do was get out as quick as possible.’

‘She was late, and two dress sizes too big.’

‘19 yrs old blonde…needs to lose a little flab around the midriff.’

‘Nice girl but too chubby I’m afraid.’

‘Looked older and fatter (size 14 in my opinion compared to the size 8 advertised). This was plain deception and therefore not only will I never see Somaya again.’

‘The liars get away with it because the industry is unregulated. It is not like going into a shop where the consumer has rights.’

https://nordicmodelnow.org/myths-about-prostitution/myth-punters-care-about-the-women-they-buy/

The Nordic Model does not decriminalise sex workers, one of the reasons it is under a lot of opposition. Decriminalisation does.

"My second serious boyfriend... as well as being physically abusive, he was also sexually abusive. He signed me up to an escorting website and forced me to have sex with men for money, money that he would keep. If I said no, I got beaten. Eventually, he signed me up to a brothel. Where I would have sex with over 20 men in a night and he would pocket every single penny I made!"

A tonne of crimes here, which there are existing laws for- domestic abuse, sexual harassment, sex trafficking, assault, theft.

"they attempted to have unprotected sex with me"

Pretty sure this would be attempted rape under British law.

Yes that's a very horrific story, but there are already laws in place for these crimes and I don't see how introducing the Nordic Model would help prevent any of these. If a violent man isn't deterred from laws against rape and assault I find it difficult to understand how it would deter him from a law against paying for sex (which in Sweden at least, is almost impossible to get a conviction for).

www.hivlawandpolicy.org/sites/default/files/FinalReport-Risks%2CRights%26Health-EN.pdf

A UN commission report 13 years after the Nordic Model was introduced in Sweden reveals that the sex-trade remains "at pre-law levels", the Swedish State Criminal Dept. warns "the sex trade may be more violent" and only 2 client convictions were made.

And 20 men a night? How is that even possible? I'm not doubting the story but it does sound a lot and I can't imagine a sex worker getting 20 bookings for a day even if she tried to.

The likes of Amnesty supporting the decriminalisation of punters and pimps is neither surprising, nor of merit, since they have long squandered their moral authority. Prostitution is harmful to women and girls. Any move that removes sanctions from pimps and punters is a step towards more poor, vulnerable women being lured into a trade where they are at risk of violence and ill health.

"My second serious boyfriend... as well as being physically abusive, he was also sexually abusive. He signed me up to an escorting website and forced me to have sex with men for money, money that he would keep. If I said no, I got beaten. Eventually, he signed me up to a brothel. Where I would have sex with over 20 men in a night and he would pocket every single penny I made!"

nordicmodelnow.org/2021/05/16/we-do-not-want-to-be-sex-workers-its-not-fun-and-its-so-damaging/

"I live with the trauma of being in the sex trade from 16-25 years old but also with the fact that I involved other women"

nordicmodelnow.org/2021/05/08/i-live-with-the-trauma-of-being-in-the-sex-trade-from-16-25-years-old-but-also-with-the-fact-that-i-involved-other-women/

"What’s wrong with the open letter on Decriminalisation?"

"The open letter cited support for full decriminalisation from Amnesty Internationall and the World Health Organisation (WHO)) without mentioning that these organisations were advised by a pimp who has since been sentenced to 15 years in prisonn for sex trafficking, that their research is generally of very poor qualityy, and that their position has been robustly critiquedd_."

nordicmodelnow.org/2021/04/15/response-to-the-decrimnow-open-letter-opposing-the-nordic-model/

you seem really invested in the decriminalisation of prostitution. Are you involved in the sex trade? Or do you use prostitutes?

decrimnow.org.uk/open-letter-on-the-nordic-model/

The Decrim Now letter which opposes the Nordic Model has about 250 and counting signatures from individuals and organisations(including large well-established orgs relating to health and human rights). Do you think everyone who signed that letter "uses prostitutes"? Some of the signatures are from groups made up of prostitutes themselves.

Jenny you seem really invested in the decriminalisation of prostitution. Are you involved in the sex trade? Or do you use prostitutes?

Page 9 of this thread started with Helleofabore talking about referrals to the National Referral Mechanism. Then PurgatoryOfPotholes quoting from a 15 year old newspaper article by Catherine Bennett in the Guardian.

Emily Kenway in her 2021 book The Truth About Modern Slavery has something to say about both of these things. Catherine Bennett wrote about the police raid on the 'Cuddles' brothel (quoted by PurgatoryOfPotholes):-

"In the recent raid on Cuddles, the Birmingham massage parlour where 19 women were immured, police had to use battering rams to knock down locked internal doors, windows had been boarded up, and an electric fence stopped anyone trying to escape from the back of the building. What kind of person lives in a house like this?"

This is Emily Kenway's take on the same event:-

"The 2005 raid on Cuddles 'massage parlour' in the West Midlands is regarded by sex worker activists and academics as pivotal, marking the start of a distortion in media coverage regarding sex work and a shift from tolerant to interventionist policing, all legitimised under the banner of anti-trafficking. Women found inside the brothel were marched out in front of the media, their faces exposed in the press in what has been likened to an American 'perp-walk', despite the fact that they were supposedly victims."

6 of the 19 women taken away by the police 'were detained under immigration powers and scheduled for deportation'. Catherine Bennett doesn't mention anything about deportations though.

There were other raids, for example in Redbridge in London. The media stated 'police rescue 15 women from pop-up brothels during Redbridge raids'. Emily made Freedom of Information requests and found that none of these 15 women had been referred to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM). This means the women did not consider themselves victims of trafficking. What's more, no Duty to Notify submissions were made. This means that the police did not consider them to be possible victims of trafficking.

So the women in Birmingham and Redbridge were not being rescued by the police. The police and the state have lied. I am confident that Catherine Bennett has said things in her article which are not true. I don't believe that 'an electric fence stopped anyone trying to escape from the back of the building'. These women were not prisoners in brothels and did not require rescue. Instead of being rescued many will have been detained for deportation or prosecution for brothel keeping. Not rescued from imprisonment but imprisoned.

I have read the first 3 chapters of 'The Truth About Modern Slavery' by Emily Kenway. Chapter 3 is about prostitution and trafficking, and part of it is her assessment of the Nordic Model. This is the final paragraph of her assessment.

"In sum, this legislative model provides no concrete evidence of combating trafficking but does provide conclusive evidence of creating vulnerabilities which may lead, at best, to more poverty, more abuse, riskier working conditions and, at worst, to severe exploitation itself."

The final paragraph of chapter 3 says this

"The 'radical feminists' and religious interests that promote models which harm women want us to think we have to take a side; against sex work entirely and therefore exploitation, or for it entirely and therefore comfortable with exploitation. This in totally untrue. In fact, we can be against exploitation and support those in sex work, recognising sex work as work and recognising trafficking for sexual exploitation as abhorrent and wrong."

Emily Kenway is a writer and activist. As a former advisor to the UK's first Anti-Slavery Commissioner she was at the heart of modern slavery action. She has written for a variety of publications including the Guardian and TLS.

This book will have a place on my bookshelf alongside 'Revolting Prostitutes: The Fight for Sex Workers' Rights' by Molly Smith and Juno Mac and 'The Sex Myth: Why Everything We’re Told is Wrong' by Dr Brooke Magnanti as essential reference works on this subject. All of them women!

Women are at risk of violence when they are not allowed to work together. There are a lot of prostitutes in Soho, or at least there were before the pandemonium, and in the 'walk ups' there are always two women in a flat. Nobody has been murdered there since 1947. Radical Feminists stand in the way of sensible reform of the law to allow small groups of women to work together. You would think that anyone who believes in the Nordic Model would want to stop the arrest of women but they don't.

I know Nordic Model Now! say we can never make it safe but their arguments aren't convincing. Lots of prostitutes have been murdered recently in Nordic Model France. None in Sweden but then there weren't any before either. Not for more than a decade before the sex-buyer law. It doesn't seem to make any difference.

Most prostitutes are not drug addicts and do not go on to develop drug addiction. As for ill health, I can only refer you back to my quote of Dr Petra Boynton.

You have to ask yourself the question why some people are so ready to believe the false statistics of people like Jim Wells and Ruhama. It enrages me when someone sees a stat they like and they retweet it without checking it. They are disgusted by the idea of prostitution and that leads them to just believe the most ridiculous things. It backs up their emotions. Radical Feminists are not religious bigots but they share the false statistics of religious bigots. Read what I said earlier about Kat Banyard and Julie Bindel quoting 'Mr Wells' in recent books.

Seriously, could you come up with something a bit more inventive than the "aligned with the far/religious right" slur. Anyone taking the time to read what the many intelligent women on this board have to say will know that their concerns for women in prostitution - that it is a profession most likely to attract poor women, who are at greater risk of violence, drug addiction and ill health as a result of their work - will know that the women who think it's wrong and that punters should be criminalised and not prostitutes are not religious bigots the like of which you find in the Bible Belt. Let's be a little more honest shall we? Prostitution is damaging to all women because it lowers the status of all women. It is a feminist position to take to see it in that way. It is not left wing to view women's bodies as commodities.

@Helleofabore

If it wasn't an issue, why is there a multi-national effort to stop it.

The State Department in the USA under the instruction of George W Bush under the influence of Franklin Graham threatened countries who did not comply with anti-trafficking measures. They did that by withholding aid, often to the poorest countries like Cambodia.

Britain decided to go along with what these puritans were telling them. When you think that all that money could have been used for drug rehab. That's the best way to help women.

@Helleofabore

I find people to use that term 'ally' when really it is simply a moment of agreement from different points of view to be used by those who seek to shut down discussion.

So you don't think that Amnesty International is an ally of pimps and traffickers? Perhaps you could tell Julie Bindel and the other Radical Feminists that.

When Communists agree with Fascists they show themselves not to be the progressives that they like to present themselves as. When Radical Feminists agree with religious bigots they show themselves not to be the progressives that they like to present themselves as.

What is this shared belief? Do you think that Jim Wells really believes that 127 prostitutes were murdered in the Netherlands since legalization? Do you think that Ruhama really believe that 38% of Irish prostitutes have attempted suicide? They attend the same conferences and agree to tell each other's lies.

The Christians want to stop people fornicating but they don't say that. The Radical Feminists believe that "all women's consent to be sexually used by men cannot be true consent under the existing conditions of gender inequality" (hence the celibacy) but they keep that quiet. They all pretend they care about the welfare of prostitutes.

If a man has been convicted of pimping and hasn't coerced anyone but has merely allowed sex workers to use his platform for advertizing I am happy to listen to him. I am happy to listen to anarchists if they have interesting information and not lies. I wouldn't be in the same room as Jim Wells.