Louis Theroux: Sex work is valid work

I think the issue there is that migrant women are in such a precarious situation. They would face those issues regardless of decriminalisation wouldn't they? That's the system that needs to change, so people who are being trafficked or coerced (in any industry) can actually get help without risking deportation.

You said:

There are no illegal brothels in New Zealand

It doesn’t matter what you say the legislation says. Those news articles are all examples of brothels that failed to comply with legislation, and hence, were illegal. Too many women, immigrant women etc. They were illegal brothels. To claim there are none is unequivocally false. It’s also unequivocally ridiculous to claim there aren’t any other brothels in New Zealand right at this very minute that aren’t acting illegally.

Your assertion is wrong.

@NotBadConsidering

Brothel-keeping is not illegal. There are lots of things that people can't do, and that's a good thing. But two or three women can work together for safety without being arrested.

"Prostitution in New Zealand, brothel-keeping, living off the proceeds of someone else's prostitution, and street solicitation are legal in New Zealand and have been since the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 came into effect."

"I'm also not 100% clear on the difference between legalisation and decriminalisation, so if anyone could explain that to me I would appreciate it"

If you get a chance to look at Oxford Professor Amia Srinivasan's book The Right to Sex she explains it very well. She believes in decriminalisation.

With legalisation there will be women who don't ask for or can't get permission to do sex work. They will do it anyway and they can be arrested. If they can't work together with other women they will work alone and can be murdered.

She says something else about legalisation, something about men becoming rich. I haven't got the book with me or I would quote from her. Legalisation favours men who can make a profit from opening brothels whereas decriminalisation favours women who choose to work with one or two other women for safety.

There are no illegal brothels in New Zealand

i.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/8367052/Illegal-brothel-owner-fined

i.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/6118887/Black-market-brothels-thriving-in-Hamilton

www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/chinese-prostitutes-worry-sex-industry/WUYUNXOV5WMPFR67MSR6UTVALE/?c_id=1&objectid=10718424

i.stuff.co.nz/business/102248502/illegal-migrant-prostitutes-too-terrified-to-report-exploitation

www.odt.co.nz/business/mayor-says-brothel-rule-not-too-strict

I just honestly don't know what the best approach is to keep women as safe as they can be in such an inherently risky situation.

The best approach has got to be getting women educated and skilled to do jobs that don't involve them being abused daily.

Normalisation of pornography and prostitution is not helping women.

@OldCrone

There has been no increase in the sex trade. I know that Melissa Farley said there was and Bindel is going with that, but it is untrue. There are no illegal brothels in New Zealand. If two or more women choose to work together for safety they are doing nothing illegal (unlike in Britain and Sweden) and they will not be arrested.

Do you have any evidence that more women are murdered now in New Zealand that before decriminalisation? The evidence is that no women who work in SOOBs (Small Owner Operated Brothels) have been murdered.

Bindel found one woman in New Zealand who doesn't believe in decriminalisation. I don't know why she didn't pretend that she had found lots, that's what she did with the one learning disabled woman that she found in Nevada when she reported on the brothels there. Bindel went on Womans Hour and said that she had found learning disabled women who had been double pimped. That's not what she wrote in her original report though, she wrote that she had found one, who she called Sindy (who had not been double pimped). I don't trust anything that Julie Bindel says, she is dishonest.

It works in New Zealand. There has been no increase in the amount of prostitution there or trafficking.

I posted a link to this article about prostitution in New Zealand earlier in the thread, which says that trafficking is still rife.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/30/new-zealand-sex-work-prostitution-migrants-julie-bindel

The promises from the government – that decriminalisation would result in less violence, regular inspections of brothels and no increase of the sex trade – have not materialised. The opposite has happened. Trafficking of women into New Zealand into legal and illegal brothels is a serious problem, and for every licensed brothel there are, on average, four times the number that operate illegally. Violent attacks on women in the brothels are as common as ever. “The men feel even more entitled when the law tells them it is OK to buy us,” says Sabrinna Valisce, who was prostituted in New Zealand brothels both before and after decriminalisation. Under legalisation, women are still murdered by pimps and punters.

I also posted a link to this article by Sabrinna Valisce:

www.spaceintl.org/media/full-decriminalization-in-new-zealand/

After seeing marked declines in the very areas she’d campaigned to improve, Sabrinna hoped to fix these flaws while maintaining the decriminalized system, until she finally had to admit that Full Decriminalization was a failed model. She saw the successful outcomes from countries that had taken on the Abolitionist (Nordic) Model, and now campaigns to expose the truth about Full Decriminalisation, with the hope of seeing governments worldwide adopt The Abolitionist Model as their own.

So he wouldn't mind if his sons did it then?

That doesn't apply when it's a job does it?

In theory it still does, but in practice you would be putting yourself in a very difficult situation I imagine . But that's one reason I would never call it a 'job' in that sense because you're absolutely right that it creates a narrative of obligation. In reality there is never any obligation to have sex.

I guess to use the analogy of 'normal' work again, you wouldn't be forced to do something, but you would lose your job or not get paid for work if you weren't comfortable doing the central element of it. But I don't agree with 'sex work is work', I just honestly don't know what the best approach is to keep women as safe as they can be in such an inherently risky situation. The more I read about it the more sad and hopeless I feel tbh.

but as a general argument, money = no consent seems quite weak to me?

The thing for me is that sex should always be consensual. A woman should be able to say "no, stop, I don't feel like it" at any point and be respected.

That doesn't apply when it's a job does it?

Thanks MargaritaPie, that's interesting.

"I'm also not 100% clear on the difference between legalisation and decriminalisation, so if anyone could explain that to me I would appreciate it"

My understanding (jennywhitehorses might be able to offer a better explanation) is that legalisation (eg Germany, Netherlands) means there are set rules and regulations to be followed, whereas decriminalisation (eg NZ and parts of Australia) means as long as laws are followed then sex workers are left to it to make their own rules.

Decriminalisation (not legalisation) is often the model advocated for by many human rights, health, anti-trafficking and sex worker orgs. There is a list of supporters of decrim at the end of this letter:

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

@PurgatoryOfPotholes

This is telling lies. Most of the 127 women murdered were murdered BEFORE legalisation, not AFTER.

@Hestyo

I'd need to revisit Kat Banyard's Pimp State to write a proper post on this but I believe regulating doesn't work. You end up with very exploitative super brothels like in Germany. Trafficking increases to supply demand. Think of a warehouse but with prostituted women instead of people rushing to get items on and off trolleys quickly enough.

It works in New Zealand. There has been no increase in the amount of prostitution there or trafficking. Kat Banyard does not tell the truth. She says that 127 prostitutes were murdered in the Netherlands since legalisation there. That is not true. This false statistic comes from 'Mr Wells' who she quotes in her book. Mr Wells is the Evangelical Christian bigot Jim Wells.

Remember the Ipswich sex workers who were murdered?

Actually, the town decided it could never be safe and worked to eradicate prostitution. They were pretty successful too until about a year or so ago

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-suffolk-15258959

I've read through this thread and I'm still not 100% sure about my views but just wanted to add my thoughts, tentatively. I definitely don't feel sex work (prostitution) should be treated like other forms of work, so in that sense I disagree with LT.

And I get why people say you're not consenting to sex freely if you're being paid for it, but surely there's a difference between a financial incentive and being forced into doing something? Not in terms of sex but in any context really? Not that it should be treated like any other activity (stacking shelves etc) but as a general argument, money = no consent seems quite weak to me?

Where it is obviously not a real choice is in cases of poverty where people are doing it to survive and see it as their only viable option. Being driven by desperation, or addiction, is different from just making the decision to sell sex in the absence of that kind of pressure. But in that situation, I don't see how further stigmatising prostitution and driving it underground would help those individuals - and surely they deserve to be helped rather than forced into making riskier choices? That includes being helped to leave sex work (if they wish to), given counselling and other kinds of support. I think this is where we need to focus efforts, reducing the need for women to turn to sex work, taking action against trafficking and pimping. But people who do sex work generally say the best thing for their safety and welfare is decriminalisation. The Nordic model makes them less safe. How can that be acceptable? The argument is then that it increases trafficking. But then we need to put all our energies into ending trafficking.

I'm not trying to gloss over the reality of the sex industry, I think it's probably 90% awful for the people involved, particularly because I don't see it as a choice many women would make from a place of mental health, safety and financial security. But that being said, I don't feel it's my place to make that assumption on someone else's behalf and therefore prohibit them from doing so or make it less safe for them. I'd just much rather see a genuine focus on lessening the reasons people (women) might come to see it as the best of their crappy options and on putting more resources into fighting against trafficking and coercive situations.

I'm also not 100% clear on the difference between legalisation and decriminalisation, so if anyone could explain that to me I would appreciate it.

www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-10/victoria-sex-work-act-repealed-decriminalisation/100818818

In related news, Victoria has just become the third jurisdiction [in Australia] to decriminalise sex work.

@AKASammyScrounge
Thank you for mentioning that, I looked it up and wouldn’t have known about it otherwise.

What an difference in intelligence and sheer cutting wit between Martin Amis’s and Louis Theroux’s portrayals of pornography. LT’s seems mushy and complaisant by comparison.

Just to warn people, it is unsettling to read.

Martin Amis's articles on the realities of prostitution, 'A Rough Trade', can be read on the net. Grim stuff but an antidote to Theroux's limp liberalism. Google will get you there.
WARNING Articles are full of graphic material.

Yea, stopped watching him ages ago.

Re the murder of Petite-Jasmine in Sweden (which is worth noting has a much smaller population than the other mentioned countries), it's interesting to note the Swedish Social Services took her children off her and gave custody to her violent ex.

Even though she wasn't committing a crime, Swedish Social Work sees sex workers as victims of self-harm which can have abovementioned consequence for them (lose custody of children).

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eva_Marree_Kullander_Smith

www.thelocal.se/20130717/49120/

"Social services removed her two children and placed them with her ex-boyfriend, arguing that "she lacked insight and didn't realize sex work was a form of self-harm".[1] She was not allowed to see her children.[2]"

That's one of the "small print" parts of the Nordic Model which tends to be kept quiet. Sex workers in Nordic-Model countries still aren't allowed to legally work together either.

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

www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-trafficking-and-slavery/long-read-how-nordic-model-france-changed-everything-sex-workers/

newsinfo.inquirer.net/1547253/france-jails-two-for-22-years-for-murdering-trans-sex-worker

Yes I do realise that as I have worked with sex workers as mentioned above

The stories are often tragic and awful many leave hating men and worse hating themselves

Many could have been far better protected but it’s not something as a society we really want to deal with we don’t want to accept sex is sold so rather than accept that this happens it’s not really dealt with it’s what sad desperate women do and desperate horrible creepy sad men pay for (many are the lovely guy you could have gone out with, the quiet guy at work, your best friends lovely brother) because we prefer to accept that narrative. It’s horrible it’s a dark side of society but it’s there and no matter what has been put in place it’s an industry that thrives

We could learn from how other countries have got it wrong, we could set up safer brothels, we could make sure all women have regular sex screening and harsher sentences for those that abuse women in the industry

And we could be teaching our sons in particular that sex isn’t a right to have but a desire

We could do all those thing but it will still be there (and no I do not use the term it’s the oldest profession …)