Louis Theroux: Sex work is valid work

That we should accept sex work exists
@DisappearingGirl but who here has denied that "sex work exists"? Women on here may prefer to call it by a different term but no one is claiming it doesn't exist. If they were, there wouldn't be a point to their posts.

Criminalising the victims forces them underground. The answer is to criminalise the customer.

The most unusual think about this post on reddit is that it's from the perspective of the man reporting the woman's onlyfans account. I normally see accounts like this from the viewpoint of exited women, reporting ex-clients who have attempted to blackmail them or get them sacked.

From the Spectator article:
Having dropped out of her degree course, she claims to have made around £30,000 every month

Which sounds great. But then what happens as the market saturates with her images? She'll get older too. The demand for her content will dry up and she'll have to find other ways of earning a living. Trouble is that without any qualifications or workplace experience, she will struggle to get a proper job, particularly one which can fund the sort of lifestyle she has become accustomed to. Care work and food factories don't pay well. In order to keep revenues up she may have to do ever more extreme stuff, sinking steadily into an awful downward spiral.

The people who have actually done some research disagree with you, barley.

And sex workers themselves disagree with you:

Norway – Criminalised clients in 2009. Amnesty International’s 2016 research[xii] found that sex workers are still criminalised, including for working together for safety. Forced evictions, investigations, surveillance, prosecutions and increased stigma are prevalent with migrant workers particularly targeted: “police are using sex workers’ reports of violence and crimes against them as evidence to facilitate their eviction and/or deportation”; “sex workers were routinely evicted from their homes under so-called ‘pimping laws”.

France – Criminalised clients in 2016. Medecins du Monde’s 2018 report[xiii] found that since the law was introduced: 63% of sex workers have experienced deterioration of their living conditions, more isolation and greater stress; 42% are more exposed to violence (sexual violence, theft, and armed robbery); 38% have found it increasingly hard to demand use of condoms.

Ireland – Criminalised clients (Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Bill) in 2017. Attacks on sex workers have increased dramatically. Reported incidences of violent crime against sex workers, from threats to assaults with weapons, have risen by almost 50% — from 900 in 2016 to more than 1,300 since.[xiv] Sex workers are now less likely to report dangerous clients to Gardaí.[xv]

prostitutescollective.net/briefing-no-nordic-model/

But that is impossible to do without harming sex workers themselves who under any increased criminalisation will either be impoverished or forced into more dangerous forms of sex work - as well as be at risk of prosecution if they organise together to try and make themselves safe.

So you're saying that what Julie Bindel says here is wrong?

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.

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

And this from another article I linked to earlier:

There is “absolutely” a correlation between legalised prostitution and trafficking, says Andrea Matolcsi, the programme officer for sexual violence and trafficking at Equality Now. “For a trafficker it’s much easier to go to a country where it’s legal to have brothels and it’s legal to manage people in prostitution. It’s just a more attractive environment.”

She points out that Denmark, which decriminalised prostitution in 1999 – the same year Sweden made the purchase of sex illegal - has four times the number of trafficking victims than its neighbour despite having around half the population.

s.telegraph.co.uk/graphics/projects/welcome-to-paradise/

The people who have actually done some research disagree with you, barley.

Add him to the (incredibly long) list of disappointing men.

Here's an antidote: Julie Bindel on Triggernometry debunking this kind of bullshit

I agree with him.

Goghom
“and who have never even met a person in this industry“

‘Industry’ seems like a euphemism.

Do you remember Dirty Pretty Things, about immigrants?

"we are the people you do not see. We are the ones who drive your cabs. We clean your rooms. And suck your cocks."

I went off him awhile ago, his shtick got very old. Exploitative muppet.

So instead women are trafficked from abroad instead (more than 90% are from abroad). There was a line on tv recently - Call of Duty, a scene that showed a prostituted woman, who was referred to as "live stock". When we have reached this place, where women can be referred to on an entertainment programme in the UK, as "livestock", we are serious trouble. No-one can justify this. There is no dignity for anyone in this position. It is unarguable in my eyes.

Utterly distressed by this ... come ON Louis!? Wtf??

Attack the cause, not the symptom.

The cause is the men who pay for sex, and the pimps who profit from it. I absolutely agree we should be targeting the cause.

Not at all, but increased criminalisation will not work. What will work is free education, adequate benefits or even a basic income, higher wages, high quality social housing for everyone who wants one.

I live in a country which, while not a socialist paradise, has a pretty decent welfare system, and prostitution is decriminalised. As a result of the fact that most women don't need to work as prostitutes to survive hardly any do (because regardless of the empowerment narrative its not something most women choose). So instead women are trafficked from abroad instead (more than 90% are from abroad). As well as legal brothels in the red light district, there are still illegal brothels elsewhere. Both types contain co-erced and trafficked women. Decriminalisation doesn't help women. But it does help men persuade themselves they are doing nothing wrong.

When as a society we condemn the poorest women to desperate poverty, homelessness, soul destroying low paid work and make it near impossible for people to get an education or training to improve their circumstances then sex work will flourish. Attack the cause, not the symptom. Of course that would mean the affluent middle classes paying significantly more tax.

@FrancescaContini

I have young adult daughters and no I wouldn't promote sex work as a good career but nor did I suggest retail, warehouse or hospitality were good options.

There is a difference between protecting people legally and suggesting it's a desirable career. Would I be disappointed - yes but then I would be disappointed if they dropped out and worked shelf stacking too, I'm being honest

He's an investigate journalist who has spent a fair amount of time researching these issues. He does know what he's talking about.

I know from talking to women to women involved in sex work through a project connecting to my work that it's incredibly complex and diverse. There's a lot of assumptions made on this forum, made by people who are not in this position and who have never even met a person in this industry which are simply not the case.

I've met women who enjoy their chosen work - they get paid a far higher amount for less hours and genuinely don't see the problem, one said to me that is she who is exploiting men. I've also met women who were being pimped, who had been trafficked and who were on drugs at the time. It's true that some of the issues are caused by the underground nature of sex work, not all but it really doesn't help.

I do not want anyone to be forced into selling their body but if you choose to you should be respected and the law should protect you which it doesn't currently.

Sex is not shelf-stacking or drink-mixing.

For sex, the consent bar should be enthusiastic and the idea that it need not be is misogyny. In practice.

Aww, for Fucks sake why did you have to go and say that *Louis Theroux•

My pool of decent men is getting smaller and smaller….

“Alonelonelylonersbadidea

If my kids were desperate for food and I'd get 50 quid for fucking or blowing a dude in a car to buy said food- I would do it. In a heartbeat.
I've fucked dudes for less.
And I've had a very stable loving childhood, blah blah blah but I do know that I would do what it takes. I'm educated. I'm a lawyer. I'm fucking lucky.
Any woman who claims not or who would critique a desperate woman's choices is either a liar or just an asshole/ä. IMHO.“

Is it not the case that in this scenario “having kids desperate for food” might mean the blow job in the car wouldn’t really, in the truest sense of the word, be a “choice”?

That’s what is troubling about punters who think they’ve simply hired an employee.