@Dumbo12 ,
‘I'm still trying to reconcile the idea that women have to take ppersonal responsibility, while the men wii pay for sex, presumably, don't.’
It is about taking personal responsibility for making a choice as an adult human being. You may not like the choice that they make to prostitute themselves, but is it right to ban the choice?
You keep going on about how the ‘Belle du jour’ type is vanishingly rare. Honestly, I have no idea of the truth or how many of them there are; I suspect, however, nor do you. What you are saying is that choice should be made illegal (I know you want to criminalise the man, not the woman, but the idea behind it is to ban it altogether).
I do think that, if you truly believe in equality, that provided the woman has made a free choice, criminalising one half of the transaction is quite infantilising to the woman.
I do get that there are some things that we don’t allow for the good of society, such as paid surrogacy or organ sales. And you could claim prostitution is on the same spectrum. But, again, most wouldn’t make the claim that sleeping with someone for money was akin to selling an organ. But I do see this argument.
And then, how far do you go? Would you make penetration illegal or all sexual acts, and would that only include face-to-face or virtual too. Should Only Fans be made illegal?
But, even I did buy the above, you then have the practical argument. You can’t ban prostitution. Even in countries where the penalty is death, it still happens. And the evidence of the famed Nordic model is that it causes more harm, and again penalises the women more than the men.
I have engaged properly on this thread and steered clear of trite or ad hominem attacks. This is a discussion board and people are entitled to dissenting views, I don’t get upset or shamed by 3 (or even 7) word trivial meaningless slogans, so you will be wasting your time replying in that vane (unless trying to impress other fellow travellers).