poundingthestreets I think what can be learned from this thread is that there is a distinction between women who being pimped or trafficked or coerced or desperate, where there is much higher risk, and women who are able to choose clients and to a much greater extent mitigate risks. Do you agree?
And that more should be done to raise awareness and push for political and social change to (a) totally eliminate pimped/trafficked/coerced/forced to do it for money and (b) legalise sex work for those who are freely choosing to do it so as to give greater protection. Do you agree?
In terms of risk to women, we are at risk from the legal ways of having sex, whether casual sex which goes wrong or dv within marriages.
Before this thread I saw prostitution in one dimensional terms and, basically, bad. After having read the thread, I realise (and respect the fact that) some women choose to do it and I don't find that wrong morally or in any other respect. It is a choice. If my dh saw a sex worker I would say I had a dh problem, not a sex worker problem.
Where I used to live there was a long road running between two areas of north london with a park on one side. You would often see groups of women who looked perfectly normal from a distance but close up their skin was as damaged as leather, they were skin and bones on some areas of their body not others. You would see them all hours from early morning to late. And nearby you'd see a couple of men who would talk to them from time to time, and the talk was fake "everything is ok" joking around. They were the pimps I am sure. And the women would disappear into the bushes with punters every now and then. It was beyond grim. It was frightening, disgusting that these women were being treated like slaves in open view. It is this which should be stamped out. That is partly to do with police work, presumably, and partly to do with our country's utterly inadequate social nets. Do you agree? What can be done?
I think that women should have choice, and that people should not be modern slaves.