Janice Turner on Prostitution

[Igneococcus]

Specifically on banning soldiers from buying sex while overseas. Comments are maybe even more depressing than JT's article:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/e81e1390-09ee-11ed-a986-fc91b4ad48f0?shareToken=fcfa41418014c530dd6917def531741d

It’s a superb article, but the majority of the comments are fucking depressing. it’s like a bingo card.

its the oldest profession
not all prostitutes are exploited
poor little lonely soldiers so far from home.

I don’t see any comments?

I would be very interested in hearing how they plan to enforce that.

"the Nordic model, which decriminalises sex work but makes buying it a crime"

Interesting how person who articles article favouring the Nordic Model fails yet again to mention how it doesn't decriminalise selling of sex (it's still illegal for sexworkers to work together in Nordic Model countries), or how sexworkers can be evicted for selling sex under the Nordic Model or have Social Work take their children off them (because selling sex is seen as "self harm" under Nordic Model) or the evidence it just increases violence against them.

"I don’t see any comments?"

Maybe they were disabled by the author. It often happens in cases where a political-based article is written and the vast majority are not in agreement with the author.

"articles article"

*writes article

I think you may need to be a subscriber to read the comments.

I really struggle with anyone defending a soldier's rights to sex.

"I really struggle with anyone defending a soldier's rights to sex."

So any idea how this could actually be enforced? You can line your soldiers up and tell them "don't visit sexworkers when you go abroad" and they can reply "Yes Drill Sergeant!" (or whatever it is they say) but tbh that's all you can do.

It's just one of those things you can't enforce IMO. "Banning" something doesn't mean it just magically stops happening.

well there will be punishments attached to it if caught once it is banned and that will put off many of the soldiers that would have been casual users. Good. Like anything, the way to get rid of something is to take away the market.

My brother is an ex-soldier and i just asked him about it. He said the only times he saw soldiers openly doing it was in Afghanistan on 2 tours and that most of them wouldn't have done so if they knew they'd have highly valued comfort privileges taken away if caught. So banning is probably a reasonable strategy to stop or at least cut down on military abuse of local women.

I think you can only see the comments if you have an account.

I'm only really here to see how our local punters advocate justifies sexual exploitation of vulnerable and desperate adults and children.

I’ve been reading “Paid For” by Rachel Moran- an account of the time she spent working as a prostitute. It’s a pretty depressing read, and there are no big surprises in it, but to me there were two really important themes in it:

• the idea of “high class” prostitution, or of some kind of scale of sex work with some being less degrading than others, is a myth. Whether it’s stripping, or porn, or cam work, or escorting, or street prostitution, it’s degrading and humiliating and robs the woman of her humanity.
• women who aren’t opposed to prostitution in all its forms do not genuinely believe that it’s a valid free choice like the choice to do any other kind of work: they just think that there is a fundamental difference between them and prostituted women that means they would never be in that position. Because to understand as a woman that if it exists it could happen to any woman, is to be opposed to it.

"well there will be punishments attached to it if caught"

How do you catch them?

"I’ve been reading “Paid For” by Rachel Moran"

Have you reached the part where she mentions she ran an escort agency, or to put it another way, became a pimp? Douglas Fox sells sexual services (or did at one point), but because his civil partner owns an escort agency a lot of posters here call DF a pimp and believe that to be grounds to discredit anything he has to say on sexwork. So why should we listen to Rachel Moran?

I have. I’ve also read enough of your posts to know you have no genuino concern for women’s rights, so I’m not going to waste my time rising to you.

MargaritaPie. Do you use prostituted women? Do you think sex is a valid purchase? If the woman is addicted, or coerced, or 16?

Men do not have a right to sex. They just don't. A women can offer it for free if she wants it. If he has to pay her she doesn't want it.
I know it's VERY simplistic of a view but it's the basis of my stand point.
People do dangerous things for the money they need. If there's a safer alternative I would think that it would be taken. And that's just those doing it be choice.
Any man who uses prostitutes can never be sure of her consent, not know her background, her autonomy.
Men disgust me.

My main priority is the health+safety of sexworkers and trafficked victims, and helping ensure they are not subject to violence, criminalised, evicted or have their children taken off them. Sexworkers should see police as there to help if needed, not have to fear or hide from them. The best model IMO is decriminalisation, not the Nordic Model.
decrimnow.org.uk/the-facts/
decrimnow.org.uk/open-letter-on-the-nordic-model/

I also agree drug abuse is a significant problem in the UK with the UK being amongst the worst countries for overdose deaths per 100k people (in the general population, not sexwork specifically). Drug abuse, poverty and trafficking are issues that also need addressing.

Even though the age of consent in the UK is 16, the min legal age for sexworkers is 18. Anyone paying for sex with an under 18 would be subject to child abuse laws.

The article isn’t discussing the best model for prostitution. It’s discussing the army withdrawing what has until now been tacit support for soldiers using prostitutes.

So back on topic, how do we enforce this?

Since the Government and police have difficulties controlling adults buying and paying for sex in their own country, how does the Government control what adults do in other countries?

Great article. I am horrified about Agnes Wahiru 😢

And some of the comments are terrible but we will get the same on here shortly I'm sure.

I'm glad you want to get back on topic Marguerita.

A first step is to be pleased that the Army have finally banned their soldiers from visiting prostitutes.

It needs to be enforced of course.

And paying for sex needs to be seen for the exploitation that it is and become culturally unacceptable.

you dont really have to catch them - or many - the threat of sanction if caught (or dobbed in) will be enough to put off many of the casual users.

@LoobyDop

I have. I’ve also read enough of your posts to know you have no genuino concern for women’s rights, so I’m not going to waste my time rising to you.

It seems that you are feel unable to counter MargaritaPie's arguments and have resorted to abuse.

MargaritaPie is only saying what academics such as Professor Belinda Brooks-Gordon and Professor Nick Mai have been saying. Or authors such as Emily Kenway, Amia Srinivasan, Molly Smith and Juno Mac. Do you think that they have no genuine concern for women's rights? They believe in decriminalisation as do MargaritaPie and myself.

You think that the journalist Janice Turner has more concern for women's rights? She wrote "It is time that the Nordic model, which decriminalises sex work but makes buying it a crime and has been adopted in France, Ireland and Sweden, is debated in parliament." She doesn't realise that it has already been debated in parliament. On 04 July 2018 there was the debate Commercial Sexual Exploitation.

The Nordic model doesn't decriminalise sex work. It isn't illegal to be a prostitute, but it is illegal for them to work together. That doesn't change in Nordic model countries, in fact in Ireland they doubled the penalties. We have looked into it, whereas people like you want to live in some silly fantasy world where you believe that in Nordic model countries sex workers never get arrested, are helped to exit, and demand decreases.

@MargaritaPie

So why should we listen to Rachel Moran?

I have read Paid For and I found it very interesting. She wrote that she didn't have penetrative sex for the first two years in prostitution, and never did anal sex ever. She only started doing penetrative sex after 1993 when there was a change in the law that made life more difficult for sex workers. Even then she only did it sporadically, when she couldn't get her usual dominatrix work. She owned her own flat and mobile phone.

Here is some recent writing by a New Zealand sex worker on decriminalisation(which NZ has) vs the Nordic Model. She addresses some of the claims made by "Nordic Model Now".

dollargirlblog.wordpress.com/2022/04/18/nz-model-v-nordic-model-a-rebuttal/

In Janice Turner's article she states that most sex workers aren't Belle de Jours but drug addicted and pimped. I think that she has probably been reading the new book by Louise Perry called The Case Against the Sexual Revolution.

In the book Louise Perry quotes American sociologist Elizabeth Bernstein. I have come across Elizabeth Bernstein before, she writes about sex work and trafficking and has some interesting things to say.

Elizabeth Bernstein says that there is a continuum with well-paid escorts at one end and drug addicts at the other. That is true. However Elizabeth Bernstein doesn't say that there are only two groups of sex workers, and she doesn't say that the drug addicted group is in the majority.

Drug addicts seem to be only about 15% of the total number of sex workers. That doesn't mean that well-paid escorts are 85% or more. There are many categories of sex worker. Non British women tend not to take drugs.

This is how the misunderstanding arose. Obviously if you really believe that most sex workers are pimped then you will want to eliminate it. That's not true though.

Whichever way we look at this issue, there's one thing: the man believes he can have a woman's body whether she wants him or not. If she doesn't desire him he can pay and get it anyway. He's in a position of power, like in cases of rape, sexual attack, or by paying money to someone who needs it. Another thing is the guilt: it is placed on the prostitute, even if she's there because of difficult life circumstances, she's the one ending up in the cells. Hardly ever is the man/client who ends up in trouble. Patriarchy has its not very subtle ways to perpetuate this easy access to woman's bodies. (For this post I'm assuming prostitute = female, user = male - I'm aware there are multiple combinations and this will apply to all of them.).