Amnesty International says laws against buying sex breach men's human rights

[DonkeySkin]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2545003/Amnesty-calls-legal-prostitution-Charity-says-laws-ban-people-buying-selling-sex-breach-human-rights.html

The organisation is planning to adopt a position that calls for the full decriminalisation of the sex industry, including johns and pimps.

It is tabling a paper for its UK branch to vote on that says it is a human right for 'consenting adults' to purchase sexual consent from another person (regardless of the desperate circumstances that person may be in, presumably). The paper also devotes time to that latest favourite cover-all for sex-industry advocates, 'the rights of the disabled', as a reason to allow the continuing expansion of the global sex industry with no oversight or concern from governments.

Apparently the human rights of the (overwhelmingly) women and girls who are coerced, trafficked and enslaved inside the sex industry to satisfy the demand from men for paid sex are of no concern.

Oh, sorry - Amnesty does remember to devote a whole two words to this, conceding that prostitution takes place in an 'imperfect context'. That would presumably be the context of a worldwide patriarchy that devalues female human beings, denies them education, safety and fairly paid work, and tells men they have the right to use their bodies for sex regardless of their actual desires. Not to mention, systemic racism, colonialism and exploitative capitalism.

Good to know Amnesty is prepared to stand up for the most vulnerable people on earth - male sex buyers.

Haven't checked if it's already been linked in this thread, but there is a petition

www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/amnesty-international-we-demand-amnesty-international-listen-to-survivors-and-reject-the-proposal-to-decriminalize-all-aspects-of-prostitution?share_id=TBJKcVmLrx&utm_campaign=signature_receipt&utm_medium=email&utm_source=share_petition

Am on my phone so don't know if it will be a clicky link.

m.thelocal.se20140128/amnesty-legalize-prostitution-bid-angers-swedes

"My instinctive reaction is to leave. I haven't done it yet, but I am one of the many women who carry Amnesty with our volunteer work."

"I am one of the many women who carry Amnesty with our volunteer work."

Yes organisations like this usually are carried by women's free work - often with men in higher positions. So you would think that the least they could do is making sure their mission statement is to protect women's human rights.

Exactly Briar, that comment really stood out to me.

I am seeing female members all over the web saying they are going to leave. Please don't leave until you have made your voice known at the AGM.

I am not naive, I don't think AI cares if we leave. In fact the policy document may have been leaked by AI so that we do leave.

I wrote this today on my fb page as a bit of a rant.

it is just my general perception and i'm interested to know what you all think? Feel free to ignore, if you want.

It is a bit long!

Imagine this, we still have slaves. Black slaves with white owners. Imagine there is a group within this society who want to abolish slavery. They campaign etc, but are met with the very closed notion, that slavery is as old as time and we will never be able to abolish it, because there will always be white people who want a slave, and black people who are willing to be a slave. Or people who argue, 'How will the black people feed their children'?

Imagine the government as made it illegal to be a slave and illegal to buy slaves. Then imagine a slave advertising in the back of newspapers, telephone boxes for slave services. Imagine then, the slave being arrested on numerous occasions and getting a criminal record and a fine, and being once again forced back to advertise their slavery services, as now they could never get a regular job and they need some way to pay the fine.

Eventually the notion of criminalising the black slaves is considered harmful and futile, so they are de criminalised. The white buyers of black slaves however are still prosecuted if they are caught. Now imagine the black slaves begin setting up unions and campaigning for the white buyers to be de criminalised, because they believe themselves to be making a 'free' choice, they will be safer because they can work in groups and perhaps stop some of the violence and abuse that some of the white buyers dish out. Imagine, that the black slaves argument is that it will increase demand and make them more money and more importantly that demand will be from the more (hollow laugh) respectful members of the white buyers, as they wouldn't buy the services of the black slaves when there was a risk of a criminal record.

Then imagine that a quite respected, powerful organisation for human rights, decides to look into the issue. They draft a document that proposes that it is an 'imperfect setting' but it is the white man's right to be able to buy a 'consenting' black person.

No?

It's hard to imagine any of that. It seems ludicrous on soooo many levels.

I understand that there are differences between female prostitutes and black slaves, not least as one is completed owned and the other is only 'owned' for an hour.

I'm quite sure someone can come along and dissect this down, to show the differences between the two, how one is/was extremely more oppressed etc, and I would accept that. It was as far as I know, all black people who were treated this way, whereas female prostitutes are not even the majority within the female population.

However I do feel I could plausibly counter argue that with the overall perception of women is not great and certainly not equal within quite a considerable section of the male population. You don't even need to take my word for it. The World Health organisation has called the threat to women and children as endemic.

The general misogyny is every where. Spend 20 mins looking at www.everydaysexism, or www.theinvisblemenproject and see the ingrained, sometimes even unconscious sexism out there. Even Beyonce has apparently argued that equality is bullshit, ironically unaware that she herself contributes to that inequality. (Hint Beyonce; Jay Z doesn't flash his flesh, his talent is enough)

But in my opinion these aren't the differences that we should be focusing on.

I'm more interested to know why black people fought against their predicament, why they believed themselves to be (quite rightly) deserving of being equal? Why do women not believe they are worthy of being equal? Why are they so excepting of the situation and moreover, actually fighting for better conditions within that situation? And the most ludicrous of all, why the hell have a leading human rights organisation decided that these women are right?

I don't want women who are faced with this 'choice' to be penalised, or hurt in any way. I wish for it to not be the situation at all for any of them. But in a world where the power dynamics between men and women are no where near equal, I refuse to accept that this is an inevitable, acceptable situation and is in fact a 'right' for men.

Are there going to be classes in school where our children are told that men have a 'right' to buy women?

WTAF?

It's so god damn scary and unbelievable. I would imagine all the dead feminists are turning in their graves and all the alive ones are quite rightly up in arms.

And as usual this is a war between the women, whilst the men who are supportive of this patriarchal society are probably sitting back, rubbing their hands in glee and watching the bum fight with a beer.

I don't think AI cares if we leave. In fact the policy document may have been leaked by AI so that we do leave.

AI cares a lot about membership. They only exist because of members and in the current economic environment they need every member they can get. And I can't believe they want the Duncan Fox type of members.

I have absolutely no proof but I think the document was leaked by a disgruntled employee. Amnesty are struggling financially (like almost every charity at the moment) and are restructuring with some redundancies. There have been a few leaks recently.

The Paisley group isn't exactly 'rogue', AI is very inclusive, perhaps too inclusive at times (as the Duncan Fox stuff shows). The paisley group is vocal and listened too - it is their motions that have repeatedly been approved by members. I went to the Emergency meeting they had last year and it got 'heated' but the Amnesty definition of heated was a couple of people being mildly sarcastic. They are just really nice about everything.

organisations like this usually are carried by women's free work - often with men in higher positions

The chair and chief execs of AI UK are both women. The head of marketing is a woman. Lots of women are in senior roles. Even if there was some group of misogynist fools at the helm it is a member based organisation and the members vote on policy. If it's women doing the work and they show up to vote the policy will be chucked out or amended.

I'm not meaning to set myself up as an Amnesty apologist but my experience of them is of a generally well intentioned bunch.

I will see how the AGM goes and trust the democratic process. If after that Amnesty members have voted for a policy I can't condone I will be off like a shot.

enlighted

Nice rant. :)

You could also add

"Imagine that only black people who wanted to work as slaves were considered to have a valid input into the discussion of legalisation.

Imagine that all the other black people who didn't want to be thought of as slaves, to be confused as slaves, to live in a world where being black was thought of as being equivalent to being slave, were silenced and told that they were not "expert" in the matter and had no right to an opinion on the matter.

If the Paisley Group motions in favour of the Nordic Model have been approved, who were Amnesty at the NI Assembly yesterday speaking against the Nordic Model? When did they get approval from their membership for that lobbying?

And if they need every member, they are certainly not going the right way about keeping members. Even their PR response to all of this is frankly amatuerish.

If AI approves this policy, I will not only be resigning, but actively campaigning for other members to resign. I don't think I will be the only one.

And the apologists for prostitution may be loud in places like twitter, but they are actually few in number. And most are not even in the UK. Whereas I know lots of people where I live, once I explain that decriminalisation means decriminalising pimps too, are horrified by Amnesty's proposed policy.

If Amnesty approve this, it will haunt them for years.

That's good to hear ThinkAboutIt
I've got bad experience from another organisation.

Excellent join i'm going to put that in a comment underneath.

Can you just imagine in places like Syria that have seen a rise in prostitution as a result of the war, and explaining to people that Amnesty thinks that is fine if the women are "choosing" to do it to feed their kids? And investigatiosn into pimps in war torn areas, reporters will be explaining that Amnesty thinks pimps like this should not be criminalised?

It will be an absolutely disaster for Amnesty. They really haven't thought through what a laughing stock this will make them. And many of us are not going away. We will be pointing this out every time it comes up.

I agree they haven't thought it through. I read a similar vein, along the lines of if sex work is work, then ..............

they can start at 16
the minimum wage could be used
apprenticeships could be set up
Hours of work could be 48hrs a week unless they opt out

etc etc.

It's the difference between AIUK and the global Amnesty.

The UK members have voted for the Paisley groups amendments - which were to lobby the international division to formulate a policy on prostitution in the context of the work on trafficking. The policy the international group has formulated seems to be the bloody awful one that has been leaked. But I am confident that the UK membership will chuck it out so it can't be ratified and won't become policy.

ThinkAboutIt - That just might be believable if some of Amnesty were not lobbying NI Assembly against the Nordic Model. It is that action that makes it look as if Amnesty's policy has already been decided.

Something

My phone posted too quick that last post.

Something I am not reading much in these discussions is the need to address actual causes rather than blanket blaming men and their need to feel superior to women (which I haven't experienced in all the years I've worked in the adult industry). POVERTY is being driven throughout the world by men alright, men who want to profit from other peoples misfortunes and circumstances and these men are sitting on the boards of the most powerful banking institutions, powerful corporations, as well as the men driving the military industrial complex. Wars for profit drive human trafficking, corporations drive human trafficking, yet NOTHING is being said about this fact. Why not go straight to the cause instead of debating ideologies? Poverty is what is pushing people who shouldn't be doing sex work into sex work more often than a pimp.

Here

Wish I could delete posts that are accidental lol.

Here is a petition to support amnesty and their position on decriminalization

www.change.org/petitions/amnesty-international-international-secretariat-london-we-demand-a-human-rights-based-approach-to-sex-work-and-call-for-the-decriminalization-of-all-consensual-adult-sex-work?

We want decriminalization so that people are not harmed through the legal process, so they can report violence against them. Here in the USA we are poised to establish legislation that will establish protection and accountability for sex workers and clients, legalization is not the only way to establish this in fact the negatives of legalization outweigh the positives. In Nevada for instance, where sex work is legal, the women are practically held captive in the brothel and who wants to give a large portion of their earnings over to an employer? It's not the answer. Decriminalization would absolutely reduce the harm which sex workers (trafficked or not) currently face. Why not reduce harm? I think it amounts to people wanting to punish people who would choose sex work.