privilege and prostitution

[ezinma]

Appearing in my social media today is one of those sharp and sassy thoughts for the day that I’m invited to approve by sharing. Where better to share it than here:

So, you are against prostitution. But you're an attractive person with a boyfriend. Who I assume you have sex with. That gives you privilege. Some people aren't so lucky. The only way they can get laid is by paying for it. Why do you think you have the right to experience one of life's fundamental experiences and others don't?

It’s from tumblr so we ought to make some allowances. Let’s, if we may, overlook the fact that I am a middle-aged frump with a civil partner; the debatable contention that sex, in and of itself, is one of life’s fundamental experiences; the erasure of women who aren’t “lucky” enough to have a boyfriend and whose right to A Fundamental Experience presumably requires them to seduce a partner using skills that cannot be withdrawn from a bank machine; and the regrettable (though now unavoidable) misuse of ‘privilege’ to refer to any old scenario where one group of people has a little bit more access to something than another group does. (Have I missed anything?)

What remains is the daring suggestion that a woman might be against prostitution because she is attractive. Since it's already well established that we fat old frumps are against prostitution — no glamorous john would waste his beer money on buying our flabby arses, and we are bitter about it! — then I’m left with only one conclusion: a woman’s attractiveness has no influence on her opinions about prostitution.

A lightbulb moment for me. Thanks, tumblr.

"gilo how about answering some questions?"

Your questions are not relevant to me.

gilo it's very bad form to join a forum and demand answers to your questions without answering questions that are asked of you. Mind you I wouldn't expect any more from someone who pays to stick their dick in a desperate woman.

You ask a lot of questions, Gilo. You don't understand the most pertinent ones, so I for one can't be arsed to answer your confuscating claptrap.

gilo - [weseeyou] dude.

I'm not a punter so I cannot answer your questions.

Talk about jumping to assumptions.

If you're not a punter, what's your interest in this area? What other aspects of women's rights are you involved with?

Sure you're a punter. What else would you be?

Oh, you could be a pimp I suppose....

Just in case you missed it:

Here is a quote from Carina Edlund, Rose Alliance, a prostitute in Sweden:

“Before even thinking of a law that criminalises men who buy sex, UK politicians should hear from Swedish sex workers like myself about how we have treated under the law. We are still criminalised if we work together in apartments, we risk losing our home if we sell sex there even if we own it, social workers treat as like children and we can even lose custody of our kids because we are seen as victims suffering from a form of self-harm who can't take care of ourselves. This law should be taken away not exported to other countries.”

But maybe you know better??

What are you? Feminists who know better than prostitutes themselves?

We know you're a punter, dude. You know why? Normal men have never heard of Melissa Farley, Operation Pentameter or the Rose Alliance. Normal men don't lurk around prostitution websites looking for quotes to justify their right to stick their dick in a woman who is repulsed by them.

[weeseeyou]

Do you know better about prostitution than prostitutes do?

We know that men shouldn't feel entitled to buy sex from women, gilo. And that women can never have true equality with men while we're treated as the sex class.

Tell me, gilo, (in your remaining time left under this username) what makes a man want to have sex with someone who doesn't want it?

Rapists, in my view.

Do you know better about prostitution than prostitutes do?

This is how you can look at yourself in the mirror, isn't it? You have to tell yourself what you're doing is fine and dandy. You know it's not though, otherwise you wouldn't be making such an effort to convince yourself. Inside you, there's a voice telling you what you are doing is wrong, that it's exploitative, that you are a lowlife abuser. You're just trying to shout down that voice.

Does your mother know what you do?

Do you know better about prostitution than prostitutes do?

Should we pass laws on prostitution without hearing what prostitutes have to say?

It's bad to click on an OP, read it and just post 'that's bollocks', isn't it?

Oh well.

Women in prostitution have an opportunity to speak, as has been happening in Northern Ireland. Their voice is well represented in the media and public sphere.

gilo, how about what these prostitution survivors say? I think I'll listen to them. You listen to who you like.

Who do you think the law should protect - the vulnerable? Or the strong voices that shout the loudest (and have a vested financial interest in prostitution)?

Any comment to make on what Carina Edlund has said?

Why won't you listen to the survivor Carina Edlund?

How are the vulnerable going to be protected by having their homes and children taken off them?

Should we pass laws on prostitution without hearing what I as a punter have to say?

Corrected that ^^ for you.

Do you have any comment on what this survivor has said?

People seem to be under the impression that we ‘choose’ to work as prostitutes. It’s an argument that falls with its first assumption, because, hey, define ‘choice’. Selling your body being the last option you have to survive, or because it’s all you’ve been brought up to know, isn’t in any way ‘choice’ at all, especially not when you add on extra pressures like a family to feed. Yet it’s exactly these reasons why the vast majority of women work in prostitution.

And please, you are a punter, why else would you want to have paid access to exploited women's bodies? Oh no, sorry, our questions are irrelevant to you.

punter.

@Blistory, the above quote isn't by me. It was said by a Swedish prostitute who knows better than anyone whether the Swedish model is a good idea or not.