The greens and prostitutes

[IceBeing]

Be gentle as I am new to thinking about this.

I found the Natalie Bennett's comments on decriminalising prostitution pretty persuasive - what am I missing?

She basically said that sex workers would like this policy (having contributed to it) and that research from other countries indicated it was the way forward.

Rosie, you wrote: "I do get quite uncomfortable, though, with the argument that there might not be as many trafficking victims as people assume. I've heard this quite often, and sometimes it's as extreme as claiming that feminists are intentionally lying because they're prudes who hate sex etc. (and probably fat ugly lesbians too! Obviously you're not saying that, but there are some very dodgy claims made sometimes).

Isn't it a bit like quibbling over the proportion of women who have been raped? Claiming that the figure is actually less than 1/5, and that recording rape is really difficult, and that most women are lucky enough not to be raped, and how do we even define rape anyway... it might be academically coherent, but I'd seriously question the motives of the person making that argument!"

I agree with what you are saying. I am suspicious of anyone spouting ANY statistics in such a highly heated debate. And I deplore ad hominem attacks as they are counter productive.

I am not sure that statistics really address the issue. Someone else upthread stated her position as being firm in her conviction that prostitution is wrong because our society should not engender the idea that men have the right to purchase sex, or that sex should not be seen as something that can be bought and sold. I like this argument because it seems pure to me and statistics have no bearing on it. You can attempt to have a debate over the ethics of buying sex, defining what that may or may not mean, etc., but the argument holds true whether or not it rarely happens or happens a lot.

I have no problem selling sex and I don't have a problem with most of my clients (this is based on my perceptions of their motives and attitudes) and so I'm not necessarily moved by the argument, but I can respect it and I'm willing to mull over the larger ethical issues at play.

FloraFox No, I don't have a link to the survey, itself. I think you could do some Googling (based on what is said in the Guardian article) and perhaps find more about it but I don't think the survey itself - all the questions and possible answers - is still there.

I am not offended at all and I think you raise a perfectly valid issue.

I, too, deplore the society in which porn is so readily available. In addition to issues of objectifying human beings, I think it utterly distorts views of what sex is. Some of us prostitutes have a joke: "I blame the porn." We say that when we've encountered some clueless numpty who has some strange ideas about what would be fun or would feel good in the context of sex. Example: there is an increasingly common idea that a good blow job is one in which the woman chokes and gags and her eyes tear up to the point of mascara running down her face. I think porn conditions viewers to find things erotic that would otherwise never occur to them.

I make many ethical decisions based on my own financial interests. It's why I don't eat free-range, organic, locally-sourced chicken and why I buy clothes from Primark. It's why I choose to pay tax (partly because I wish to be on the grid and have the necessary paperwork to get a mortgage or invest in a pension, partly because I don't want to be arrested, partly because I think it's the right thing to do) and why I choose to skim some money and not pay tax on it (because I can get away with it and doing so means that I can buy an iPhone 6 for six blow jobs instead of ten). So, I am obviously going to make the decision to engage in sex work and perpetuate the capitalist, sexist culture in which sex can be purchased based on my desire to live a more comfortable life. Of course there are things I would NOT do for money (lest someone get the idea that I have no morals or ethics at all) but sex work doesn't bother me and I don't think my participating or not really makes a difference in the grand scheme of things. Of all the things listed above, probably only the factory farmed chickens will be affected by any decisions I make.

I would like to point

Essentially nothing you do causes harm. However every punter the more frequently he engages in it the chances he's contributing to the suffering increase. Now it is possible to do a bit of mental gymnastics and argue there is no intent to do harm, and otherwise the chaps may seem perfectly nice, but this concept seems key to me.

Again this encapsulates why prostitution is not just a job.

And I'm not sure I agree with the statement that "nothing you do causes harm"

Maybe not to your punter but you are perpetuating the notion a woman's body can be bought for sex. And I do think that causes harm.

1) set a societal norm that it's AOK to fuck people who, at a very basic level, have no wish to fuck you. This is immensely problematic when so many men already don't understand (or choose to ignore) the basic principle of consent.

I'd be horrified to read in paper if a guy had raped some girl and then slipped £50 quid in her wallet

Sorry - haven't caught up with whole thread - on small lunch break - Buffy I thought the same re the living wage, however what then hit me was that this would ensure trafficking was at the very heart of prostitution (s these girls wouldn't be entitled to our benefit). It would increase that problem and legalise it, making it very hard to discover slavery or pimps who are acting illegally with a legal 'front'. Hope that makes sense.

when I think about it yes thats true blackrider, I found it horrific that someone even came up with the term child prostitute. Didn't that radio DJ use some excuse that he gave his boys gifts?

I think we "Happy Hookers" dominate the discourse because we're the ones who blog, or read MN, or organise conferences, etc.

KimCar first of all, thank you for coming on here - I have found it genuinely useful. I have especially appreciated your willingness to engage with women who don't take the "sex work is work like any other" line.

I think what you said (quoted above) hits the nail on the head. I don't want to go into too much detail without namechanging, as it would out me, but although I've never worked in prostitution, I've known enough women (not a huge number, but enough) who have, over the years, and I cannot imagine a single one of them writing a blog or attending a "sex workers' conference" or anything like that. They've either moved on, got regular jobs, have hidden that information away as though that chapter of their life never happened - or they are dead, from various things usually linked to drug use.

It's why when I see panels discussing sex work/prostitution at conferences, and people complain that there are no "sex worker voices" represented, it really annoys me - because how do we know? If we demand that people out themselves before deciding whether their opinion on the sex industry is valid, then we will necessarily limit the voices we listen to, to those who can for whatever reason be semi-public or public about it.

We have this terrible habit in our society that unless a 100% guaranteed to work solution is presented, nothing should change. Then we go round the houses with vested interests vs proponents of change throwing statistics, studies and everything but the kitchen sink at one another. With whomever is representing the status quo at a natural advantage as whilst there is constant debate and argument it is harder to enact change.

Put simply and I believe I can say this without reference to figures and statistics: "There are vulnerable people who suffer within sex industry."

Just in relation that single statement illustrates the status quo has to change. Is the Nordic Model the right answer? Honestly I don't know, but I sure as shit realise that things cannot carry on as they are.

We could try it, but I don't think if we did just by itself the problem goes away. The absolute primary laser like focus should be focused on two areas. Protection and ensuring that it becomes harder for vulnerable people to find their lives made all the worse by falling into it.

"However, as I wrote that the thought occurred to me that if punters actually lived in a society where the only prostitutes available were the truly happy ones, they would probably have - or be forced to recognise - much less entitlement than many of them currently seem to feel. That is, some of them (not all of them) strike me as thinking that they should be able to have sex with any woman they choose for a relatively low price whenever they like."

Interesting insight, Kimcar.

The fact that some slaves were cared for by their masters very wellthat some slaves, indeed, may have been happy with their lotmakes literally no ethical difference to whether slavery is wrong. It is.

The existence of prostitutes who enjoy their job does not make prostitution as a system ethically sound. Imagine if the response of slaveholders to abolitionists was to start having a bunch of happy slaves penning articles about how for them, this was really work like any other, and they really always enjoyed farming or housework, and their owners were quite kind.

I bet it would have worked on a lot of guilty white people: "Oh, it's not as bad as those abolitionists made it sound. We shouldn't be so fast to judge. Quick, go buy some more cheap cotton and we'll make it into dresses."

And no one should listen to those stupid runaway slaves, who obviously are biased against masters in the first place and probably just couldn't handle the work.

Slavery is so different as there is never choice involved. Another person owns you and there is nothing you can do about it. The contributer to this thread is doing sex work through choice. Different context entirely.

A political party can talk about legalising prostitution, and a debate can be had.

If a political party talked about legalising slavery, they would be insane.

Buffy, at the time of slavery, wasn't it the case that black people were not seen as full persons and that was how it was justified - these "others" need a hierarchy, to know their subordinate place in it etc.

Many slaves died of starvation after the end of slavery as their previous owners had no motivation to keep them fed. My Mum used this example to point out that capitalism can be a worse option than slavery as the employer has no "investment" in paying the worker a decent wage, unless there is a shortage of workers.

www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jun/16/slavery-starvation-civil-war

A government could discuss a form of bonded indenture where a person could choose to sell themselves into slavery for a period of time. That would be consensual, so would that be okay?

A slight derailment but slaves were and are seen as "property." Seen as no more important than a house, dog or horse. They couldn't leave, and had no choice over what they did, and no legal rights. 3/5 a human being in America at the time.

I don't think anyone can argue that slavery takes place in sex work today. Women are owned by pimps, cannot leave and have no choice in what they do.

That is illegal, and all sorts of crimes from kidnap, false imprisonment, fraud and numerous of sexual offences will have been committed.

I just find the idea that all prostitutes, regardless of circumstances, are comparable with slaves as troubling.

Buffy -

But the critical social (un)scientist in me questions the freedom of all choices made in our capitalist, male dominated society with attitudes shaped by the history we have

The problem with that is that all choices made in ANY "society" (ie, pretty much all of those made by any human who has ever existed or will ever exist) are shaped by the conditioning of that society. There is nothing unique about male dominance or capitalism in this regard.

Which means that if you're ever going to acknowledge any validity in free choice ever, you're going to have to accept the fact of that choice being formed within a context of social conditioning. The idea that we acknowledge freedom of choice - but we just want to wait until there's a completely open and unconditioned human state in which power and history play no part in such choices before acknowledging them as valid - is really a non-idea. People saying that need to own up to the fact that they really DON'T acknowledge freedom of choice, in any meaningful sense.