Corbyn - "I'm in favour of decriminalising the sex industry"

[IndominusRex]

www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/mar/04/jeremy-corbyn-decriminalise-sex-industry-prostitution?CMP=share_btn_tw

Not a huge shock but still troubling to see him say it.

Punternet is dead. There was a spin-off of guys who got sick of the "quesily polite" set and started their own review forum. Meanwhile, Punternet's admin failed to keep up with various developments over the past several years and, as happens to most forums eventually, it has been in decline.

On the new spinoff review forum, you may actually see punters use a term like "wanksock." They're a particularly angry group of men who are regularly culled of anyone who doesn't espouse the same angry attitude.

The reason they are so angry is that they hate not having the control they believe they ought to have just because they are paying. They fear us and resent us and are obsessed with us. They're not your garden-variety punter: they're "hobbyists" and they don't like me at all. Doesn't impact my income one little bit, as there are a great many clients who don't think the way they do.

I've stumbled across even more horrible forums than that one (the one dedicated to seeking out unprotected sex comes to mind). I very rarely encounter horrible cretins in actual bookings, because I'm very good at screening them out. I do encounter them on the phone. I do not deny that there are some awful punters out there. However, I meet genuinely lovely men.

I do think that I am privileged in many ways. I had a stable family life, I'm educated and reasonably clever, and I have resources and options. I know that some women don't have them.

When I debate about prostitution I feel as if I am engaging in two debates. What usually tempts me to join in is when I read things like "99% of prostitutes in my city are on Class A drugs." (That was on AIBU) Broad generalisations that don't apply to me or any of my many friends get my back up. So, one debate is arguing that I am not being raped, etc.

Then there is the other debate over what to do about prostitutes that are vulnerable. I am actually happy with the current UK law criminalising brothels and streetwalking, although I would rather the onus was put on the punters over the prostitutes. It seems to me that it's absurd to say what I do with my own body in my own flat out of my own choice, but agree that pimps and predators prey on those lower down in the hierarchy. I must admit that my own self-interests are at play, here. The fewer massage parlours and pimped Eastern European prostitutes, the better the market is for me. But, I also would like to see women who are NOT happy hookers to get as much help as possible.

I don't think there will be any such help if the Nordic model is enacted here. We don't even take care of the mentally ill, the elderly, etc and benefits to the poor are being stripped away. The economic migrants will fuck off to a more tolerant country but those who are stuck here will just be worse off.

sillage - Honestly, are you huffing glue? At what point have I ever victim-blamed in this thread?

Yes, I did say: "To completely erase sex work from society would mean erasing the problems and circumstances that lead women and men into sex work in the first place."

That's not victim blaming at all. And if you think it is, you need to have a sit down and a

Brazen, in your next post please either provide one measly example of a prostituted woman being arrested for brothel-keeping or have the integrity to retract your unfounded assertion.

Let me explain how you are victim-blaming in simple steps.

"To completely erase sex work from society would mean erasing the problems and circumstances that lead women and men into sex work in the first place."

1. The phrase "erasing the problems and circumstances that lead" refers to the victims. It is about the problems of victims, and the circumstances of victims. It is not about the abusers. There is no referent at all about abusers and their "problems and circumstances".

1. The phrase "women and men" is a deliberate obfuscation of the extreme sex-skew in prostitution. It ignores a planet's worth of evidence about the majority of prostitutes were prostituted for the first time before they turned 18.

1. "in the first place" brushes aside the planet's worth of evidence about how the majority of prostitutes were prostituted for the 'first' time before they turned 18. Because truly, prostituted get prostituted "in the first place" by predatory men while the victims are mostly underage. Men's predation comes first.

To rewrite your sentence is a way that puts the blame where it deserves to go:

The societal problem and circumstance that lead men to seek prostituteded victims is predatory men enacting rape culture and getting away with it because of worldwide misogyny.

sillage - There aren't any statistics that I can find on exactly how many sex workers have been arrested for brothel-keeping. It doesn't seem anyone has published stats on it (that I can find in a google search anyway.)
I'm drawing on experience as a sex worker and from talking to other sex workers locally. Isn't that good enough evidence? Or are you calling us liars?

To answer your other points:

1.) It's not about the 'abusers' (I prefer to call them clients, as the majority are not abusive, unless you see sex as being inherently abusive towards women?)
I'm more interested in the circumstances and real world safety of sex workers, than I am interested in launching an idealogical attack on men who exchange money for sexual services.
That in no way means I'm victim-blaming.

2.) I do think it's worth mentioning sometimes that, while most sex workers are women, there are also men and trans-women in the industry. And they do experience the same safety issues as women in the industry do... sometimes with extra layers of homophobia or transphobia (and we're talking real transphobia here, not the new brand of 'boohoo, talking about periods is transphobic' transphobia.)
It helps to remember that the safety of all sex workers, should trump feminist idealism. This is people's lives we're talking about.

There is also no evidence that most sex workers entered the sex industry before turning 18.
The study used to get the, frequently quoted, 'most sex workers entered the sex industry before turning 18' stat was a survey on young people under age 18.

3.) See point 2.
And, furthermore, what about women who choose to enter the industry? We're not all 'prostituted' by male pimps against our will. In fact, the majority of us aren't.

"Isn't that good enough evidence?"

It isn't. It fails on multiple levels.

It fails the burden of proof of that is exists at all, much less that it is so common a practice to make risking rape and murder seem less risky.

It fails to support your alleged fear of arrest in a climate where johns frequently commit rapes and murders.

It fails to support your case for allowing women to prostitute collectively for "safety".

It fails to back up your claim you're, "I'm more interested in the circumstances and real world safety of sex workers," when you locate the source of harm in police officers without proof that police officers in Nordic model countries are a primary source of harm.

It fails.

A sex worker on Twitter (a real one that actually has had experience selling sex btw) is accusing RosalieHaynes64 of being a fraud! oh my! (see screengrab)

And I agree with her. RosalieHaynes64 is a fraud. She isn't the first, and I doubt she will be the last.

I read all of her blog and it didn't add up to me. I'm not going to declare someone a fake but it's not clear why she feels forced to endure frequent beatings. She claims to be in uni, and she's able to blog and tweet. So she's not physically captive. She can access help and has the mental and cultural acumen to do so.

She indicates that she works in a brothel where violence is frequent, and her pimp gets angry if she doesn't dress and look sexy. But this brothel tolerates bruises from violence? I'm not a fan of brothels and their rules, but I know that they all have security and don't tolerate violent clients. If there were a brothel this crazy, I would have heard of it.

Then she goes on an outcall to see two men, one of whom beats her for having not worn tights. Brothels with multiple rooms don't also offer outcalls, so is she doing outcall independently? Then why is she taking dodgy bookings and talking about them as if it is inevitable and normal?

I avoid these situations because I am picky and know that I don't have to tolerate it. A uni student who blogs and talks to people on Twitter isn't someone who doesn't have options.

I noticed that all of the comments on her blog were from people who utterly believe her, many praising her for telling the "truth." I think these are people with preconceived ideas and she's confirming them. It's like she's just saying all the lurid things some people imagine are true. Like The Awful Confessions of Maria Monk.

Are you accusing a woman of lying?? Misogynists. What happened to the "we believe you" campaign?

RosalieHaynes64 is how most prostituted women live, the happy hookers who come onto this thread are the rare privileged ones funded by the pimp industry.

We all need to share RosalieHaynes64's blog and Twitter account with everyone we can including our politicians (has that fucking Corbyn and that fucking MSP Jean Urquart seen her blog???). Men should read her blog. Men who visit (i.e., rape) prostitutes should all be shown her blog.

I have emailed my MSP and asked her to support the Nordic model and shown her Rosalie's blog. We all need to do this. TODAY

I'm not funded by a "pimp industry." By definition, pimps take money off prostitutes - they don't give it. I don't have a pimp.

My pay comes from my clients. I'm not "funded" to come on here and post any more than you are.

I've never been a part of any "we believe you" campaign. I don't campaign. I judge everything individually and Rosalie's blog doesn't add up. You say that that is how the majority of prostitutes in the UK live and that people like me are rare. I personally know many, many prostitutes like me and I am acquaintances with far more.

Rosalie describes working in a parlour - talking about working with other girls in "rooms" and it's a place where she is free to come and go as she goes to Uni. I know girls who work in parlours and have worked in parlours (I've worked in a British parlour and in another country). I know their complaints about them and why they choose to work in them or no longer want to work in them. I know the names of all the parlours in my city and many of them in other cities - I know what they're like and have a general idea what goes on in them. Never have I heard of a place where clients are allowed to hit the girls. Rosalie said that whoever runs the brothel dictates that she wear makeup and sexy clothes - but they don't mind cuts and bruises? That's absurd.

Being as charitable as I possibly can, I suppose Rosalie does work both in a brothel and arranges outcalls on her own and she has suffered from abuse since childhood and so thinks that it is inevitable that she has to go be alone with two men at once.

But I don't see how a university student who has access to social media and feels that she is being raped and abused is actually stuck in that situation. She is no less privileged than I am. I don't get beaten and I reject any booking that I don't think will be pleasant.

Strumpet - Agree with your posts re. Rosalie's blog... I thought similarly that most of what she claimed was a load of bollocks didn't quite ring true.

But I was hesitant to voice my doubts due to anticipating posts like turoide's and accusations of victim blaming.

The thing is, even if Rosalie's blog is true, her issue is child abuse not prostitution. Had she been protected by existing laws regarding child abuse, her situation would have been very different.

I think a lot of people believe what they want to believe about prostitution. Somehow, one (most likely false) blog detailing horror is more believable than the handful of sex workers on this thread sharing their experiences, the many sex workers behind the ECP, Amnesty International etc.

Rosalie's blog fits the narrative, so it's held up as truth while the rest of us are dismissed as a 'happy hooker' minority (which we aren't.)

"I'm not a fan of brothels and their rules, but I know that they all have security and don't tolerate violent clients."

Is that what you know?

Your entire post reads like a bingo card for disbelieving domestic violence, starting right at the top, "it's not clear why she feels forced to endure frequent beatings...she's not physically captive."

Someone who blames abused women with, "Why didn't she just leave?" is not a feminist.

Someone who says brothels "don't tolerate violent clients" is a terrible liar.

Your words have led me to believe you're not a feminist and you're a terrible liar.

I have never claimed to be a feminist. I believe that women should have equal rights, equal pay, etc. But whether or not that makes me a feminist or not I really don't care. It's not a political party.

But can you give me any coherent explanation for a university student who blogs and tweets saying that she is raped and beaten regularly? This is an articulate woman in a first-world country with access to social media. I do believe that educated, privileged women can get trapped into emotional and physical abuse... but do you really think this girl is chained up somewhere? Something out of the movie "Taken" that also lets her blog and go to uni?

I have known and advised other prostitutes "you don't have to put up with that shit." (Usually in terms of taking bookings that are obviously bad news.) It's true that some girls have skewed judgement because they learned skewed things at an early age and don't know that something is "off" about a caller. I'm not going to deny that. But this girl is saying the word "rape" - she is angry enough to compose an essay to a politician about it - but she is somehow compelled to continue? How? Why? Is someone holding her mother hostage or something?

I do believe it is hard to leave prostitution. If I decided right this second to never suck another cock again I would be as flummoxed as a housewife deciding to leave an abusive husband. How will I pay my bills? What else can I do?

But I know that it's possible to make good money as a prostitute without getting beaten. I say that as an utterly ordinary-looking, flat-chested middle-aged woman.

Why do you think a brothel will allow clients to beat up their girls? It makes no sense. For one thing, clients don't want some bruised and battered girl. They want to believe that the girl is willingly and happily having sex with them. There are undoubtedly some who don't care one way or the other - but the majority of British punters would be horrified if they thought the girls weren't happy to see them. For another thing, the primary benefit a pimp offers girls is protection. When I worked in a brothel I liked being safe around other people. I liked that Tommy dealt with the gas and electric and phone bills and handled the advertising. I put up with his rules because I could make easy money. The girls I know who work at brothels do so because it suits them to do so for various reasons. None of them would continue if they didn't feel it was a safe and easy way to work.

You have to try and understand how pimps work. Very few of them force girls. The vast, vast majority are there to facilitate work for the girls. This can be an agency or massage parlour that provides bookings and venues or just someone who hangs out in the other room as "protection" when needed. Even the Eastern European girls who come over here know what they're getting into - and they're grateful to the people who set up their advertising, organise their work venues, etc. I am no fan of pimps. But I at least know more about them than you do and I have some clue as to why they exist and why some women choose to work with them.

I've heard plenty of complaints from girls about working with a "pimp." I understand what the actual issues are. There have been times I have worked with a "pimp" because it suited me to have their assistance. There are reasons I currently work independently - I don't need what they have to offer.

But at no point have I felt as if being forced or coerced was an issue.

"But I know that it's possible to make good money as a prostitute without getting beaten."

Bully for you that you're not one of those stupid women who gets themselves beaten up because they don't know what they're doing.

What do you think about what's happening in Sudan with the prostitution of women and girls being an increasingly established form of currency?

"The testimony from dozens of people working in Bentiu, the capital of South Sudan’s Unity state, points to the systematic abduction and abuse of women as a form of wages for forces allied to the government. The worst atrocities have led more than 110,000 people to seek safety at a UN base in the town.

'Their pay is what they loot and the women they abduct,' said one military expert based in Bentiu..."

www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/sep/28/south-sudan-women-girls-raped-as-wages-for-government-allied-fighters

Are these women and children also dummies for not profiting more for themselves off the military men trading and selling their bodies for sexual abuse?

Are the buildings in which these women and children are being held for prostitution not technically "brothels", or are they included in your epic knowledge of how 100% safe all brothels are because pimps would never let their chattel get harmed?

Or maybe you think all this horrific prostitution in the Sudan is coordinated, calculated lies made up by manipulative women like Rosalie who hate sex workers and just want to make your "business" look bad?

sillage - Prostitution is Sudan is nowhere near the same thing as prostitution in the UK. The situation there is not comparable to here (and you already know that.)

We're talking about UK prostitution and UK law so your last post is completely irrelevant to the discussion.

Damn it. That should say "prostitution in Sudan is nowhere near the same thing" ^

I didn't say it was "the same thing", I said it was prostitution and there are brothels and therefore it's one more example from thousands of how prostitution is a grotesque violation of women and children's human rights.

Your attempt to evade or dismiss anything about prostitution you've solipsistically decided doesn't pertain to your infinitesimally teensy, very specific situation is very selfish. It's not all about you.

You have to try and understand how pimps work. Very few of them force girls. The vast, vast majority are there to facilitate work for the girls. This can be an agency or massage parlour that provides bookings and venues or just someone who hangs out in the other room as "protection" when needed. Even the Eastern European girls who come over here know what they're getting into - and they're grateful to the people who set up their advertising, organise their work venues, etc

I am actually at a loss for words to describe how much I find wrong with this statement.

Agree with lass

If you had stuck with the halpy hooker bit i might have thought "interesting" and nodded sagely at a more "experienced" point of view

But nope, you've lost me

What I mean is that a lot of people legally defined as "pimps" are not vicious brutes. There are vicious brutes, to be sure. But many prostitutes choose to work with a third party facilitating their bookings and venues. I have done so in the past and would consider it again if there were a "pimp" that offered me something of value in return for their cut of the revenue.

One of my closest friends "pimped" me for a few months - she rented a room to me to work from, as well as showed me the ropes for exactly how to work in the UK (where to advertise, etc.) Now, she never actually controlled prostitution for gain... she had no control over whom I saw, what I did, or what I charged. I was utterly autonomous. But she did rent me a room and so was running a brothel. In general parlance, someone who runs a brothel is a pimp.

By the same token, when people think of trafficking they often imagine something like abduction and forced prostitution. In fact, under UK law facilitating travel across borders for the purposes of prostitution is automatically considered trafficking. There absolutely are girls who want to come here to work and they are happy to let someone facilitate this for them. I think that they can be in a vulnerable position in that situation, but I know that it's not always an unhappy arrangement for the prostitute.

Not all "happy hookers" are independent escorts charging premium rates and working on their own. There are happy hookers in parlours and working for agencies. I think that the "lower" down the hierarchy, particularly for foreign migrants, you do find more of the relatively unhappy hookers. I even think there are miserable women who are coerced or otherwise don't have sufficient autonomy in their work.

But I do not believe that they are the majority of prostitutes in the UK.

What I mean is that a lot of people legally defined as "pimps" are not vicious brutes

That is not actually the part I find so wrong. In a bizarre way it is almost worse that you think the fact they are not violent makes it OK.

That is not actually the part I find so wrong. In a bizarre way it is almost worse that you think the fact they are not violent makes it OK

I didn't put that very well. It's not just the violence which makes pimps wrong.