Nordic Model on the Big Questions tomorrow

[LauraMipsum]

The BBC's political equivalent of Jeremy Kyle is hosting "has the time come to decriminalise sex work" tomorrow morning.

I'm going to be in the audience; if anyone wants to support the Nordic model voice via twitter please do!

I thought Niki Adams came across very well. Good spokeswomen for a section of women who are stigmatised, on the margins of society and would otherwise be denied a voice. I applaud her courage.

I think she didn't really listen to the questions, used each turn to speak as an opportunity to recite her prepared speeches and tried to interrupt much more than anyone else.

I was really pleased that Campbell didn't let her get away with preventing others from speaking. I have a feeling that the way he apolgised to the woman at the end suggested to me she agreed to go on the show only if she wasn't prevented from making her points by the pro-prostitution brigade. There definitely seemed to be something goin on - maybe green room intimidation?

No it looked like she agreed to stay calm and let others speak. She was anything but the overbearing bully that posters here thought she would be. A credit to her organisation and the women she speaks for.

I think I was the only person who suggested she would do what the ECP usually do.
I reckon she may have been told firmly that if she made personal comments about or inimidated other guests she would be asked to leave.

So Laura were you one of the people who got a chance to speak? Did you further enhance your feminist credentials by speaking out against the exploitation of women in a public debate?

I didn't get picked to speak, no.

Just been reading a Heather Brunskell-Evans' blogpost - she was the woman being profusely apologised to by Campbell at the end. Very good nordicmodelnow.org/2017/01/14/decriminalization-and-the-prostitution-of-british-law/

Yes one woman who made the point that it is men's behaviour that needs to change

Indeed. They might try only having sex with women who want to have sex with them without having to be paid.

LOL Lass Now THAT would be 'Progressive'

I think the ECP woman just made the point about health and safety. "Let women work together".

ROFL - how is working together going to stop them getting STDs? Going to comply with regulation about disposal of hazardous waste?

I think you're hung up on the 'Safety' aspect and entirely forgetting the 'Health' one.

My nurse puts on gloves to perform my smear test. She wears clothes that are washed by a commercial laundry to do so, it's performed on a wipe clean bench which is covered by a disposable cover, which then goes in a special bin (all the while gloved). Any tools she uses are sterilised between uses, the bench wiped down with the correct cleaner, and the room is regularly deep cleaned. The actual sample collected is sealed and placed in a clearly labelled bag, where everyone touching it will be similarly gloved and use similar safety procedures. I am a co-operative, still client, who doesn't touch her at all.

Prostitutes are dealing with much greater volume of fluid, which shoots, rather than passively staying put. They are dealing with an active client, and likely not in a clean facility, or on a cleanable bed.

Until they are following hygiene procedures at least as comprehensive as used for a smear test, they cannot be legally meeting H&S regulations, and as such, until that is addressed, I could not support it as a 'real job' or for legalisation.

So because of risky practices in the sex industry you would still advocate barring women from working together and looking out for one another.

As the law stands at the moment, two girls working in a house together is illegal. If one of them drives the other to work or picks them up at the end of the day(some women can have £1000-£2000 in cash on their person after a day) then that counts as the controlling of prostitution and the woman driving can go to jail.

If any one of us drive a sex worker over an international border that under law equates to human trafficking.

You cannot change much of the hygiene. Some women will always offer services without condom and to swallow. You can however reduce the risk of robbery, rape, murder and assault. This is something you could campaign for on behalf of your sisters rather than misguidedly thinking you can drive prostitution out by using the police to arrest men.

Robbery, rape, murder and assault are already against the law gender

And yet the current laws around prostitution still leave women at risk by forcing them to work separately. I think Mumsnet owned and run brothels would be the way to go only under current laws you cannot do that. Imagine a feminist owned and run brothel. All profits went to the workers. You could drastically improve the lives of 10,000s of women.

You can however reduce the risk of robbery, rape, murder and assault. This is something you could campaign for on behalf of your sisters rather than misguidedly thinking you can drive prostitution out by using the police to arrest men.

No, I think I'll decide what I want my feminism to look like, not men. I believe legitimising prostitution is wrong. I also believe that it will increase demand, which will increase trafficking.

So what alternative are you going to offer a single mother, who is raising two children on the proceeds of sex work. A woman living in London, no qualifications and limited English? Currently her kids get an education in UK schools, she can house, feeds and clothe them and take them on holidays. You are going to drive her customers away and force her into a life of poverty. She cannot afford London and will most likely move to her country of origin which means her children lose out on the best chance they had to get a UK based education and escape poverty.

Some of you really live in Ivory Towers and are out of touch with the poorest women and mothers in society

The only way you can think of, GEA, for a woman in that situation to survive is prostitution? Is that really what you think? You would suggest prostitution to women who are likely to find themselves in that position, as the best, or only, option for them and their children?

Wow -You are really fighting dirty now gender

Sometimes it is the only option that the poorest women have. They manage through sex work to obtain a life for them and their children that would otherwise not be possible. They lift their children out of a lifetime of poverty.

You though to satisfy your feminist ideals would remove this choice. Women are not to profiteer or exploit the difference in sexual appetites that exist between the genders. In this feminist utopia no woman will ever use sex ever again to get what she wants.

So, by your reasoning, just because its the only option, then it must be accepted and encouraged? Rather than look to make other options possible?

Sometimes it is the only option that the poorest women have

This is what I would change. Rather than end up with what Germany has, which by the accounts I've read is horrific and no safer, rather than legitimise men's rights to put women in danger and infect them with diseases.

We have a social security system lets make it work best for the people who need it most, rather than make it work for men who want to exploit desperate women.

It's not "work" and it affects all women. I would work to reduce demand by criminalising purchase and campaign to create pathways for women to exit.

Women in poverty are being exploited by these indirect economic forms of coercion.

BTW gender I thought the laws you are referencing were about profiting from prostitution, keeping a brothel and trafficking.
I don't think easyjet is going to be prosecuted as traffickers for simply providing transport to someone who is prostituted. Pimps rarely call themselves pimps - they would go by 'driver', 'boyfriend', 'agent', etc. And as far aso I can see brothel keeping laws aren't exactly enforced either judging by the openly advertised saunas etc. I'd be interested in knowing how many cases there are of prostitutes hiring adjacent rooms being prosecuted under brothel-keeping laws. And some other stats to back up your claims.
I think gender you are just using the horror people naturally have of violence against women and girls to get them to listen uncritically to your claims that don't add up.

What other options are available to a mother of two. Limited education, Russian national, minimal family. Just her alone raising two children in London. If she works one day a week and walks away with £500 and can still claim benefits that is more than she could hope to earn even with a degree and average career. She brings in more than the average poster here but you would deny her that because you do not approve of her using sex and encouraging men to objectify women. You are out of touch with reality. You cannot live in London on supermarket/cleaners wages

Wow I'm going to look at everyone working at my local Lidl in a different light, since they must be prostituting themselves.