Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Feminism: chat

Original poster

Prostitution; help me argue on Facebook

676 replies

MrsTerryPratchett · 13/04/2017 20:56

I'm arguing with a friend on FB about prostitution. She is the most libfem, choosy choice, libertarian person I know. Currently at college so every second post is about gender neutral bathrooms and the like. I almost never engage.

But her argument is that most prostitution is hidden and therefore we can't know that these workers aren't happy, healthy, free and consenting. I've given her the PTSD stats and the violence and rape stats. But she is insisting that these invisible women are all loving it.

Any stats on home-based, self-employed workers? Also, I know that people here have said that workers' organisations are frequently dominated by pimps. Where's the proof of that. And, former workers who are radfem/anti-sex work and have written pieces about it?

Sorry to use your labour Grin

OP posts:
PirateQueenie · 01/05/2017 13:40

Tartle - why on earth would webcamming be detrimental? By all previous arguments and reasons against prostitution - webcamming -

  • No risk of STIs or pregnancy
  • In the safety of their own home
  • Can choose what they do with their bodies
  • Can log off at any time
  • Can kick people out if being abusive (again I never had to do that)
  • Choose own hours of work
independentthinker21 · 01/05/2017 13:42

And if porn were criminalised gender political quandaries would arise. We know more and more women use porn. Would they face a criminal penalty if they were found to be using it? After all, you could not implement a law which made it only illegal for men to use porn.

PirateQueenie · 01/05/2017 13:43

Exactly indy - everyone is man bashing here. What about women who use escorts / webcam girls or porn??

independentthinker21 · 01/05/2017 13:46

I think very very few women use male prostitutes.

But I do more and more women are using porn, and I think somehow that fact has to be factored into any critique of the sex industry. And it certainly has to be considered if we're talking about criminalising people who consume commercialised sex - and that includes porn.

Atenco · 01/05/2017 13:54

more and more women are using porn, and I think somehow that fact has to be factored into any critique of the sex industry

Sorry, but the exploitation of vulnerable young people can not be justified by the fact that women as well as men enjoy it.

Tartle · 01/05/2017 13:54

We have already been through this on this thread when we were talking about replacing prostitutes with robots. The rad gem standpoint which I am endorsing is:

  1. prostitution and sex work is harmful to women
  2. it harms individual women who are placed at risk of violence, exploitation, trafficking etc
  3. it harms women as a class by treating them as the sex class, reinforcing the idea that our role is to provide for the sexual and emotional needs of men over our own. It enables men to see women as objects and contributes to rape culture.

Yes banning porn, web sex etc is incredibly difficult and I am not sure that I have any workable ideas about how it should be implemented. It is a very tough problem.

As a woman who has used porn in the past I do understand that it's a difficult choice and will impact both women and men. I think that the lib fem standpoint on porn was unhealthy and my use of porn was about fetishising my oppression. I still have lots to unpick here but I have made a decision to stop engaging in it on a personal level.

PirateQueenie · 01/05/2017 13:58

Indy - I was talking about women who use female escorts?

GuardianLions · 01/05/2017 13:58

this is an interesting read
The fact that the article is very reactive (against feminists), defensive and full of exaggeration makes it a bit questionable. She is taking an extreme position to make an extreme point.
It is interesting that she seems to be a fan of Maslow.....

independentthinker21 · 01/05/2017 13:58

Sorry, but the exploitation of vulnerable young people can not be justified by the fact that women as well as men enjoy it

And I wasn't attempting to make such a justification.

PirateQueenie · 01/05/2017 13:59

Why is everyone involved in porn a "vulnerable young person"?!

Dervel · 01/05/2017 14:01

Prostitutes are at risk of murder several magnitudes more than the average. How anyone cannot spot the glaring obvious fact prostitution is dangerous is beyond me.

I'm not wedded to the Nordic model, but I'd support giving it a go. The main thing I want to see avoided is German style super brothels. I defy anyone with an ounce of compassion to not look into those and find it terrifying.

I would credit the posters who have advocated for it here with bringing me around to this perspective. I'm not sure I would have arrived at it on my own.

independentthinker21 · 01/05/2017 14:02

1) prostitution and sex work is harmful to women
2) it harms individual women who are placed at risk of violence, exploitation, trafficking etc
3) it harms women as a class by treating them as the sex class, reinforcing the idea that our role is to provide for the sexual and emotional needs of men over our own. It enables men to see women as objects and contributes to rape culture.

Tatle, just be fanciful and imagine we live in a post-patriarchal society. And in that society women produce porn for the enjoyment of women - some of which objectifies men. What if it harmed both men and women to an exactly equal degree wand was produced by men and women to an exactly equal degree?

Would that be OK?

In other words, is there, do you think, an intrinsic problem with all porn or only porn which objectifies women?

independentthinker21 · 01/05/2017 14:06

And if you're going to criminalise porn how would you legally distinguish between porn that is harmful and demeaning to women and porn that isn't?

So, if a woman enjoys some Pandora Blake stuff, would that be OK? But if a man logged on to 'Barely Legal Babes' he'd get done?

What if a woman logged in to Barely Legal Babes'? Would she get done?

I'm not presupposing any answers to these questions, just pointing out that with the net and the ubiquity of porn in our culture, a discussion that was once very simple has become very complicated.

PirateQueenie · 01/05/2017 14:07

We have to get away from such sweeping statements as "sex work is harmful to women" and be more specific. Yes it can be when women are forced into it. To suggest that all men that access porn are degrading women is absurd though.
Before I met my partner I know he used to watch porn a fair bit. He is the gentlest, kindest and sweetest person I've ever met. He doesn't have a bad bone in his body and would never do anything to harm ANYONE. We as women need to show our strength, not play the victim all the time.

scaryclown · 01/05/2017 14:10

sparrowhawk are those statistics from sources that automatically define paid for sex as rape?

TheSparrowhawk · 01/05/2017 14:10

You had bad experiences of men while single and those men were men you didn't know or like? Who were they then? Just random people?

TheSparrowhawk · 01/05/2017 14:10

Which statistics scary?

GuardianLions · 01/05/2017 14:12

Would that be OK?
In my opinion you have no way of ensuring everyone is happy in porn, especially when there is a financial incentive to feign happiness. Masturbating and programming your sexual responses to become desensitised to sexual unhappiness in others is not good.

scaryclown · 01/05/2017 14:12

The one about 85,000+ women raped in their daily business..

independentthinker21 · 01/05/2017 14:13

I agree. In which case women must be castigated for using and producing porn to exactly the same degree as men are.

Tartle · 01/05/2017 14:14

Hmm good question. It is possible that in a post patriarchal society porn could be a neutral moral choice. However whilst porn exists in its current format it hinders the chances of building a post patriarchal society.

All porn is harmful and demeaning to women. The normalisation of porn over the past 30 years has led to extremes of violence and degradation becoming mainstream. People are chasing an increasing high.

This is a high level analysis and I do not mean to imply that every person who uses porn is violent or abusive. Especially as the way in which porn is normalised means that most users (myself included) do not consider the wider implications of their consumption.

TheSparrowhawk · 01/05/2017 14:15

No it's from rape crisis and covers all tales of women, prostitutes and non-prostitutes.

TheSparrowhawk · 01/05/2017 14:15

All rapes ffs. Autocorrect is really annoying me today.

GuardianLions · 01/05/2017 14:16

In which case women must be castigated for using and producing porn to exactly the same degree as men are.
Are you still speaking about the hypothetical post-patriarchal world of your question, or are you dragging the conclusion back to the here and now?