How is it possible to be a feminist and support the sex industry?

[Molesworth]

I've just been reading this article from the guardian. Young girls are being sold to brothel keepers and made to take steroids so that they look older than they really are.

All my instincts say that the sex industry is just plain wrong. I know some feminists think it's OK (although obviously they wouldn't support practices like those described in the article). Are there any sex industry supporting feminists here? What's the rationale?

What I don't understand - and I have read the thread, honestly - is why anyone would defend prostitution. "I will defend to the last breath in my body your right to sell your body for pennies to any passing inadequate man, and for you to give hals those pennies to your pimp, who will take even more of them if you don't turn enough tricks" What sort of a standpoint is that for a thoughtful, educated woman to take?

Is it OK then if a woman sells her body for lots of money (rather than pennies) to adequate men (rather than inadequate ones) and keeps all the money (rather than give it to a pimp)?

I'm not sure, CotedeAzur - when you come across this scenario, let me know and I'll think about it.

seeker, I think that is the case with MissHoneyMoon and many other prostitutes. It is ignoring reality to think that everybody is forced to do it and that there is little money in it.

Anyone who thinks prostitutes like MissHM are in the majority is deluded imo. Even if prostitutes like MissHM make up half of all prostitutes, what about the other half? It's extremely depressing that so many here seem to think that the suffering of so many women (and girls and men and boys) whose 'choice' to enter prostitution is really no choice at all is a price worth paying to protect MissHM's privileged position.

The thing is, condemning, stigmatizing and forcing out of business the women (and men) who are selling sex without having been coerced into doing so will not prevent the abuse and exploitation of other people, any more than shutting down the entire catering industry would prevent people traffickers from enslaving the desperate for industries other than the sex industry. That organised criminal gangs treat human beings as a disposable commodity is a huge social problem that is not exclusively about the sex industry.

seeker "And prostitution is absolutely nothing to do with female sexual desire".

That is probably the main reason I would never want my daughter to be a prostitute. She would equate sex with "pleasing a man", a man's desire, and (let's be honest here) sticking it in. None of that has anything to do with female sexual desire. Real sex feels gorgeous for men and women equally, (not every single time with my man, granted ) but its not something that only men want or need, but the kind of sex that some men want:, the emotion-free, effortless "stick it in" sex is available from prostitutes for a few quid.

slhilly, I wasn't "happy" to wipe elderly people's bottoms, but as I said, it didn't touch any part of me deep inside, where it counts. Please don't ask me to give a link to an explanation about the "place deep inside where it counts". It's connected to self-esteem and integrity, and the ability to enjoy sex on equal terms with a partner.

SGB, regarding your last post, two wrongs don't make a right. Just because there are other exploitative and dangerous industries doesn't mean prostitution is ok. You can't say "see, that's bad too!" as a reason for justifying prostitution. As for answers, I don't have any. De-criminalisation comes with its own set of problems, out-lawing completely comes with another set of problems. As I said, its a sick industry.
But from my point of view this is a discussion about prostitution itself and I have no idea why women are defending it.

I cannot believe the term "man-hating" has come up on this discussion. A man who buys another human being's body to do what he likes with is mentally sound, apparently. Not woman-hating at all. He thinks the industry is fine. So does he think its a problem if a man pays his own daughter to stick their dick in her?
But a woman who questions his right to do that is a man-hater

The only argument I've heard so far in favour of prostitution is that a tiny percentage of women are doing it as a pro-active choice. Of that tiny percentage, lets get rid of a few more of them, like that Belle-de-Jour lady who obviously has father issues, so lets get rid of all the ones with circumstances making them emotionally vulnerable and you end up with an even tinier percentage of women who have "chosen" prostitution. WHy on earth should I defend an entire industry that encompasses everything from sex-slavery to abuse to death on the evidence of a few happy hookers?
And those happy hookers may not be deluding themselves about their own motives for being a prostitute but if they think the men that pay them see them as a person then they are seriously delusional. A Japanese aquaintance of mine worked as a hotelier in Thailand and the hotel industry and sex industry are closely related. He said that men would buy a woman and because they'd paid for her body for a set amount of time they belived they could do what they liked with it during that time. They used to give the woman black eyes or whatever they felt like. They are paying, right? So her body belongs to him.
Not all men are like that of course (although strangely, a high percentage of men who use prostitutes are like that) , but women who think that they are ok in this job must realise that the only reason they're ok is because the real sickos have gone off to buy a poorer, more vulnerable woman. And even the "respectful" men who buy a woman still see the woman's body as his. And as a feminist, I can't defend an industry where almost all the buying of bodies is done by men, and the selling of bodies is done by women.

WHoever said MissMH was an academic should read his arguments. They were full of holes.
Including this gem that Molesworth found:

"There are underlying issues of education, economic disadvantages, education etc . Simply suggesting that prostitution has caused the hardship for these women does not address the underlying problems.""

We're not saying prostitution has created the economic hardship for women. Economic hardship for women is everywhere in our society, just look around you. We're saying that the economic hardships that women experience in our society due to society being sexist (i.e men earning more, child-rearing and care-work carried out by women being largely unpaid, men getting more promotions because they don't have babies, ridiculously huge divide between rich and poor etc) leads to women ending up in prostitution because it seems like the best option in the face of all other options. Prostitution exists because the economic power imbalance is so strongly in favour of men that it makes economic sense for some women to go down the prostitution route. MissMH has misunderstood the connection between the feminization of poverty in society and those factors leading to women becoming prostitutes. We need to keep working reducing the power gap between men and women in society. Imagine a society where women had more money and power than men. The sex industry would disappear (well, apart from that minority who are doing it as a pro-active choice, but if society changed in women's favour so that women earned a lot more than they do now in all other industries I'm sure the amount of women who "choose" prostitution would reduce dramatically too). Why? Because if prostitution earned less than the minimum wage (let's say you earned 3 pound an hour) I think it would honestly be the last job on earth that women would choose. Way down on the list after wiping edlerly-people's bums.

Sakura: It's an oversimplification of commercial sex to say that men are just 'buying a woman to stick it in'. There is a large category of willing sex workers who specialise in BDSM which involves little or no fucking and mostly the men are paying to be tied up and beaten. Again, stigmatizing and criminalising these people does nothing to help the victims of trafficking or those working in coercive unsafe conditions.

ALso, something that No-one on this thread is addressing is that abuse of the vulnerable in prostitution is not all about misogyny, that the young and vulnerable sex workers doing it against their will or to feed a drug habit, are often young men and teenage boys as well as girls and young women.

SGB,

But again, paying to be tied up and beaten is part of the man's sexual desires, nothing to do with the women's. So when I say "stick it in", what I mean is "do whatever the man desires sexually".

And even though I realise its not just women who are being bought, it has to be acknowledged that its always the men who do the buying. I think its a feminist perogative to fight for children's rights as well as women's rights. When I went on holiday to Thailand it was f*cking sick to see all these huge white beach-whale sex-tourist men from Western countries approach little primary-school aged Thai boys on the beach. As long as the wealth and power remains firmly in the hands of men then all these forms of prostitution will continue.

I can't argue with you about the solutions, because I know you're right on that point, and I'm not sure there are any. You say that stigmatizing and criminalising these people is not going to help the women; I believe that. But acting as though its perfectly reasonable for a man to be paying a woman for her body is also not going to help the situation either. Its not reasonable, its just the result of a patriarchal society. And yes, I'm sure if women did start to gain power in society, children would then begin to play a bigger role in the sex industry than they already do.

sakura - "But again, paying to be tied up and beaten is part of the man's sexual desires, nothing to do with the women's"

does your array of knowledge also span to BDSM, have you been in the scene long, which clubs do you visit?

Your statement suggests you know nothing about the subject, I'm speaking as someone who knows many Pro-Dommes (as a friend, not a customer!).

I think though, to a certain extent, stigmatizing the buyers could help. Let's make them feel ashamed. Let's educated men so that the normal, reasonable men think begin to agree with feminists and understand the complete de-humanizing effect of selling one person's body to another. Perhaps then, instead of the "wink wink, nudge nudge, Wey-hey-hey!" attitude that some men have about sex-work, they'd begin to actively look down on men who- for whatever reason- think paying for sex is appropriate. Instead they could say "MAn, don't do that. How would you feel if it was your sister or your daughter in there..?"

StepSideways, sorry, what's your point? That some women enjoy BDSM therefore prostitution is justified?

Oh, you thought I meant that women didn't enjoy BDSM? Sorry for being unclear. WOmen have all sorts of sexual preferences, I just doubt that a man paying for a prostitute's services is particularly interested in which preferences each particular woman has.

TSH - are you suggesting that legalization will make prostitution safer then, as legalizing abortion did?

Because I repeat once again, the evidence from places where prostitution has been legalized shows that the illegal trade grows (see previous post about Australia).

So legalization does not decrease the illegal trade and therefore does not make prostitution safer for the women, girls, men and boys involved.

And SGB, in response to your "let's not forget the men" remark, in almost all of my posts on this I have been careful not to exclude the (much smaller number of) men and boys involved in prostitution. But let's not pretend that this isn't mainly about women being used by men.

Sakura, I agree with everything you have said. There is no simple solution to this because it's all tied up with entrenched, global gender inequality and therefore 'solving' it means fighting against those inequalities on all fronts. We all agree that prostituted women (and girls and men and boys) should not be criminalized or stigmatized. I support the Nordic model - imperfect though it is - because I think it's important for the state to send out the message that it is not OK for human beings to be treated like this. We need a culture change: one in which treating human beings as if they are pieces of meat is not seen as inevitable, "a bit of a laugh" or "boys being boys".

sakura - yes, that was my understanding of what you said, i do think a lot of what you say makes sense, but, all the Pro-Dommes I know get paid and do enjoy their work, if i misunderstood then i apologise...

hello, I'm still following, but not had chance to join in. I found a really interesting post by an ex-prostitute about why she is pro-abolition of prostitution and though it would be good to bring it into the discussion. Her thoughts represent some that we haven't heard in this debate. We've had MissHM's happy-with-the-work perspective, but this is an ex prostitute writing from the other side of the fence. I think she really highlights why we don't hear from people like this so much, they are in pain and trying to sort their lives out and don't have time/energy/resources to fight a public debate.

Some of what she says....

"One of the major reasons that I am pro-abolition is because I live on a daily basis with the damage that the sex trade did to me.

But more, I know too many wonderful, strong and highly courageous women who live every day with the trauma forced into their bodies and minds by the sex trade.

And like most women who manage to exit, I know deep inside my heart there are women and girls who had so much to give the world who did not survive.

The sex trade is a system that built on that many of the prostituted women and girls will commit suicide, will lose their mental health, will get so ill from STDs they cannot continue, will have parts of their body wrecked by the violence, will become addicted to drugs, will be the living dead ? and of course will murdered by johns or profiteers.

And some people dare to call that ?sex work?. I have no words for that, except look exited prostituted women in the eye and make that this damage is just the risk of the ?job?.

But, usually when speaking of ?sex work?, exited prostituted women are excluded from the discussion, they are too full of rage, have too much pain, too much raw grief ? they are too bloody real."

Ironically I'm currently in the process of trying to get the police to accept what I believe is some evidence of attempted human trafficking, and so far they have passed the buck first to a website which doesn't even deal with that sort of thing, and then to someplace even more useless, they dont seem to want to be given this evidence, it's very frustrating...

Christ, step, you'd think that's something the police would take very seriously wouldn't you

i know, i can't believe it, im asking the poppy people if they have a better contact in the police, the apathy is disgusting

Just realized I'm way behind the discussion and dittany's already talking about the post in a separate thread over here sorry about that. Feel free to ignore.

why she taking it to another thread?

I've read every single post in this thread.. now getting left behind!