Nothing even remotely resembling a fresh or original thought in this opinion piece regarding legalization of prostitution. Read the whole thing at the venerable Northern Iowan…

What’s so bad about prostitution anyways?
By Nick Krob

Isn’t it time for the world’s oldest profession to become legal? In a world of religious activists fighting to end abortion, crush the thought of gay marriage, abolish birth control and put religion into the schools and take sex education out, though, prostitution will never stand a chance.

Christian America will die before considering the arguments behind legalizing prostitution. Because it’s gross right? It’s immoral! It’s disgusting!

In our modern world, pornography is legal, as is stripping. Both involve nudity and sexual content, and rely on the internal sex-drive in both men and women. Neither serves a positive role in society, other than a gateway for horny America to release their collective hormones. The same can be said for prostitution. What negative trait does prostitution have that porn and stripping doesn’t?

The most common argument behind the legalization of prostitution is taxes. But the issue goes much deeper than that. While the country could benefit from increased income, there are humane issues that are much more crucial to our modern society than dollars and cents.

Opponents to the legalization of prostitution seem to care more about morals than health and safety. Looking at Nevada, where prostitution is legal (in brothels in counties with less than 400,000 people), it is reported by Reade, Richwald and Williams in their AIDS prevention study, that the AIDS rate among workers, more than 350, was zero in 1990, while illegal prostitution was measured to be above 25 percent infected. If prostitution were legalized, measures could be made to have regular health checks, and prevent diseases such as AIDS from spreading. Mandatory use of condoms and birth control could help fight disease and lower unplanned pregnancies, and thus, abortion rates.

Read more at BCLocalNews.com…

No ‘choice’ for women in the sex trade

As a frontline worker at Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter I am not surprised at the series of excuses men use to buy women.

I am happy to see a news article that focus on the “demand” side of prostitution – that is the men. Prostitution exists because of demand. If men stopped buying and selling women, prostitution would be abolished.

We believe that prostitution is a reflection and product of women’s inequality, not a free “choice.”

Thank you for highlighting the men who drive the prostitution industry.

And for highlighting the violence prostituted women face and also that so many of the women cannot live on the abysmal welfare rates and “choose” prostitution because there are no other economic alternatives.

Daisy Kler
Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter

Another look at the prostitution business as it will impact the 2012 Olympics in Vancouver, by someone who calls herself ‘Joyce Arthur.’ Read the whole article at Straight.com…

Facts and fictions about sex trafficking and Vancouver’s 2010 Olympics
By Joyce Arthur

With the 2010 Winter Olympic Games only seven months away, there is growing speculation that trafficking in women will increase significantly in Vancouver. A major new report lays these fears to rest by debunking the alleged link between a boom in sex trafficking and large sporting events.

The 150-page report, Human Trafficking, Sex Work Safety and the 2010 Games, was commissioned by Vancouver’s Sex Industry Worker Safety Action Group (SIWSAG). Warning that ill-informed assumptions about 2010 and trafficking may actually endanger sex workers, its recommendations focus on the real concern: that Games-related street closures and the planned security regime risks displacing sex workers into more dangerous and isolated areas. The report also notes community fears that street-level sex workers may be moved in an effort to “clean up the streets”.

The report echoes the 2009 Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women report on sex trafficking and the 2010 Olympics, which found that “an increase of trafficking in persons into forced prostitution does not occur around sporting events”. Further, the RCMP has stated that there is no evidence to suggest an increase in human trafficking during the Games (Vancouver Sun, January 7).

In the moral crusade against prostitution, trafficking is often wrongly conflated with sex work, a position first argued by the Bush Republicans who refused American funding aid to sex-worker and anti-trafficking organizations that support the decriminalization of sex work. However, trafficking in persons involves the coerced movement of a person into a situation of forced labour, while sex work is the consensual exchange of sexual services for money.

The great majority of sex workers are not trafficked or controlled by “pimps”. Most are in business for themselves or work through an agency, and most work indoors, not on the street where it’s far more dangerous. Conflating trafficking with sex work is wrong and, worse, can mask the real issues of violence and exploitation that occur within both trafficking and sex work. For example, trafficking victims in other economic sectors, such as construction or farm work, are ignored in the moral panic over sex trafficking.

An interesting commentary making the case against prostitution. Read the whole article at Straight.com…

Why prostitution, the world’s oldest oppression, must be stamped out
By Trisha Baptie

The conversation that pits current prostitute against former prostitute, indoor versus outdoor, and drug-addicted versus Gucci-addicted has gone on for too long. I have fallen into all those categories. With female “choice” being the only side discussed, let’s subvert that conversation and ask the root question: As a society do we think men should be able to pay to sexually access women’s bodies?

Do we really think that is a sign of an egalitarian society?

One of the most “sex-positive” things you can do is make sure men cannot buy sex, because the buying of sex is violence against women and is a direct deterrent to women’s equality.

Women’s silence and “consent” can be bought—I remember how much mine cost—and almost 100 percent want out now. Allowing a minority of women in prostitution to argue “choice” on the backs of the majority who are out there, in perfect storm of oppression, neglect, abuse, and human trafficking, is absurd. Instead of offering them a hand to reach their full potential, we offer them up to feed the demand for paid sex whilst “choice” is argued.

Prostitution commodifies women’s bodies; this is sexual and social subordination, wherein all women are seen as a subclass of being. Tolerating prostitution affects everyone, because the inherent inequality in prostitution becomes a reference point for sexual and social relations, which are not rooted in equality, fairness, or respect.

It is not the prostituted women we must penalize but rather the men who demand access to them. Prostitution is the oldest form of patriarchal oppression, which is why we must hold accountable the men who pay for sex.

I remember working indoors and men calling in and ordering a woman: “I want brunette, small boobs, will do ____ or Asian, round face, petite.” You get the idea. How is it equality if women can be reduced to what amounts to ordering a pizza and picking the toppings? How are those men respecting, honouring, and valuing women?

What I remember about my years as a prostituted woman was how much I tried to find something empowering in what I found myself doing.

That by choosing who raped me, based on their ability to pay, I was empowered.

That by consenting to the abuse, I was free from it.

That by caving in to the demands of patriarchy; by working hard to look like what they wanted, talk like they wanted; and when submitting to sex on their terms, for which I got money, that I had somehow bested them and was now in control of them.

But I was not, for I remember how much I flinched when they moved too quickly, how I would lay under them and in my imagination be anywhere else. How they always seemed to have a sob story for why they needed to buy me, but my sob story of not wanting to be under them, not wanting to have them in my mouth, was never as urgent a need as theirs.

A True Confessions column from the UK.  There are some excellent insights in the article, so please take the time and read the entire piece at The Daily Mail Online…

I was addicted to call girls
A respected script writer explains how he succumbed to the lure of paying for sex
By Andy Bodle

There’s little doubt which movie will be the talk of the Edinburgh Film Festival this month.

The Girlfriend Experience, directed by Oscar-winner Steven Soderbergh, tells the story of a high-class New York call girl.

Doubtless the film will characterise prostitution as glamorous, a world of silk sheets and fancy lingerie.

But I have to confess to knowing the truth about this sordid profession – because eight years ago, I succumbed to the lure of paying for sex.

Over the course of 18 months, I spent all my savings – £15,000 – on high-class escort girls. Before I go any further, let me make it clear that I am not in the least proud of this.

I’m ashamed of exploiting women, and of having supported a degrading, dangerous industry. I don’t expect anyone to condone what I did.

But now, after many years have passed, I want to explain why I was propelled into that addiction – and why so many other men are, too.

…

Without really intending to, by 2000, I had saved up several thousand pounds. At about this time, I read an article in a magazine about escorting.

I’d never seriously thought about paying for female company: my image of the sex industry was of kerbcrawlers and kneetremblers in needle-strewn alleyways.

But, according to the article, it was very safe and very clean. You visited the girls in plush, rented apartments; you were paying for companionship, not sex.

It was like going on a really expensive date, but one where you were guaranteed a goodnight kiss.

That night, I went online and looked up a few escort agencies. I was scared, certainly, and a little ashamed. Was I really capable of this?

But everything the article said seemed to be true. I looked at my empty bed. I looked at my empty diary. And I looked at my bank statement. Then, heart pounding furiously, I picked up the phone.

As I waited for an answer, a thousand terrifying thoughts flashed through my head. I was scared of what my friends and family would think if they found out.

I was scared of being arrested (I was unaware, at the time, that what I was doing wasn’t technically illegal). And I was scared that the girl I arranged to visit would turn out not to be a girl at all, but an eastern European thug waiting to rob me.

Then the person at the other end of the line picked up. It was a female voice – calm, professional, friendly.

She asked me who I wanted to see, when, and for how long. It felt like booking an appointment at the hairdresser.

I made more effort for that first illicit rendezvous than I ever had for a real date. I went to the gym. I used a tanning machine. I had a haircut, bought some new clothes, and read all the papers so I’d have something interesting to talk about.

It sounds ridiculous that I prepared for such a sordid sexual transaction in such a way, but I really believed the disclaimer on the website: ‘We offer only a legitimate introductory service for beautiful women. Anything that takes place afterwards is a matter of choice between two consenting adults.’

Two days later, at 8pm sharp, I arrived outside an anonymous-looking flat in a well-to-do area of London.

Read the entire article here.

Listen to this interesting, brief interview at NPR’s website….

Prostitution A Difficult Job To Escape

Tell Me More, May 18, 2009 · For many prostitutes, the prospect of escaping the industry seems impossible or at the very least too dangerous to endure. Jackie McReynolds is a former prostitute and now executive director of the Angels Project Power, a program that helps women leave prostitution. McReynolds explains how the program works and Nakita Harrison, who is enrolled in the project, shares her experience and her attempt to turn her life around.

Read the whole column at The Las Vegas Review Journal…

Taxing prostitution distracts lawmakers from the real issue: Fixing the system
by John L Smith

It’s mere chance that brings me to write about the unlikely possibility of legalizing prostitution on the same day the state legislators gathered in Carson City to commence the 75th session of Nevada’s lawmaking body.

Given the Legislature’s history of, ahem, special interest constituent service, your skepticism about the nature of their true calling is understandable. A Legislature that can’t consistently clear the path to provide basic services for the citizenry but has time to embrace tax relief for art-collecting casino billionaires and allows hundreds of millions in property taxes to slip away in the name of “green building” tax breaks for those gaming bosses, is bound to be mistaken for a bunch of brothel workers on occasion.

The question facing us today is: Will our legislators defy the historical stereotype and break with tradition this time? Will they acknowledge the genuine need and address complex issues with alacrity and a greater sense of purpose?

Or will they squabble and delay and practice the petty political games that have become the Legislature’s trademark?

Which brings me back to all the stories published recently about the idea of legalizing prostitution as a way of generating tax revenue. To no one’s surprise, Mayor Oscar Goodman has had the audacity to suggest such a thing. (He’s been suggesting it for a decade now.) He quotes top brothel sources — and one cannot doubt he has only the very best brothel sources at his disposal — who contend legalizing prostitution could annually generate upward of $200 million. State Sen. Bob Coffin, the veteran Democrat, recently said the time was right to consider all potential revenue streams. (Prostitution is illegal in Clark County, and under state law can only be practiced legally in counties with a population lower than 400,000.)

Some trying to sell the idea might liken it to the hotel room tax, which is paid mostly by tourists. Perhaps its promoters will take to calling it the “Womb Tax.”

Others have said organizing the prostitutes and centralizing them in one area could be good for society. (Yes, that’s why the world is flocking to Pahrump — because of all the good that legalized brothels have done for Nye County.)

So much media has been devoted to the subject I am left to wonder whether we shouldn’t just accept our fate. Perhaps those high-minded legislators who dream of a better Nevada that doesn’t come in behind Guatemala when it comes to social services, should refrain from doing the heavy intellectual lifting necessary to expand the state’s tax structure, and simply “broaden” it instead.

Not that I endorse legalizing prostitution for the purpose of taxation. It’s about as morally backward an idea as I’ve heard. It’s the depth of desperation — even in a recession.

It’s ethically bankrupt, a real sellout in a state whose lawmakers, with a few exceptions, haven’t mustered the collective will to tax businesses and banks and big mining. Big casino companies, who love to bray about how much they pay into state coffers, pay far more gaming taxes by percentage once they set foot outside Nevada.

Some neat insights into efforts to regulate the escort agency business from a lady who runs an escort service.  The Journal Star reports…

Escort service owner speaks out on bill

A bill introduced by Sen. Mark Christensen of Imperial that would require escort services to be licensed — a costly, work-intensive process that would likely put a stop to many of them — prompted one escort service owner to speak her mind.

She calls herself Reese DeBoccio, not her legal name, and she has run Allure Entertainment for 10 years. She wonders why Christensen has not contacted owners of escort services that are operating legally to get their cooperation and information on making positive changes.

The problems are with the entertainers and the clients not willing to follow the laws already in place, she said.

The major thing she teaches those new to the business is that they are first and foremost “incredible listeners” and ego builders, she said.

“Escort does not mean prostitution,” she said. And the majority of people who work in the business are not trying to break the law.

The “visual entertainers” at Allure are not into getting drugs, or attention from men, she said. They are into paying their bills and supporting their kids.

Sexuality is a part of human existence in all cultures, DeBoccio said. And control of escort services should be done through reasonable measures that allow for safe activity.

If women who work for legitimate escort services lose confidentiality, the most appealing would not want to be involved, she said, and the more unscrupulous who have nothing to lose would become the new pool of entertainers.

The women who work for Allure are private contractors, she said, and she is the manager, trainer, coach and protector.

“This is an ugly business,” she said. “You’ve got to run it safely.”

Some insights into the effectiveness of publicizing clients from Heleen Mees, a feminist ‘Dutch economist and lawyer.’  Read her whole article at The Japan Times…

Fight prostitution by punishing the solicitors
By HELEEN MEES

Prostitution is virtually the only part of the personal services industry in the Netherlands that works. One can’t get a manicure in Amsterdam without booking an appointment two weeks in advance, but men can buy sex anytime — and at an attractive price. The legalization of prostitution in October 2000 merely codified a long-standing Dutch tradition of tolerance toward buying and selling sex. But is legalization the right approach?

Even in the Netherlands, women and girls who sell their bodies are routinely threatened, beaten, raped, and terrorized by pimps and customers. In a recent criminal trial, two German-Turkish brothers stood accused of forcing more than 100 women to work in Amsterdam’s red-light district (De Wallen). According to the attorney who represented one of the victims, most of these women come from families marred by incest, alcohol abuse and parental suicide. Or they come from countries in Eastern Europe or Southeast Asia and have fallen victim to human trafficking, lured by decent job offers or simply sold by their parents.

These women are Amsterdam’s leading tourist attraction (followed by the coffee shops that sell marijuana). But an estimated 50-90 percent of them are actually sex slaves, raped on a daily basis with police idly standing by. It is incomprehensible that their clients are not prosecuted for rape, but Dutch politicians argue that it cannot be established whether or not a prostitute works voluntarily.

Appalled by their daily routine, police officers from the Amsterdam vice squad have asked to be transferred to other departments. Only this year, the city administration has started to close down some brothels because of their ties to criminal organizations.

According to a study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, the average age of death of prostitutes is 34. In the United States, the rate at which prostitutes are killed in the workplace is 51 times that of the next most dangerous occupation for women, working in a liquor store. Other studies show that nine out of 10 prostitutes urgently want to escape the job. Almost half have attempted suicide at least once.

An excellent insight into why working girls (and the men who patronize them) aren’t particularly anxious for legalized prostitution in Las Vegas city limits.  Read the whole blog entry at The LA Times…

Vegas prostitutes: Lukewarm on legalization

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman kept the idea for a red-light district for downtown Vegas alive. At his news conference yesterday the mayor told reporters: “I’ve met with folks from that industry who make a very compelling argument that it could generate $200 million a year in tax dollars, and that would buy a lot of textbooks, pay for a lot of teachers.” Interestingly, the prostitutes legal and illegal do not seem very excited by the potential of plying their trade in Vegas, at least, within the sanction of the law.

You see, when the mayor refers to “that industry” he does not mean he met with hookers. He met with representatives of the brothel industry and not actual prostitutes. I reached a prostitute at the Chicken Ranch to get her opinion of legal prostitution in Vegas. She asked that her name not be used but e-mailed:

“Since many customers are critically concerned with discretion and prostitutes prefer their ‘freedom,’ I believe the idea may appear much more appealing than the reality of the situation and what is necessary to make it happen”

As for what is necessary, she adds:

“I suspect that many in favor of legalizing prostitution may not realize all the checks and balances necessary to do so. Legalizing prostitution in Las Vegas may benefit the city as long as we recognize that legal prostitutes must remain in a ‘quarantined’ brothel where condoms remain a requirement for all sexual services, the ladies are tested for AIDS and STDs.”

The first point is the one I want to focus on. At Southern Nevada brothels, sex workers are quarantined, which means (with only certain specific exceptions) that they are not allowed to leave the brothel property after getting tested for diseases. A week spent unable to leave the property is not unusual. Many workers, leaving children behind, stay for a month. When I lived at the Chicken Ranch for a story, I found being unable to ever leave the property one of the most oppressive aspects of life at a brothel.