Hmmm the trouble with this..is there will be all the great rules...disease free....drug free....legal age...GREAT ...but what about the ones that aren't?? What happenes to them...? They will still be out there..but with less protection than they have now....(if you can call it that)...There will never be a cut and dried with this I don't think...
I do. Here's why:
Many underage girls are currently recruited into the sex trade because they come from violent/abusive homes, and/or homes where they were exposed to sexual violence as children, or sexually exploited themselves. Often, they are runaways. Just to give an example, an ENORMOUS amount of those who are homeless, drug addicted, involved in the sex trade, etc., aged out of foster care at age 18. No family, no education, no money. No hope. Once there, they are "taken" by pimps, who get them addicted to drugs. These pimps claim to be "protecting" these girls from the law, but are really just compromising their access to resources that would allow them to get off the streets. The relationship with the pimp becomes just another violent relationship, fuelled by addiction and dependence. The only one who wins in this scenario is the pimp. Some girls in the sex trade can be as young as 11 or 12.
9/10's of the time, prostitutes themselves are victims, especially when they are underage. They are generally, as I mentioned, looking to fuel an addiction. These are not women looking to buck the law, generally speaking. They should not be prosecuted. They need help. Should johns? Yes. For sexual exploitation, and possibly statutory rape, if applicable. Should pimps? Absolutely. For human trafficking and sexual exploitation. But to prosecute disenfranchised, disempowered, often addicted and oppressed women is absolutely ludicrous.
If we legalize only the act of the prostitute, and not any other participants in the transaction, we protect those who need help, free those who do not (I believe prostitution is rarely a choice, but for those for whom it is, bases are covered), the need for pimps is eliminated, or at least mitigated greatly, and pimps and johns both are seen for what they are--mysoginists praying on women who do not have the resources at their disposal to truly choose for themselves.
IMHO, this is a huge human/women's rights issue that needs to be addressed. It also, IMO, speaks to a huge gap in our society's efforts in the rights of children, both children in foster care, and abused/disenfranchised/sexually exploited youth.
Quoting futureshock:
I don't know how I feel about this.
Neither do I. On one hand I can see where since it happens anyway, it would probably be safer for it to be legal, however I also see the negatives like for example high rates of infidelity.
But now I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
---Umberto Eco
Ashley's Husband Made it Home From a Deployment in Iraq - And Then Tragedy Struck
- futureshock
on Mar. 20, 2010 at 1:50 AM