Prostitution: immoral or in demand

[ramboondiea]

hey escapist, just a little question.

I am in the middle of a assignment on prostitution for my university course, and all my readings on the theoretical perspectives talk heavily of public perceptions, decisions, and opinions as a basis for anti-prostitution arguments.

so i thought i would take a little census of what your opinion on prostitution is and how you think it should be dealt with.

so my questions are;what are your feelings on prostitution?. why do you think people enter prostitutes? if you think there should be harsher punishments in place? should it be legitimised as a business model. what your opinion on managed and tolerance zones?

all so a little side note, here in the UK, prostitution is technically not illegal (i.e paying for sex is legal), just the things associated with it.

Edit- apparently my grammar was 'inexcusable' so I changed it to stop offending people. if anyone is still offended, well I just don't care.

 

[darth.pixie]

If it's a personal choice, not forced, it's fine. It should be legitimized as a business mostly because that way, they can get health check ups without lying and get them more often.

It's one of the oldest jobs in the world and let's be honest, sometimes they're more available.

 

[Kiefer13]

I've personally never seen why it's illegal to pay money for something that it's perfectly legal to give away from free. I'm fairly sure legalising and regulating it would solve many of the problems associated with it in the first place.

 

[rbstewart7263]

I like the way prostitution was handled in the firefly series That would be a bad ass job if I was a female.

 

[Leon Last Lord Shyle]

it can be IE: people on the streets doing it to fuel addictions etc
but of course there are the people who don't have addictions and some even genuinely enjoy the job, its all down to the circumstances... take a look back at several old religions where they actually had temple employed prostitutes, where it was considered a woman's duty to do it.

 

[ramboondiea]

I've personally never seen why it's illegal to pay money for something that it's perfectly legal to give away from free. I'm fairly sure legalising and regulating it would solve many of the problems associated with it in the first place.

it isnt illegal to pay for sex, thats the part of prostitution that is compleatly legal, its things like soliciting, kerb crawling, advertising, those are illegal

 

[Scabadus]

I'm of the mindset that people can do (or sell) what they want with their own body, but forcing somebody into prostitution should be cracked down upon very seriously. Out of interest though - as another UK citizen - what are the 'other things' assosiated with prostitution that are illegal, if prostitution itself isn't?

Edit: you answered me before I asked the question! Will you teach me the ways of the force too?

 

[Jamboxdotcom]

If it's a personal choice, not forced, it's fine. It should be legitimized as a business mostly because that way, they can get health check ups without lying and get them more often.

It's one of the oldest jobs in the world and let's be honest, sometimes they're more available.

my thoughts exactly. prostitution is not necessarily something i agree with, but i feel legalizing it would be very beneficial.

 

[lAljax]

here in brasil, prostitution is not illegal, explotation of it on the other hand is... also, no under age of course.

i support prostitution as a legitmate profession, keeping in mind that advertisements should be restricted, prostitutes should have protection against abusive clients and should be responsible for their and their clients health using condoms, and having regular testings.

people become prostitutes because it's a job that doesn't require a lot of skills, and here where the minimum wage is well below 500 dollars a month is a good way to provide for his or herself.

 

[Zaik]

It's only illegal because the government hasn't bothered to find a way to tax it.

If they'd just set up a clean, legal operation for it they could cut down sharply on crimes related to it while pulling in a decent bit in taxes on it.

But no, it's apparently better to cut the fire department and police force in half than to start opening up legal prostitution businesses.

 

[ramboondiea]

If it's a personal choice, not forced, it's fine. It should be legitimized as a business mostly because that way, they can get health check ups without lying and get them more often.

It's one of the oldest jobs in the world and let's be honest, sometimes they're more available.

Hit the nail on the head here. If its regulated by the government instead of the gangsters it makes it safer and potentially healthier for both worker and customer.

although that may sound good, just look at the state in germany, they have compleatly legalised all aspects, and prostitutes must now be registered (i believe they carry cards aswell)
but as a quote in one of my journals reads "this merely makes the state a pimp" as legalising has done nothing to remove the stigma, nor does it provide the same protection and benefits but is still taxed

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I'm not going to say whether it's moral or immoral. What I will say is that I think that because sex, at it's core, is the process of creating new life (disregarding contraceptives, condoms etc etc etc), it should mean something and shouldn't be reduced to a commodity to be bought and sold. And likewise I think a person should have enough dignity and self-respect not to reduce themselves to the level of a commodity to be bought and sold regardless of the circumstances.
Figure out the right and wrong of it for yourselves.

 

[Wolfram23]

Well first off I've never been with or known a prostitute or anything related.

That said, I think prostitution as a "career" is ok. But unfortunately, as I've heard anyway, most prostitutes are forced into the trade and have "pimps" who take most of the cash and are also often forced to do hard drugs and get addicted to them. That is all very very bad/evil stuff.

But let's say you go to a strip club and offer to take the stripper home for $xxx(x?) amount and she agrees... that seems ok to me. But I don't think working the streets is a decent business at all.

 

[Realitycrash]

I wouldn't call it immoral, but a society where prostitution is legal there are going to be plenty of people that are doing it even though they really don't want to, to do it because they are addicted to drugs, in poverty, or what not.
Then again, in a society where it isn't legal, people still do it, except in worse conditions. Point is; If people truly, really wanna sell themselves, they should be able to do it. But society better be god-damn sure that it is what they really, really want.
Otherwise, these people need help. I can imagine few things as horrible as forced prostitution because of starvation/threats of violence/ drug abuse.

 

[loc978]

I say legalize and regulate it everywhere... and prosecute anyone who tries to force or coerce people into it... the immoral bit isn't the prostitution itself... it's the "pimping". This is one case where carefully regulated big business would be an improvement.

...also, any advertising of it in the UK is illegal? Even the kind of advertisement one has to go looking for specifically (like erotic personals on a website like craigslist)?
That just strikes me as a little silly... I personally think that's how it should work legally. No billboards or street corner ads, just discreet personals with a price attached.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

It's not immoral at all. If someone wants to be a prostitute, they should be allowed to. I see no reason why prostitution is illegal. It's just sex.

 

[ramboondiea]

Well first off I've never been with or known a prostitute or anything related.

That said, I think prostitution as a "career" is ok. But unfortunately, as I've heard anyway, most prostitutes are forced into the trade and have "pimps" who take most of the cash and are also often forced to do hard drugs and get addicted to them. That is all very very bad/evil stuff.

But let's say you go to a strip club and offer to take the stripper home for $xxx(x?) amount and she agrees... that seems ok to me. But I don't think working the streets is a decent business at all.

you know thats a false figure, from the number of studies taken into prostitution it would appear that those forced into it due to drugs is actually the minority, and the majority do it due to the economic climate, or just to earn a living and have little to no involvement in drugs
infact pimps are more prevalent in 'mini-brothels' then street sex-workers.

 

[Shoqiyqa]

Asking whether prostitution's "immoral or in demand" is a false dichotomy, like asking whether fruit is red or crunchy.

Here's an example [http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/jun/12/ukcrime.immigrationpolicy] of an overlap between the sets:

The trade in hundreds of children smuggled into the UK for sexual exploitation, drug smuggling, under-age marriage, street crime and domestic slavery was exposed last night in a government report. The Home Office-commissioned survey identifies 330 cases ...

Most of the victims are girls and most likely to enter the country through airports to supply the underground sex trade or to work as domestic servants;

Physical and sexual violence is often used to control and "break-in" victims, with children gang-raped, beaten and burned with cigarettes;

... and the report admits the figures are "heavily under-represented".

I think the morality question depends largely on who's in charge and who profits from whose body. There are many arguments for legalisation, including that brothels run by collectives for shared good are better for the women working there than any other system currently in use. I tend to let the voluntary organisations working for the interests of the women involved influence my opinion on these matters and treat the newspapers as biased sources of unreliable information, but others may have the reverse position.