Should brothels be banned?

[LongRider]

~~~~snip~~~

most prostitutes are in the business of selling a fantasy to their customers, and the sex industry spends alot of money getting its message out.

The same 'selling a fantasy' can be said for writers, movie stars, performers in general and other professions. So what.

[ElizabethB.]

To the question of the topic...

And in my pretty innocent mind, I do not imagine any parent would come to their children and say I was a whore if they could help it.

ChillyPolly, I agree with you that no woman should be a prostitute. I mean come on! Women worked so hard to get rights to work and to have some degree of independence; choosing to sell yourself instead is spitting in the face of that.

Women worked hard to get rights to work? What women? The rich women who did not have to work to provide in the first place? Women have been working to provide for themselves and their family throughout history.

You are basically saying that being free simply means acting the way you would like.

[ChillyPolly]

On other threads you've mentioned ... [snip]

Do not import disputes from other threads. I do not want to get into a discussion on what I did not did not say on another thread on another tropic. It's dumb.

[ChillyPolly]

The same 'selling a fantasy' can be said for writers, movie stars, performers in general and other professions. So what.

Merely that fantasy is not fact. That eager happy hooker might not be as eager or happy as she seems. Etc. etc. etc.

[ElizabethB.]

Merely that fantasy is not fact. That eager happy hooker might not be as eager or happy as she seems. Etc. etc. etc.

You know, I had my nails done by this awful woman, she didn't smile or talk, yawned, and to top that, kept looking out the window. Damn her. I wonder if she was just in it for the money.

But I have enjoyed my hands all my life... Why would she not?

I wish she would have at least pretended!

Nail salons are bad.

[ChillyPolly]

What exactly is the problem? Prostitution or the abuse of prostitutes?

Frankly, I find it hard to distinguish the two. But even if one could make this distinction, the JOHN is never in a position to make that distinction. The John is NEVER in a position to know if his money will be used for trafficking and abuse, for bribery or corruption of the system. Hence, the JOHN is always behaving irresponsibly.

A man should find his own woman, and accept responsibility for how he treats her. Men patronise prostitutes because they don't want to to this. I do not think it is acceptable for a man to delegate his responsibilities to a pimp. Nor do I find it acceptable to delegate to the government the policing of the pimps that your money keeps in business. The better solution is not to be part of the problem.

Legalizing prostitution in Germany, allowed them to have access to health/unemployment insurance, penisons, and legal protection. They have to pay taxes, which in turn gives them the ability to get a bank account and a credit score, which allows many prostitutes to get out of the job and open a buisness or become independent.

But it didn't stop human trafficking and other forms of illegal prostitution.

Sounds like your saying that it does not matter if the number of women being abused has increased, as long as there are more token "happy hookers" (even they, probably not so happy) to serve as the poster girls of the sex industry.

[JonSnow4President]

Frankly, I find it hard to distinguish the two. But even if one could make this distinction, the JOHN is never in a position to make that distinction. The John is NEVER in a position to know if his money will be used for trafficking and abuse, for bribery or corruption of the system. Hence, the JOHN is always behaving irresponsibly.

A man should find his own woman, and accept responsibility for how he treats her. Men patronise prostitutes because they don't want to to this. I do not think it is acceptable for a man to delegate his responsibilities to a pimp. Nor do I find it acceptable to delegate to the government the policing of the pimps that your money keeps in business. The better solution is not to be part of the problem.

Sounds like your saying that it does not matter if the number of women being abused has increased, as long as there are more token "happy hookers" (even they, probably not so happy) to serve as the poster girls of the sex industry.

What a wonderfully enlightened take on things. I'm sure that stance gets you so many women who want to be your possession.

[TimJames]

Prostitution almost always leads to abuse and very often it goes hand in hand with human trafficking.

Legalizing something doesn't make it less harmful.

[Lemonking]

Frankly, I find it hard to distinguish the two. But even if one could make this distinction, the JOHN is never in a position to make that distinction. The John is NEVER in a position to know if his money will be used for trafficking and abuse, for bribery or corruption of the system. Hence, the JOHN is always behaving irresponsibly.

A man should find his own woman, and accept responsibility for how he treats her. Men patronise prostitutes because they don't want to to this. I do not think it is acceptable for a man to delegate his responsibilities to a pimp. Nor do I find it acceptable to delegate to the government the policing of the pimps that your money keeps in business. The better solution is not to be part of the problem.

Sounds like your saying that it does not matter if the number of women being abused has increased, as long as there are more token "happy hookers" (even they, probably not so happy) to serve as the poster girls of the sex industry.

You make it sound like a marriage/relationship is nothing more than a man owning a woman like a pimp.

Human trafficking and forced prostituion does matter and that's why it is illegal, but a person who chose to become a prostitute shouldn't be criminalized because someone else breaks the law.

[Deicida]

Are you talking about that book? I think there is some academic work that disagrees with it. Is there something better about the stats models used in the Bell Curve and the data used in it that makes it better than other work?

What kind of metric are using to asses "better interaction". If there is no such metric, then how do you conclude "on average" it's better?

Yes, I am referring to the book. A lot of work written in response to it criticizes the intentions of the authors without even addressing the data. A fair number of responses that do contain data and statistics are written in support of the book. You should have a look at the Reception section of the Wikipedia article I linked to or do more in-depth research if you're interested.

I'm making the assumption that intelligence factors into the quality of an interaction.

Now you've pissed me off. I've never been a surgeon but I've scrubbed toilets so f*** y***. Scrubbing toilets is not glam by any means but it's honest work and creates a clean environment. Because of my work history I respect the people who do work like that and treat them respectfully too.

I've met surgeons that are total and complete assholes so please, don't tell me I should respect someone because of what they do. It's who they are that counts. And that goes for sex workers as well as the toilet scrubber.

Well that's not very polite. I'm sure there are surgeons who are assholes, but there are whores and custodians too. Unless you have some evidence that the likelihood of someone being an asshole increases with income, yours is not a good argument.

ETA: "It's who they are that counts" - like I said, I'm generalizing, not talking about specific people. I've also mentioned that there are exceptions to the rule, but using profanity isn't exactly helping your argument

[ChillyPolly]

You make it sound like a marriage/relationship is nothing more than a man owning a woman like a pimp.

You are trying to make it sound like I made it sound that way. But that's just a big fat stupid lie on your part.

[ChillyPolly]

What a wonderfully enlightened take on things. I'm sure that stance gets you so many women who want to be your possession.

I said nothing whatsoever that implies that women are "possessions". Treating them as commodities is precisely what I am objecting to.

However, one woman tried to put me in a cage and feed me avocados. But I flew away. I miss the avocados though.

[Bryanfury]

Prostitution almost always leads to abuse and very often it goes hand in hand with human trafficking.

Legalizing something doesn't make it less harmful.

Neither does criminalising it; see drugs, prostitution, prohibition...

[Theon {HUNGRY WOLF} Stark]

Well well The Morality Police is back in full force. Carry on Moral Hounds.

[JonSnow4President]

Yes, I am referring to the book. A lot of work written in response to it criticizes the intentions of the authors without even addressing the data. A fair number of responses that do contain data and statistics are written in support of the book. You should have a look at the Reception section of the Wikipedia article I linked to or do more in-depth research if you're interested.

I'm making the assumption that intelligence factors into the quality of an interaction.

Well that's not very polite. I'm sure there are surgeons who are assholes, but there are whores and custodians too. Unless you have some evidence that the likelihood of someone being an asshole increases with income, yours is not a good argument.

Well, we all know BMW and Mercedes owners are ALL assholes behind the wheel. And while I don't have data, that has to be correlated with income.

[kimim]

To all those who say legalizing prostitution won't work, listen to the lyrics of "Santa Baby," from 1953. The guy gives the woman a mink, the deed to a platinum mine, and a ring. In return, she'll be faithful, and give him sex. That's a comic take on marriage, 1950s style, and it depicts marriage as a monogamous, socially acceptable prostitute-client relationship, all in a Christmas song, yay!

Legalizing works wonders, lol.

[Deicida]

Well, we all know BMW and Mercedes owners are ALL assholes behind the wheel. And while I don't have data, that has to be correlated with income.

Poe's law be damned. Are you being serious or not?

[TimJames]

Neither does criminalising it; see drugs, prostitution, prohibition...

Prohibition needs some explaining. Before prohibition was passed, alcoholism was rampant in the US. It was common for a man to get payments at the end of the month, go to the bar, drink away his entire paycheck, and leave his family to go hungry. Remember, the people who pushed for prohibition were mostly Progressives (the same group that pushed for suffrage and tried to outlaw child labor). After it was passed, alcohol consumption was cut back quite a bit. Eventually it was repealed, but not because it failed: it was repealed because people changed their mind (which is how a democracy works).

As for drugs, I don't get why people consider the war on drugs unnecessary. Meth, heroine, and crack are all proven to be extremely dangerous to human health and to cause rampant crime. Criminalizing them has cut back their use significantly.

At a certain point, the lawmakers have to draw a line when people go too far.

[TimJames]

Well well The Morality Police is back in full force. Carry on Moral Hounds.

Morality is relative. Something that is immoral to to one person would be considered holy to another person (human sacrifice for example [aztecs have strong views on this]).

That being said, you yourself are more overly moralistic than you accuse me of being, giving your monolithic ranting over "sexual liberation". Remember that in the beginning of the 20th century feminists were the ones who spearheaded making prostitution illegal. Josephine Butler is one such example.

[JonSnow4President]

Poe's law be damned. Are you being serious or not?

Slightly serious about expensive car drivers being assholes in higher proportions. But more just joking in regards to wealth being tied to assholeism.