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And another political sex scandal. When will this ridiculous, hypocritical, tittering at salacious stories, political backstabbing bullshit end? WHEN?? Two notable Democrats "smeared" by sex scandals (does ANYONE out there smell Karl Rove??? Hello, it's an election year w/ the Democrats primed to win big), two young women just trying to earn a few bucks harassed by law enforcement. Wow, people like sex. Wow, older men will pay outrageous prices for sex with young, cute, white girls. Wow, a young cute white girl can make in ten minutes what her friends w/ straight jobs make in a day, or a week. Wow, politicians will use law enforcement, the media, and sex to smear one another. This shit is just getting sadder & sadder. Legalize ALL adult sex work. Make a national mandate to promote healthy sexuality as part of a national health care plan. Stop using sex as a weapon, period. And, please, PLEASE, stop all the salacious crap about politicians' sex lives. Can it be THAT hard to do??? Really???
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A lot of middle aged men out there are teenage boys under the skin. We can huff and puff puritanical about that till we're blue in the face, or we can chose the path of least damage. Legalize brothels, require that the girls use condoms and undergo frequent medical inspections, require that sex workers be at least 21, and most of all, TAX THE TRICK MONEY just as we tax fags and booze. In exchange, the working girls would enjoy the full protection of labour law and the criminal code. In particular, johns who beat up or infect girls would be prosecuted.
As a working girl, I'd like prostitution legalized, too. However, when people talk about legalizing prostitution, they often only mean to legalize brothels and agencies. In a sense, "pimping" would be legal. If people want to legalize independent prostitutes working on their own with a business license (just as freelancers and contractors of in all fields), then I'm all for it. Unfortunately too many people think prostitutes should be managed by others, and so when I hear "legalization," I cringe.
A working girl: I think your question is so important! Those words are used to describe so many different approaches, and not all are equally helpful, to say the least.
I'd love to see a system that decriminalizes the act of transacting sex, and then works on sensible application of labor, health & safety and zoning laws.
...because public space really matters!
Elizabeth
Unfortunately, Working Girl, there is a lot of confusion around the law relating to sex work in each country and the terminology. In most countries in the world, the US being a notable exception, selling sexual services is not prohibited. However much of the activity is, such as communicating with clients (soliciting), using any premises (bawdy house, disorderly house, brothel), any form of organisation (living off the earnings), or movement from one place to another (trafficking).
Removing these from the Criminal Code is called decriminalisation. However as soon as you do that - ie it becomes 'legal' you run into new legal problems, because you are now running a business, and therefore subject to labour law, business law and zoning regulations. So in the end decriminalising sex work, still end sup with laws. In practice, countries like New Zealand and parts of Australia have left your typical independent working girl (or 2-4 working together) alone, and just regulated larger businesses such as brothels, massage parlours, strip clubs, saunas and escort agencies.
As a personal service business, health and safety regulations would apply as they do to restaurants, hairdressers and cosmeticians. Sex workers do not respond wel to be told what to do, so Libertarian, we recommend minimal regulatins. Requiring regular health inspections is an invasion of privacy, sexual discrimination and ineffective. Sex workers on the whole are careful and clean. If anyone should have health inspections it should be clients.
The age issue is a tricky one, and we should not be too rigid about it. Consider what other trades have age regulations, but also people's civil right to earn a living. Whether as self employed independents, independent contractors or employees, sex workers and sexual service businesses would be subject to income and business taxes.
Incidentally trsansmitting STIs is not a crime, but knowingly doing so is. Violence is already criminal. For a thorough handling of these subjects see Beyond Decriminalisation . See also Sylvia Law's paper on this.
