The Morality of Prostitution

[BubbleJab]

Gents, this is a really interesting thread, thanks for some of the great thoughts and very interesting links. To add to the discussion, here is an article on the failure of the Swedish "ban on johns". I somewhere read the original research paper that is referenced in this HuffPo article, but I can't find it this moment. Here is a citation from that original research paper:

"Not surprisingly, the experiment has failed. In the 13 years since the law was enacted, the Swedish government has been unable to prove that the law has reduced the number of sex buyers or sellers or stopped trafficking. All it has to show for its efforts are a (contested) public support for the law and more danger for street-based sex workers. Despite this failure, the government has chosen to ignore the evidence and proclaim the law to be a success; it also continues to advocate that other countries should adopt a similar law. ".

And from a UN report:

"There is very little evidence to suggest that any criminal laws related to sex work stop demand for sex or reduce the number of sex workers. Rather, all of them create an environment of fear and marginalisation for sex workers, who often have to work in remote and unsafe locations to avoid arrest of themselves or their clients. These laws can undermine sex workers' ability to work together to identify potentially violent clients and their capacity to demand condom use of clients. ".

Alas, while I have some problems with the idea of prostitution, I think it is just part of the human condition. Hundreds, if not thousands, of years of history of trying to make it go away shows that it never will. It just IS. I think any monger has a duty of care towards his ASP, to ensure that they are not controlled or being forced. But once reasonable caution is exercised, I don't see any universal moral case against prostitution.

[ItsMyPiv]

Hi people,

1. Having sex / being intimate is a physiological need (Maslows hierarchy teamed it that way). What if a guy does not have a relationship or is stuck in a sexless marriage. Is he expected to just live life without this basic need fulfilled. I have tried. And hell. Its not been good.

In a perfect world, everyone would pair off at a young age, and then the partner would fulfill each other's needs for life. That would really cut down on the spread of STDs. But in real life genders aren't always balanced (more men than women, or more women than men), girls all fuck the same men (players) and exclude others (losers).

In marriages, men get tired of banging the same woman, and wives get sick of sex with the husband. So prostitution thrives.

[SuperJock]

Hi people,

Liked the idea of this forum.

I feel prostitution is a great noble profession. No pun intended.

The word Prostitute / Hooker. They have negative associations with them. But do they deserve such associations.

For me, I term them as therapists. Like doctors. Why is that.

1. Having sex / being intimate is a physiological need (Maslows hierarchy teamed it that way). What if a guy does not have a relationship or is stuck in a sexless marriage. Is he expected to just live life without this basic need fulfilled. I have tried. And hell. Its not been good.

2. If it weren't for these therapists, I would just wonder how terrible existence would be especially for such guys.

3. Its a pity that its illegal in so many places. Why is it? Its between two consenting adults. Nobody is being forced. We have two happy people at the end of it. A satisfied guy and a richer girl!

Some might find what I wrote BS. And pardon me if you feel that way. But these are my 2 cents.

Cheers

[The Old Teaboy]

Men have stronger libidos than women and polygamy is only natural. We need to fuck multiple women. These are facts of nature.

Most women do not want to be prostitutes or are only in it for the money. They disassociate when having sex with a customer as opposed to for free. It is a more emotional experience for women. But purely physical for most of us, at least most of thetime.

Please weigh in with your ideas on how we can reconcile these opposing agendas. I don't think that it can be sustained in the long run and certainly isn't a healthy environment if only one party (the man) is really gaining. Especially with the women's rights movement they have more ways than any other time in history to make as much money as a male without whoring themselves out. We need to think about this rationally and ensure that they are satisfied or have a real incentive, in order to ensure a steady supply of pussy for ourselves in the future.

TonyIndian,

It is true that there are many more job opportunities for women now because of equal rights. I do not, however, think that this will lead to a decrease in the availability of women for paid sex, for three reasons:

(1) There will always be a number of women who don't want the hard work of a "normal" job.

(2) Money is an aphrodisiac for many women. The idea of earning money at the same time as getting pleasure will always appeal to a certain type of woman.

(3) When our good Pope visited the Philippines recently he re-iterated that the use of contraception is a deadly sin. The Pope's teaching will ensure that the Philippines will continue to be a supplier of pussy to the rest of the world.

[Intransit]

http://www.slate.com/articles/double...re.single.html

How Sex Trafficking Became a Christian Cause seelbre.

Evangelicals made it less feminist and more mainstream.

By Ruth Graham.

When evangelicals picked up the issue of sex trafficking around the turn of the millennium, they drastically expanded the existing movement's influence and reach.

Every January, tens of thousands of Christian college students from all over the world attend the conference Passion, where they sing, pray, and hear from a variety of pastors, authors, and activists about issues resonating within evangelical culture. For the last several years, conference founder Louie Giglio has made the issue of [CodeWord908] an increasingly central part of these activities. In 2013,60,000 students gathered at Passion in Atlanta for a late-night candlelight vigil dedicated to celebrating "Jesus, the ultimate abolitionist, the original abolitionist," Giglio told CNN. The organization's anti-trafficking project designated Feb. 27 as "Shine a Light on Slavery Day," encouraging young people to raise awareness by taking selfies with red X's drawn on their hands.

[CodeWord908]and sex trafficking in particularhas become something of a Christian cause seelbre. There are prayer weekends, movies, magazine covers, Sunday school curricula, and countless church-based ministries. More unusual efforts include lipstick sold to help "kiss slavery goodbye" and tattoo alteration services for victims who say they have been "branded" by their captors. An extraordinarily complex global issue has somehow become one of the most energetic Christian missions of the 21st century.

Many of the new anti-trafficking advocates compare their work to the 19th-century abolitionist movement against chattel slaverywith some leaders in the movement referring to themselves (and, apparently, Jesus) as "abolitionists. " But, according to Gretchen Soderlund, author of the 2013 book Sex Trafficking, Scandal, and the Transformation of Journalism, 18851917, the better comparison may be to the "white slavery" panic of the late 19th century. Like the current rhetoric around anti-trafficking, "white slavery" engaged both feminist and Christian activists. It also focused primarily on protecting female virtueoften depicting prostitution as "slavery. " The phenomenon of women being forced into selling themselves on a widespread scale was mostly malarkey, as it turned out. But the movement was triumphant anyway: The 1910 White Slave Traffic Act, which made it illegal to transport women across state lines for "immoral purposes," effectively ended an era of commercialized prostitution (and criminalized plenty of consensual sex along the way).

Today's anti-trafficking cause again finds evangelicals and feminists in wary cahootsbut it has also earned plenty of skepticism. Second-wave feminists began driving the current conversation about trafficking in the late 1970's, when a book by sociologist Kathleen Barry, Female Sexual Slavery, brought the issue to many people's attention for the first time and argued that it should be a feminist cause. Meanwhile, some feminists were finding common ground with conservatives on pornography, another issue defined by some as the sexual exploitation of women. Though it's not in fashion these days for mainstream feminists to be categorically opposed to pornography, conservative Christian anti-trafficking advocates often connect trafficking to porn:

As one prominent pastor writes in a new book, "Every time someone views pornography. They're contributing to a cycle of sex slavery. ".

"Once the evangelicals got on board, it became a much more mainstream issue, and less feminist. ".

Gretchen Soderlund, author.

Feminist organizations including the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women were active in the 1990's but had little support within the USA Government. That began to change in the late 1990's, when a confluence of factors encouraged evangelical NGOs to become increasingly involved in global issues. Christian conservatives at the time were more known for domestic issues: opposition to gay marriage and abortion and support for prayer in schools. Meanwhile, as government funding for foreign development was shrinking, NGOs of all kinds were increasingly taking on that work. In 2001, President George W. Bush established the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, which gave religious organizations new access to federal funds for causes including anti-trafficking work.

By 2004, the president of the National Association of Evangelicals characterized sex trafficking as a cause that "just jumped off the pages of the newspaper. " Based on the popular image of sex traffickinginnocent victims, usually female, forced into something like literal slaveryit seems obvious why it quickly became a marquee issue. Who could possibly dispute the travesty of helpless women and children forcibly sold into sexual bondage? For Protestants, it's particularly resonant, said Yvonne Zimmerman, an associate professor of Christian ethics at the Methodist Theological School in Ohio and author of the 2012 book Other Dreams of Freedom: Religion, Sex and [CodeWord908]. "Evangelicals on this issue were working out of really deeply held values," she said, including the notion that sexual morality is a powerful window into a person's true character.

Justin Dillon, a Christian filmmaker who directed a 2008 "rockumentary" about trafficking and spoke about the cause at the Passion conference in 2012, has another explanation for why sex trafficking in particular may have caught on as a Christian issue. "Christianity is centered around one word: redemption," Dillon said. "It's about taking something that's going down a path of perilyou could say slavery, spiritual slaveryand redeeming it, Christ redeeming it into something free. . It's not hard for the Christian church to get that idea of freedom. ".

When evangelicals picked up the issue of trafficking around the turn of the millennium, they drastically expanded the existing movement's influence and reach. By now it has spawned major institutional efforts by nonprofits like World Relief, not to mention both state and federal legislation. According to some critics, however, Christians also changed the movement's character. "It wasn't until this evangelical coalition emerged that sex trafficking became this huge everyday issue," said Soderlund. "Once the evangelicals got on board, it became a much more mainstream issue, and less feminist. You had innocent victims, and you had evildoers, and it wasn't as much about patriarchy. ".

The contemporary anti-trafficking movement has attracted plenty of criticism. Some point out the disproportionate focus on sex trafficking, when labor trafficking is a much more common phenomenon. (Many evangelical organizations do tackle labor trafficking as part of their missions, even though the issue doesn't attract as much attention. Dillon now runs a nonprofit, Made in a Free World, which focuses on labor trafficking.).

The strategy of "rescuing" supposed slaves has also been criticized as paternalist, moralist, and ineffective. Then there's the numbers of the forcibly "enslaved," which seem to be wildly overestimated by many sources, although the numbers are also hotly disputed. Meanwhile, some of the most prominent trafficking stories of this century have come under intense scrutiny. An alarming 2004 New York Times Magazine cover story was eviscerated for exaggerations and unproven claims by critics including Jack Shafer at Slate. Somaly Mam, a Cambodian activist championed by American advocates, including Nick Kristof, turned out to have fabricated significant elements of her heart-rending personal story.

One of the most persistent criticisms of the movement is that it's not opposed only to explicitly forced prostitution and child prostitution, but to prostitution as a whole, even when it's engaged in by adult women who say they are sex workers by choice. That's one point that some activists have no problem acknowledging.

"FAAST and all of our partners are very intentional in that we say that all prostitution is inherently harmful," said Mandy Porter, coordinator at the Faith Alliance Against Slavery and Trafficking, a Baltimore-based Christian coalition whose members include World Relief and the Salvation Army. "Whether or not it's consensual, whether or not they want to do it, if it's high-end or streetwalking, it's harmful, and it's not good. " She is careful to say that not all prostitution is trafficking, but adds that the "chains" in most trafficking situations are psychological, not physical.

Under that definition, almost any sex worker could indeed be classified as a victim of trafficking.

As the contemporary anti-trafficking movement matures, it shows no signs of slowing down. This month, FAAST will launch a seven-week anti-trafficking curriculum aimed at 8- to 13-year-olds in Sunday schools, home schools, and other religious settings. "Change Agents" includes lessons on topics like Internet safety and sex trafficking and frames certain Bible stories as*"abuse stories," including the tale of Abram accepting rewards from the Egyptian pharaoh who has taken his wife. *As evangelicals continue to champion the cause, the next generation of activists will view trafficking through this lens, making a political and economic question a religious one, too.

[TonyIndian]

Men have stronger libidos than women and polygamy is only natural. We need to fuck multiple women. These are facts of nature.

Most women do not want to be prostitutes or are only in it for the money. They disassociate when having sex with a customer as opposed to for free. It is a more emotional experience for women. But purely physical for most of us, at least most of thetime.

Please weigh in with your ideas on how we can reconcile these opposing agendas. I don't think that it can be sustained in the long run and certainly isn't a healthy environment if only one party (the man) is really gaining. Especially with the women's rights movement they have more ways than any other time in history to make as much money as a male without whoring themselves out. We need to think about this rationally and ensure that they are satisfied or have a real incentive, in order to ensure a steady supply of pussy for ourselves in the future.

[GF Experience]

http://www.*************************...ur_rights.html

Know your Rights.

Q. What to do if you are visited or stopped by the police. First, and most important, in an encounter with the police:

A. Know your rights!

What to do if you are visited or stopped by the police. First, and most important, in an encounter with the police:

* DO NOT physically resist or threaten the officer (s) in any way.

* DO NOT try to leave until an officer tells you that you are free to go.

* DO NOT give the officer any information about any of your activities.

* DO NOT consent to any search.

The bottom line:

IF YOU ARE NOT FREE TO GO, YOU ARE UNDER ARREST. WHEN YOU ARE UNDER ARREST YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT.

KEEP IT SIMPLE. Don't lie. Don't be a smart ass. Don't try to be friends with the officer.

Simply refuse to answer any of the officer's questions. Each time he / she asks a question, respond with the question "Am I free to go?" This will probably result in such frustration for the officer that they may arrest you anyway. But better to be arrested with little or no evidence, than to give the officer information they may use to file charges and for those charges to stick!

It's all a game. But the rules of the game (the Constitution of the United States) are in your favor. You cannot be punished more severely, just because you refused to risk incriminating yourself during a police investigation (no matter what an officer says).

REMEMBER:

If you are not free to go, then you have the right to remain silent.

Know what to expect if stopped or visited by the police!

You will be asked for identification (if you are driving, you may be asked for your registration and insurance info, as well). You are required to provide this information. Then the "investigation" will start. The conversation might go something like this:

Officer: Do you have any I'd on you?

You: Yes sir. (or ma'am).

Officer: May I see it?

You: Certainly Officer. May I reach into my pocket to get it?

Officer: Yes. Is this your current address?

You: Yes sir.

Officer: What are you doing out here tonight?

You: Officer, am I free to go?

Officer: Not yet. What are you doing out here tonight?

You: If I'm not free to go, then I'm going to exercise my right to remain silent.

The officer will then try everything he / she can think of to get you to start talking. They'll try to convince you that you'll be in more trouble if you don't cooperate. They'll try to convince you that you're not under arrest, so there's nothing wrong with cooperating. They may yell at you, or play good cop / bad cop. Most police officers are moderately skilled interrogators. One thing is sure: they practice interrogation techniques a LOT more than you practice being interrogated. So don't try to outsmart them.

Your refusal to cooperate will be very frustrating to the officer. He / she wants to put a prostitution bust on their arrest stats. Particularly if they are assigned to any Vulnarable area's. They will pull out all the stops to get you to tell them what they need to arrest you. Below are some of the interrogation techniques they may try:

1. Appeal to your innate desire to be honest and "come clean. " They'll tell you that they already know a crime has been committed (they may tell you that the other person is spilling their guts) and that if you simply tell the truth, they'll let you off the hook, or that they'll still have to arrest you but they'll "put in a good word for you with the prosecutor or judge. " This is complete crap. Police officers do not influence judges. They investigate crimes, and then provide testimony to a court regarding that investigation.

2. Intimidate you. The officer or officers will gang up on you. Get in your face. Surround you. Tell you that you have no choice but to cooperate. They may even yell at you, or knock you around a little. Yelling at, and / or using ANY kind of physical force on a detainee who is not physically resisting, is unprofessional behavior and can get the officers into deep doo-doo. Get at least one of their names and I'd #s and report them to the Professional Standards Division of the department they work for!

3. You may find yourself in a "good cop / bad cop" situation, where one officer will pretend to be your friend and give you advice about how to get out of this mess, while the other officer pretends to pressure the friendly officer to arrest you and get it over with. This is just a combination of the first two techniques described above. Sometimes a single cop will play both roles. He / she will tell you that if you don't do what he tells you to do, that he won't be able to be such a nice guy and you will force him to arrest you.

4. Threaten to embarrass you. If you're married, have a GirlFriends, kids, job, friends, etc. And it would be hard to explain why you were arrested, the police will use this to scare you into talking. A police officer detained me once and then called my wife at 2:00 am to "verify my address," telling her that he had stopped me on Brigade Road. Of course, what he was really doing was trying to embarrass me into talking.

The main tool the cops use is interrogation technique #4 (threaten to embarrass). If you've got six cops surrounding you and you think you're going to jail, and a wife is waiting at home who will eventually find out what you got arrested for, most people will panic and do anything they think will get them out of the mess. Unfortunately this will backfire on them and they will be prosecuted even more vigorously because of the info they will give the officers. Then, not only will they have to explain getting arrested, they'll also have to explain getting found guilty of the charges!

Know the law!

While some of this discussion is about street hookers which we do not support due to the public nuisance element the ideas apply also to private consenting adult sexworkers.

"Prostitution" means engaging in or agreeing or offering to engage in sexual conduct with another person under a fee arrangement with that person or any other person.

"Sexual conduct" means sexual contact, sexual intercourse, oral sexual contact or sadomasochistic abuse.

In order to arrest you, the police officer must establish that a reasonable person would believe a crime has been committed. Even if you DID make an offer for prostitution, unless the officer actually heard the conversation, then the only information the officer has, is that a person driving down the street, picked up another person who was walking down the street; or that a person was inside another person's home for a period of time; or maybe that there are many male visitors to a female's home; etc. You may have gone to a hotel with someone, or maybe just pulled off on a side street and spent some time in your car. You may even have gotten caught in the act of having sex with the other person. Having sex (even with strangers) is NOT illegal!

However, the police may suspect that you made (or accepted) an offer of sex for money, especially if any of these things occurred in a "known high-vice area" like Brigade Road or MG Road. Detaining you at this point is already skating on the ragged edge of violating your rights. Don't stand for it!

When the police stop, detain, and interrogate people, without having any real knowledge that a crime has been committed, we get a little closer to being denied the basic freedom to conduct our lives as our conscience guides us. Freedom is not just won in wars. The fight for freedom begins with each citizen and his or her daily response to government oppression.

If you engaged in an act of prostitution (as defined by the statute, above), then you DID break the law. However, you are under NO obligation to admit to a law enforcement officer that you broke the law, or to cooperate with any investigation aimed at finding out if a law has been broken.

We are not a lawyer and this is not intended as legal advice. However, I have shown this to several lawyers who agree that its contents are true and useful. I decided to produce this document after having my own civil rights violated by a group of police officers. The information here is not intended to encourage illegal activity. We simply mean to exercise my right to free speech by educating as many people as possible on ways to avoid being taken advantage of by the police.

Additional suggestions:

Paying for sex is illegal in India. Unlike most of the world. But paying for time and companionship, exchanging non sexual massage, hugging, lying together naked non-sexually caressing body is not sex and not illegal under the law. Separately from the paid session and for no compensation as consenting adults you can enjoy the natural desire for sexual sharing. As long as no money is paid for the sexual activities.

If I was a provider I would say upon meeting a first time clients, "I just want to make it clear for our legal protection I don't accept money for sex, my INR 2000/ fee is for my time and companionship. I might decide to enjoy sex with you but if so, there is no cost, we would just be friends. Is that agreeable?

In most police agencies it is against their policy to get naked with you or even more if they initiate sexual contact which may be entrapment. You might ask, would you like to get more comfortable. You might even lay in bed nude with him, give him a massage but don't touch genitals. Let him take the imitative on anything sexual not you. He is not paying you for sex just for being with him.

Even if you are arrested by aggressive cop, if you didn't get paid for sex but time and companionship based on what you said and did with undercover, your case may not be prosecuted if the facts aren't clear. Prostitution is usually a relatively low priority case and often the cases are tossed unless they are obviously easy convictions. Courts, Judges and other public resources should be directed more towards real crime with victims vs. In private morality crimes. Yet often is aggressive in enforcing morality crimes but prosecutors are not as aggressive unless again looks like a easy win.

Being arrested of course is traumatic for the non criminal just sharing pleasure in private but even if caught in a sting chances are good that if you are careful in what you have said and done the case will be dismissed.

[Errol Flynn]

What an f'in a hole.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/29/us...ors_picks=true

[Naked Gunz]

If America is serious about stopping domestic violence, the simple solution is to legalize prostitution. I think if a man were able to get sexual release from prostitutes instead of locking himself in a marriage or relationship. The fighting and arguments (violence) usually comes from the frustration of joining two completely seperate lives together. The divorce rate is 50%! It just does not work.

[Mascarado]

At its heart, the reality of sex work is rather dull and pedestrian. The main reason that people go into sex work is neither because of predatory gangsters, nor to indulge some uncontrollable nymphomania: It's all about money. It's about the need to pay your rent, put gas in your car, and buy groceries. Like becoming a waitress, a store clerk, a plumber, or a mechanic, going into sex work is driven by the economics of everyday life. If we were start to think of it as being primarily about work instead of sex, the headlines would quickly become much less sensational. "I think that media coverage needs to be less of a dichotomy between people who freely and happily choose the sex industry and people who are coerced into the sex industry," Ray says. "Because there's a vast gray area of economic circumstances in between. Economic circumstances are the reason most people enter the sex industry. I think coverage and conversations about that need to be much more complex. ".

"I have talked to people who really, really chose to do it. They thought about it for a while, it felt like it was something that was really intriguing and fun to them, and they chose it even though there were other options," Williams says. "But for most people, I think it's a quick fix to a financial problem. And so most people, I think, go into sex work because it fits their current needs. Maybe they can't work a 9-to-5 job because they're in school, or they have young children so they need a really flexible job. That's why I started doing sex work. I was in school, and I had a child, and I needed something that I could work nights. I think that a lot of people do sex work for the time that they need this flexible situation, and then as soon as they're done with school, or their children are now in school, or whatever the initial situation was is over, they move on to another job. ".

Prostitution is just a job. Sure, it has a load of negative association, e. G, child / [CodeWord908], disease, infidelity, etc. , but these associations are not causal.

Like any other industry, from securities, to food, to aviation, etc. , when regulated, they offer value to society in a significantly safer manner.

People are going to hire prostitutes just as they will drink alcohol, eat heart congesting foods, smoke cancerous cigarettes, and drive potentially dangerous vehicles.

Just regulate it in an efficient manner, and let the rest take care of itself.

Though, child prostitution is something that should always be illegal, given the child's maturity level, lack of choice, education, development, and innocence, apart from physical / mental harm.

[Intransit]

is one of the most-cited statistics about sex work wrong?

by chris hall.

if you've followed public debate over sex work and trafficking in recent decades, you've probably seen some variation on this sentence: "the average age of entry into prostitution is 13. ".

statistics have a reputation for being dull, but this one packs a punch. in only nine words, it conjures up a story worthy of dickens. hear that statistic, and you can't help but imagine the faces of children, as fragile and guileless as porcelain dolls; you imagine, too, the fear on those faces, and the violence that will be done to them to feed the greed and perverted desires of figures lurking in the shadows. those nine words tell you that this is not a story that is the exception, but rather, the norm in the industry. a person would have to have a rare degree of monstrousness not to feel their heart break, just a little, on hearing such cruelty described so starkly.

except for one thing: there is little basis for the claim that 13—or 12, as is sometimes asserted—is the age that most sex workers begin working in prostitution.

it's hard to pin down where exactly the age-of-entry claim originated, partly because it's so often repeated without a citation or context, but also because it's become such a ubiquitous part of sexual politics. "i can't really remember a time when i didn't see it used, so i think it's been in circulation for quite a while," says audacia ray, of the red umbrella project in new york. "and it's definitely used really broadly and without citation. ".

most organizations, if they refer to a source at all, reference a study released in 2001: the commercial sexual exploitation of children in the usa, canada and mexico, by richard j. estes and neil a. weiner.

thinking of sex work as work.

as such studies go, it was a pretty extensive one. estes and weiner covered 17 major cities in the united states, four in canada, and seven in mexico. but the data samples they wrangled up with weren't very large. they sent out 1,130 surveys to various organizations that dealt with abused and exploited children in the target cities. of those, 288 came back completed—a 25.5 percent response rate. most of the organizations just didn't have the information that estes and weiner were looking for: "difficulty in accessing information concerning the number of sexually exploited children in their care was one of the factors cited by many agencies for not completing the formal questionnaire," the report says.

they also did interviews directly with children, both on the streets and in the custody of law enforcement or social services. here, the information collected was even sparser; in 17 major usa cities, they interviewed a total of 210 children.

the age-of-entry statistic seems to originate in a quote on page 92 of the report, summarizing the data from those 210 interviews:

average age of first intercourse for the children we interviewed was 12 years for the boys (n=63) and 13 years for the girls (n=107). the age range of entry into prostitution for the boys, including gay and transgender boys, was somewhat younger than that of the girls, i. e. , 11-13 years vs. 12-14 years, respectively. the average age of first intercourse among minority boys and girls was younger than that of the non-minority youth we interviewed, i. e. , 10-11 years of age for minority boys and 11-12 years of age for minority girls.

since then, that single paragraph has morphed into something much shorter and much different. the estes and weiner passage isn't a conclusion about sex workers at large, or even abused and exploited children; it is a description only of their sample group. but for almost 15 years, governmental and non-profit organizations have turned to it to make broader claims about people who work in the sex trades and how they came to be there.

most current government and nonprofit policies on sex work define their goals as "rescue," which makes perfect sense if the age-of-entry statistic is central to your understanding of the sex industry. child abuse and trafficking are crises that require certain types of interventions. but these crimes do not characterize the sex industry more generally. in reality, many sex workers come into the industry as adults and without coercion, often because of economic necessity. by seeing the sex industry through the lens of the misleading age-of-entry statistic, we overlook the people who are most affected by discussions about sex work—the workers themselves.

* * *.

one of the strongest and most thorough critics of the statistic is activist emi koyama. koyama says that even when applied only to **** subjects, the stat doesn't hold up, which does a disservice to the most vulnerable in our society.

"it conceals the reality that most of the young people in the sex trade come from families affected by poverty, racism, abuse (including homophobia and transphobia in families), parental imprisonment or deportation, or from broken child welfare systems, and do not have safe places to return to," she told me in an interview. "in fact, many young people are trading sex as a way to escape from violence and abuse that they have experienced in their homes and child welfare systems. by treating them as innocent and helpless 'children,' we fail to listen to the young people who are struggling to survive in hostile circumstances. we also fail to address the root causes of their vulnerability, and instead promote further surveillance and criminalization of street culture—which actually harms young people who survive there. ".

even by mathematical standards, the numbers don't add up. in order for 12 or 13 to represent the national average age of entry, there would need to be a significant number who enter at ages younger than that. "the vast majority of young people who are 'rescued' by the law enforcement during operation cross country sweeps are 16- and 17-year olds," koyama says, "and there are rarely any under the age 13. for the average age to be around 13, there needs to be many more 5-12 year olds that are forced into prostitution than are empirically plausible. " if the massive numbers of children exist in quantities enough to offset those who enter in their late teens or as adults, they're not showing up in the arrests made by the federal government, even high-profile ones like operation cross country.

in addition, koyama says, the age of entry statistic flatters americans that their own communities are safe, while playing on the fear of outsiders: "it gives the impression that children were safe until 'bad people' came into their communities to take them away, and therefore we must arrest and prosecute these 'bad people' (often racialized). ".

researcher and activist melissa ditmore agrees with koyama that the statistic is invalid: "this has been debunked but no one will let go of it," she says. "they used to say 13, now they say 12. if that's the average age, we'd see people younger than that in the business, and i have not ever met pre-adolescent children selling sex. ".

but the biggest problem with the claim is that it automatically remakes any discussion about sex work into its own image. when you start the conversation believing that prostitution is rooted in the [CodeWord123] of children, any suggestion that sex workers can be adults who have made an economic choice sounds like an attempt to provide cover for the [CodeWord127].

"it distorts the dialogue because it's a very narrow view of how the sex industry functions," audacia ray says. "it also means the impulse is that all people are in the sex industry are victims of their situation who are disempowered and have no autonomy and no other skills. that's really damaging. and also, when you treat a whole population as victims, that very process is victimizing because it takes away agency and individual narratives about how they got there. ".

kristina dolgin, a former sex worker and activist with the san francisco chapter of the sex workers outreach project (swop-bay) agrees: "by framing the discourse around sex work—and prostitution specifically—around children, you are taking away the agency of people and instilling a moral panic. ".

the result is policies that are ostensibly intended to help people in the sex industries, but are created and implemented without input from the workers themselves. as an example, dolgin points to the case act (californians against sexual exploitation), which was voted into law in the 2012 elections as proposition 35. the law expanded the definition of [CodeWord908] much more broadly than previously existing guidelines to include virtually anyone gaining financial benefit from someone else's sex work. "it does not differentiate between the various kinds of people engaging in the work," dolgin says. "[CodeWord908] could incorporate a manager, it could incorporate staff, it could incorporate a friend who is looking out for your safety, it could incorporate partners who are sharing a living space with you—there is no statutory end to that definition. ".

although the rhetoric of advocates depicted the case act as a tool that would improve the lives of people in the sex industries, it was strongly opposed by sex-worker activists. it was, however, endorsed by a long list of law-enforcement organizations, like the california statewide law enforcement association and the fraternal order of police. in the end, proposition 35 passed with an overwhelming majority of 81.1 percent.

more recently, in june, 2014, the fbi raided and shut down a well-known website in the bay area called "myredbook" that hosted ads from escorts and massage parlors. press coverage of the raid claimed the site was "linked" to trafficking and child prostitution. the national center for missing and exploited children issued a press release congratulating the fbi: "we know that one of the main ways children are sold for sex in this country is via the internet," president and ceo john ryan said. "we are very encouraged by all of the efforts to help stop the online sex trafficking of children and help survivors reclaim their lives. " al serrato, an assistant the. a. in san mateo county, was quoted in the san francisco chronicle praising the operation as a great step for preventing exploitation: "in my experience prosecuting these types of cases, the site is associated with the setting up of dates that often involve women who are being exploited or are victims of [CodeWord908]," he said. "i view it as a positive development that the federal authorities were able to take such strong action against it. ".

however, neither of the two owners, eric omuro and annmarie lanoce, has been charged for trafficking offenses; the indictment against them lists 24 charges of money laundering and one charge of "facilitating prostitution. " the response of the local sex-worker community was not one of relief or gratitude; instead, most saw the loss of myredbook as a catastrophe. not only did the raid eliminate an important source of income, it also eliminated some of the workers' best tools for keeping themselves safe.

"there was a whole section of myredbook that was chat rooms and forums," says shannon williams, a sex worker who is also active with swop-bay. "some for clients, and then a whole bunch for sex workers. and that's really important for sex workers because the vast majority really work in a very solitary way. they work alone, they don't tell anyone in their lives, so their friends and family don't know and other people don't know. they may hold down straight jobs and they're just moonlighting in the sex industry, so no one knows what they do, they're very isolated. as you can imagine, for the kind of work it is, that's an unhealthy way to work, and it's lonely. so redbook, and a site that was linked to it called mypinkbook, created a community for these sex workers who didn't have community in real life. " the community didn't just give emotional support to people who couldn't find it anywhere else; workers also exchanged information about dangerous clients and tips about how to keep themselves safe from predators and law enforcement. they were also able to screen clients based on references from people who had seen the client before.

"a lot of sex workers i've talked to are really devastated by the loss of redbook, because they've lost their online community," williams says. "they've lost this way to share information that made them feel safer, and the reference system doesn't work as well when you don't known where the reference is coming from. ".

* * *.

at its heart, the reality of sex work is rather dull and pedestrian. the main reason that people go into sex work is neither because of predatory gangsters, nor to indulge some uncontrollable nymphomania: it's all about money. it's about the need to pay your rent, put gas in your car, and buy groceries. like becoming a waitress, a store clerk, a plumber, or a mechanic, going into sex work is driven by the economics of everyday life. if we were start to think of it as being primarily about work instead of sex, the headlines would quickly become much less sensational. "i think that media coverage needs to be less of a dichotomy between people who freely and happily choose the sex industry and people who are coerced into the sex industry," ray says. "because there's a vast gray area of economic circumstances in between. economic circumstances are the reason most people enter the sex industry. i think coverage and conversations about that need to be much more complex. ".

the age-of-entry statistic continues to hold its grip on the public imagination in part because mainstream society can't imagine it being any other way. why would anyone sell sex unless they were coerced or suffered such extreme trauma that they lost all self-respect?

"i have talked to people who really, really chose to do it. they thought about it for a while, it felt like it was something that was really intriguing and fun to them, and they chose it even though there were other options," williams says. "but for most people, i think it's a quick fix to a financial problem. and so most people, i think, go into sex work because it fits their current needs. maybe they can't work a 9-to-5 job because they're in school, or they have young children so they need a really flexible job. that's why i started doing sex work. i was in school, and i had a child, and i needed something that i could work nights. i think that a lot of people do sex work for the time that they need this flexible situation, and then as soon as they're done with school, or their children are now in school, or whatever the initial situation was is over, they move on to another job. ".

of course, some people do get stuck in prostitution when they really want to move on. just like any other field, there are people working crappy, unrewarding jobs in the sex industry. the irony of sex work, however, is that the same legal policies and social stigma that drive "rescue" efforts often make it difficult for people to transition into a regular job. williams herself isn't trying to stop doing sex work, but if she was, her options are much more limited than they once were.

in 2003, williams was teaching high school in berkeley, california, when she was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of soliciting prostitution. she was never convicted, but simply having a rap sheet ended not only her job at berkeley high, but any chance that she would ever teach again. even in berkeley, with its reputation for radical bohemianism, a prostitute isn't considered fit to teach the community's children.

the stories of sex workers like williams are never straightforward or easy. they aren't contained by the narratives we've been told about ravished children or liberated outlaws. for those of us who write about sex workers and those who make laws that determine their lives, they are a reminder of our responsibility: to quiet the voices in our heads and listen, rather than repeating numbers without knowing what they mean or where they came from.

this article available online at:

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/...-wrong/379662/

copyright © 2014 by the atlantic monthly group. all rights reserved.

[Mascarado]

http://www.economist.com/node/21611063/print

Prostitution.

A personal choice.

The internet is making the buying and selling of sex easier and safer.

But everyone else should cheer. Sex arranged online and sold from an apartment or hotel room is less bothersome for third parties than are brothels or red-light districts. Above all, the web will do more to make prostitution safer than any law has ever done. Pimps are less likely to be abusive if prostitutes have an alternative route to market. Specialist sites will enable buyers and sellers to assess risks more accurately. Apps and sites are springing up that will let them confirm each other's identities and swap verified results from sexual-health tests. Schemes such as Britain's Ugly Mugs allow prostitutes to circulate online details of clients to avoid...

Amen. One way or the other men pay for sex. Why not make it accessible, cheap, regulated, safe, and enjoyable. I'm jealous of future generations that won't be bogged down by the stupidity and down-right ridiculous attitude America and many Western "civilized" nations have about something that men need / want as much as they do food, sleep, and habitation.

[Intransit]

http://www.economist.com/node/21611063/print

Prostitution.

A personal choice.

The internet is making the buying and selling of sex easier and safer. Governments should stop trying to ban it.

Aug 9th 2014.

From the print edition.

STREET-WALKERS; kerb-crawlers; phone booths plastered with pictures of breasts and buttocks: the sheer seediness of prostitution is just one reason governments have long sought to outlaw it, or corral it in licensed brothels or "tolerance zones". NIMBYs make common cause with puritans, who think that women selling sex are sinners, and do-gooders, who think they are victims. The reality is more nuanced. Some prostitutes do indeed suffer from trafficking, exploitation or violence; their abusers ought to end up in jail for their crimes. But for many, both male and female, sex work is just that: work.

This newspaper has never found it plausible that all prostitutes are victims. That fiction is becoming harder to sustain as much of the buying and selling of sex moves online. Personal websites mean prostitutes can market themselves and build their brands. Review sites bring trustworthy customer feedback to the commercial-sex trade for the first time. The shift makes it look more and more like a normal service industry.

It can also be analysed like one. We have dissected data on prices, services and personal characteristics from one big international site that hosts 190,000 profiles of female prostitutes (see article). The results show that gentlemen really do prefer blondes, who charge 11% more than brunettes. The scrawny look beloved of fashion magazines is more marketable than flab—but less so than a healthy weight. Prostitutes themselves behave like freelancers in other labour markets. They arrange tours and take bookings online, like gigging musicians. They choose which services to offer, and whether to specialise. They temp, go part-time and fit their work around child care. There is even a graduate premium that is close to that in the wider economy.

The invisible hand-job.

Moralisers will lament the shift online because it will cause the sex trade to grow strongly. Buyers and sellers will find it easier to meet and make deals. New suppliers will enter a trade that is becoming safer and less tawdry. New customers will find their way to prostitutes, since they can more easily find exactly the services they desire and confirm their quality. Pimps and madams should shudder, too. The internet will undermine their market-making power.

But everyone else should cheer. Sex arranged online and sold from an apartment or hotel room is less bothersome for third parties than are brothels or red-light districts. Above all, the web will do more to make prostitution safer than any law has ever done. Pimps are less likely to be abusive if prostitutes have an alternative route to market. Specialist sites will enable buyers and sellers to assess risks more accurately. Apps and sites are springing up that will let them confirm each other's identities and swap verified results from sexual-health tests. Schemes such as Britain's Ugly Mugs allow prostitutes to circulate online details of clients to avoid.

Governments should seize the moment to rethink their policies. Prohibition, whether partial or total, has been a predictable dud. It has singularly failed to stamp out the sex trade. Although prostitution is illegal everywhere in America except Nevada, old figures put its value at $14 billion annually nationwide; surely an underestimate. More recent calculations in Britain, where prostitution is legal but pimping and brothels are not, suggest that including it would boost GDP figures by at least £5. 3 billion ($8. 9 billion). And prohibition has ugly results. Violence against prostitutes goes unpunished because victims who live on society's margins are unlikely to seek justice, or to get it. The problem of sex tourism plagues countries, like the Netherlands and Germany, where the legal part of the industry is both tightly circumscribed and highly visible.

The failure of prohibition is pushing governments across the rich world to try a new tack: criminalising the purchase of sex instead of its sale. Sweden was first, in 1999, followed by Norway, Iceland and France; Canada is rewriting its laws along similar lines. The European Parliament wants the "Swedish model" to be adopted right across the EU. Campaigners in America are calling for the same approach.

[KaveMan]

the reality is that most women grow out of sex by about 30, and many men do not. part of this is because we get close to 100% orgasm rate and get about a 20%. this mismatch is answered by financial handcuffs, frustration or p4 p, overt or covert. it is certainly the case in the west and in asia, given the number of asian mongers i come accross. i think its part of the human condition. sure, the demands of children / career creep in, but the typical male still wants it and does not get it. women assume their lack of urge is the same as ours. a fatal error.

so rather than starve, we hunt, and hence this forum. it's natural, and few percent of women have catered to that need for thousands of years. eventually the male gets smart and realises marriage is a con, or they don't have go without. we often deceive to segment real emotions. and often guilt mistaken for love. from a very real physical need that is unmet. its not just going to a restaurant for a change: its a question of starving and no food at all...

agree 100%.

however, a huge % of members here are actually still married in sexless marriages and refuse to end them!

over, on the moscow forum there are a number of american guys celebrating their 20th, 30th, even 40th anniversary to a woman they no longer have sex with.

its really bizarre, these guys are either financially unable to leave these women (ie, divorce is too expensive? are supported by them or are terrified of facing loneliness every-night coming home to talk to no-one, have no prepared food, or clean clothes / linens?

i don't understand it? i get societal pressure; but, after your kids are gone, does it really matter to your neighbor or boss that your not married to some old woman?

the standard answer i always hear is "oh we are together for the companionship, that will come in old age". i have news for them, your spouse will be not changing [CodeWord131] or bedpans, once your money or health ends.

lots of older gentleman i know say "only person who will take care of you is you!

reality, is you can always attract a female (and hire cooks, maids, nurses for less than a wife) if your in a dead-end marriage; and few of the mongers on this board realize that; and subside on random monger trips.

[Drive]

Prostitution is morally wrong behavior, but I'm all for legalizing it.

I'm for legalizing it because it's not morally wrong if a woman chooses that profession. It's her body, her choice. What's morally wrong is when anyone, regardless of gender, is forced into it. Also, the subtle implication is that a woman is not strong / smart enough to be able to choose prostitution, that there must be coercion via, usually a pimp or gang, behind it. In short, male dominated societies fear strong women in control of their own lives.