BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: GUEST,Patsy
Date: 29 Nov 10 - 09:27 AM

Lily Langtryn to some a harlot, an adulteress, a mistress or just a beautiful passionate society woman in a loveless marriage. My grandmother thought she was a beautiful young girl fondly remembering her face for 'Pear's' soap but my grandfather would not mention her name at all. Lily's husband (according to the book I read) was an inadequate uninspiring man. Her upbringing was far from poor so she could put one foot up on the society ladder with ease. You could say that she pimped herself from one catch to another but unfortunately didn't end her time with the man she truely loved Mountbatten. Apart from falling pregnant allegedly with Mountbatten's child she must have had the intelligence to prevent that happening in the past if the times were as ignorant or innocent as is suggested. Infact she must have been quite savvy despite it being the norm for women to have large families. Where would she have learnt that? Not from her own husband. Had she been born in a downtrodden slum it would have been a different story she probably would have become a prostitute put to work by an unscrupilous pimp.

Perhaps prostitutes should go self employed and pimp themselves from their own home or a brothel run by a woman like Cynthia Payne keeping things in order.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Ebbie
Date: 28 Nov 10 - 09:14 PM

I remember the comment I would have liked to make when this thread first appeared:: Remember WKRP? I watched most of the episodes as they were aired- I still think they were mostly well done, well acted and with a little over the top characters. I enjoyed the series.

However, do you remember the character Loni Anderson played? I've forgotten her name but she played this bright, stable, gorgeous blonde who had this opulent apartment, where quite obviously she entertained and enjoyed men. The show portrayed her as discerning, particular. wise and guiltless, but if that wasn't prostitution I have no idea of what it was implying.

I would add that the presentation was very much from the male point of view.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 28 Nov 10 - 08:24 PM

Thanks for the link, Kat.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 28 Nov 10 - 07:16 PM

There is an interesting article about women sex slaves in NYC and elsewhere HERE in the NYTimes. Here's the beginning of it:

A Woman. A Prostitute. A Slave.
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: November 27, 2010

Americans tend to associate "modern slavery" with illiterate girls in India or Cambodia. Yet there I was the other day, interviewing a college graduate who says she spent three years terrorized by pimps in a brothel in Midtown Manhattan.

Those who think that commercial sex in this country is invariably voluntary — and especially men who pay for sex — should listen to her story. The men buying her services all mistakenly assumed that she was working of her own volition, she says.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Riginslinger
Date: 01 Nov 09 - 08:25 AM

When you connect the dots, what overall conclusions do you draw?

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 31 Oct 09 - 11:57 PM

This morning, on NPR's weekend addition, I listened to a Scot Simon interview with Emma Thompson regarding a collaborative art installation with a young woman from eastern Europe who was tricked into thinking she was being offered the opportunity for legitimate work in England, only to be beaten, tortured and raped to be forced into the sex trade in the UK. The exhibit has already been shown in London, and opens at Washington Square in New York in early November.

I have been following the story of the gang rape of a 15 year old girl at a home-coming dance at a school in southern California, as well as the story of the recent rescue of a number of children who had been sold into the sex trade in the United States.

I know what overall conclusions I draw when I connect the dots.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 01:39 PM

As I understand it, while prosties can have any gender, all the customers are men.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: SINSULL
Date: 28 Apr 09 - 08:12 AM

The Comfort Women sold into prostitution by their familes and even teachers provide a heart breaking view into the ugly business of forced prostitution. Some of these women are alive today and living in a "nursing home" where they tell their stories and demand that the Japanese government admit their existence.
Imagine being 11 or 12 years old and "chosen" by your beloved teacher to go to the city and work in a respectable job where you could send money home to your family. Then days later being forced to service as many as forty men in a day. Syphilis, abortions, sterility - and add to it a culture that holds virginity sacrosanct for a bride. When freed, they had no homes to go to - no respectable family could take back a whore. So they remained prostitutes or lived alone in poverty.
GOOGLE Comfort Women.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: frogprince
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 11:33 PM

Take a look at "erotic services" on Craiglist. The head cheese of Craiglist stood up with his face hanging out the other day and claimed that those aren't ads for prostitution. Riiight.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 11:27 PM

I will watch that this weekend next, Janie. Thanks for the link.

Last night I watched the tail end of a show on a prostitution sting of underage girls being made to sell themselves with their pimps using very sophisticated means of marketing. Each girl is listed on cragislist, carries a laptop with her and is put in a motel room for the night to which the "johns" are directed. The girls get NO money for any of their "work" and are often runaways, etc. Some of them were as young as 13. I don't think this is the program I watched, but there is this one on MSNBC about a recent nationwide crackdown on this practice. Until the recent murder perpetrated by a man using craigslist to find his victim, I had no idea craigslist was such a huge part of prostitution.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 27 Apr 09 - 10:38 PM

Following is a link to "The Day My God Died," a documentary on the sex slave trade in India. It was aired on PBS in May 2008 - as part the series "Global Voices."

The Day My God Died

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Naemanson
Date: 08 Nov 08 - 07:33 PM

An update on my earlier posting. One of our friends has achieved her goal of starting her own business. We got an email from her recently wishing us a happy Halloween.

Check it out. Online Jewelry Shop

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 07 Nov 08 - 11:03 PM

I stumbled across an article on cnn.com regarding the debate about whether prostitution victimizes women. It is not in depth, but does quote two experts who disagree.

My REAL Life as a Call Girl

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 12:16 PM

When they put up the archive, after today, there is a very interesting discussion on Colorado Public Radio about sex trafficking during the DNC. Apparently pimps have been approaching homeless teens and they are expecting traffickers to bring in sex workers who are afraid to go to authorities for various reasons, including not having control of their own papers, i.e. passposrt, etc.

Here's the blurb: The Polaris Project is doing outreach - to warn people about human trafficking and the sex trade during the convention. University of Denver Professor and human trafficking expert Claude d'Estrée has lobbied the DNC committee to address the problem in its the convention platform. Host Ryan Warner talks with project coordinator Amanda Finger and d'Estrée.

Also, there is this:

From the Democratic National Committee Platform:

"We will address human trafficking—both labor and sex trafficking-- through strong legislation and enforcement to ensure that trafficking victims are protected and traffickers are brought to justice. We will also address the root causes of human trafficking, including poverty, discrimination, and gender inequality, as well as the demand for prostitution."

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 10:31 PM

You're welcome, Art. I wish them luck, too! I wish my daughter would do the same!

Ebbie, well-said. Brett, interesting, also.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Art Thieme
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 10:00 PM

Kat
Thanks for the P.M.s I found the film quite extaordinary. Chris and his wife, also Kat, showed up here a few weeks ago with 5 huge garbage bags full of VHS movies. That's how I first saw the film.

They were intent on limiting TV watching time---in favor of more talking with their daughters. I wish them luck!

Art

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Naemanson
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 07:55 PM

I just stumbled over this thread. If Big Mick will forgive me I have a question.

On legalization: As I understand it prostitution is legal in Nevada. Does anyone know how that is or is not working out? Are the prostitutes in Nevada choosing their professions or are they forced into it?

On sex work versus prostitution: Everything I've read about the subject does not separate the two items. Prostitution is an extreme version of sex work. Consider porn films. As I see it the women there are just prostitutes that we can see at work. Do they choose that lifestyle?

Here in Guam Wakana and I have gotten to know at least three women who dance in the clubs (i.e., sans clothing) They have chosen their occupation and have no more problems with self esteem than you or I. One of them was dancing to make money to start a jewelry business. Our last email from her was that she has moved back to Canada and her business is going well.

On the other hand one of the local scandals and crimes is where the owners of a local nightclub were illegally importing women from Korea (I think) and forcing them into prostitution.

I have no problem with morality if a woman goes into prostitution of her own free will. There is no punishment harsh enough for people who force women into it.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: jacqui.c
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 06:51 AM

Nicely put Ebbie.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Ebbie
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 12:06 AM

I'm of more than two minds on the subject. On the one hand I think prostitution is inevitable wherever there is a preponderance of men. Certainly that has been true in the history of gold rushes and wars. And it has not always been as cut and dried a matter as the bluenoses would have it. Many a woman went from a 'sporting house' to a home and finally to respectability, 'bad' woman become 'good' woman.

(I grew up thinking that 'morality' referred only to sex and sexual behavior. That is W A Y mistaken. Morality takes in a vast array of action. Sex may not have a thing in the world to do with it. Thank God I knew that before my daughter came along.}

On the other hand, sexual activity is simply fraught with danger. Think of the various positions engaged in during sex- and just about every single one renders the server seriously vulnerable. That is scary. The idea of opening oneself like that to a queue of men one has never met and may never see again would have been enough to send me skittering off into the wild blue yonder, no matter what the money.

On the other hand (someone come over here - I need another hand), I don't think there is anything inherently 'sacred' about sexual parts. They certainly were nicely designed for the greatest pleasure. If one removed the concept of love from the equation I imagine the world would still go on for all of us. What was it Leonard Cohen wrote about 'you just had to meet someone. Without your clothes." Badly paraphrased but you know what I mean.

One thing I told my daughter is that when a fairly casual relationship becomes sexual, the relationship tends to become somewhat static, it stalls because the couple may stop learning to actually 'know' each other, the relationship has become primarily physical. The other thing I told her was that when she was contemplating a sexual relationship to make sure that she actually wanted him, that if each relationship through life was meaningful she would not regret it later. I still believe those caveats today.

I remember back in the day when guys would say, If I were a woman I'd be sitting on a gold mine. I would never be poor...

It's probably a good thing that most of the time men and women don't quite see eye to eye. :)

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Jun 08 - 11:03 PM

Art, I finally got a chance to watch the film you recommended, Dangerous Beauty. I can see why it got two thumbs up. Really excellent and enlightening. I have read reviews of the book it was based on, probably too dry and academic for my taste, but there is also a book of Franco's poems and letters I am going to look for. She certainly was an extraordinary woman. I found more about her HERE. Thanks for the heads-up.

kat

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:12 PM

I reread Viktor Frankl's Man's Search For Meaning a few months ago. That's one way to put it in perspective--what happens at that level of extremity, and looking at stages along the way.

I reread that book because I was reminded of it when I read Canadian author Anne Michaels' book Fugitive Pieces. The main character has a lot of difficulty with intimacy, though he is involved in sexual relationships in two marriages.

While these are tangential to the subject here, there is a point of intersection, and the point is that the search for meaning can happen in many ways. Some find it through their employment, are completely validated in the workplace, others work to pay the bills and the meaning in their lives comes through other avenues. It's all in how you parse it out.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 01 Apr 08 - 09:18 PM

Been trying to think about why this topic is so difficult for me. I think it is very difficult for a lot of women, and I think that is why there have been so few of us post to this thread. Values may become obsolete, but they are not arbitrary. Who we are as individuals and as members of communities and societies, how we value ourselves and others, what we view as normal or normative, and the implications of that in terms of mental health, psychological wholeness, self-esteem, self-efficacy, our own life experiences and lessons, both positive and negative....these are are part-and-parcel of identity, wellness, a sense of being whole.

I said earlier that there is nothing inherently bad about sex for sale. There is also nothing inherently good about it. Morals arise from values. Values are not inherent in terms of what those values may be, but values are essential to the ability of we humans to live in groups, and if human are to live, groups are essential. Thus values are essential mortar. Sex is also essential. Metapysically and existentially, one handles elementals with care.

I keep trying to distance myself from my own values and experiences, both personal and professional, in pondering this issue of prostitution and sex for sale. I think that may be a mistake.

For their own psychological survival humans are capable of adopting positions that justify any action whatsoever. It can be viewed as adaptive, at least in terms of emotional survival. The human capacity to engage in rationalization is truly remarkable.

Given the above, there is no simple yes or no answer to the question "Should prostitution be legal." I also think the notion of sex worker as a career choice in the same sense as accountant, medical coder, doctor, lawyer, school teacher, factory worker, farm hand, wait staff, is a fallacy. I acknowledge that is my view through the lens shaped by my upbringing, society, socialization.

When I try to consider the costs and benefits of prostitution (or sex work) to individuals and to society, I see no net benefit over time. The market for prostitution is about power and exploitation. Legalization may give some protection to some prostitutes. But it also legitimizes exploitation. Given the reality and functionality(not the inherency) of values, I think the term 'sex worker' is highly suspect and constitutes an acceptance of rationalization.

This post is a ramble, an exploration, and an invitation to more exploration, not a conclusion. Like I said already, I don't think there are simple answers.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 02:59 PM

Does that mean that the commercial transaction between a prostitute and her customer is more honest than many marriages?

G

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 02:05 PM

Unlike the husbands you knew of, Jacqui, I think the husbands on that show were every much as aware and guilty of playing the *game* as the women. It was odd because they did things with their wives I would like Rog to do, but it seemed so fake and ALL about what would look best in OTHER people's eyes. I cannot imagine that kind of stress.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: jacqui.c
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 12:27 PM

That's true Kat. I have known at least two women who stayed in their marriages purely for the material benefits they were given. To me that is as much prostitution as anything else, just more dishonest as, in both cases the husbands thought that they had a happy marriage.

I know that there is less danger in those relationships but it must still do something to the psyche to have to make pretend so much of the time.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: katlaughing
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 12:12 PM

And still no one charged with Jon Benet's murder. She really was so representative of parents and pageantry run rampant, imo.

I was flipping through channels last night and came up on Real Housewives of New York. Watched it for a bit; I used to know some women similar to them through their patronage of the arts center I worked at. It struck me, for all of their ultra-wealth, privilege, etc. they were prostituting themselves, and in one case at least, their daughters, just as much as a woman of the streets, just at a different level. It was all about who might see them, take their picture, pleasing the man of the house so he would allow them to spend more money, keeping themselves skinny. It was sickening after awhile. There were a couple of them who seemed a bit more genuine, but it was still that world of seeing and being seen. Unreal.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 11:51 AM

I remember feeling slightly uncomfortable watching Olive's dance, taught to her be her porn-lovng grandad. I know the comment it was making, but it still made me squirm...

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 11:33 AM

Have you seen the film Little Miss Sunshine? They do quite a sendup of those pagents that overly-sexualize little girls.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: GUEST,Penny S. (elsewhere)
Date: 26 Mar 08 - 07:17 AM

Did anyone in the UK see the news items about a computer online game called Bimbo City used by many girls from 9 years up in France and the UK, in which players buy enhancements for their avatars by texting or using Paypal, such enhancements including breast surgery and diet pills, though the lads who wrote it claim that players can also send their bimbos to uni. To be the hottest bimbo?

The lads seem remarkably naive, in claiming ignorance of what they have made, that they are just reflecting reality... what do they think Bimbo means? (and I do mean naive, having seen them.)

For some years I have been concerned over the styles of dancing taught to primary age children in a local dance school, with accompanying costumes. The teacher has a national reputation, but from hearing him on the radio, he has a sense of "humour" which does not respect women, and he has certainly not been one to notice that teaching under 10s movements associated with sexualised behaviour might be questionable. At least, I have assumed that that was where the girls picked up the behaviours.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 11:56 AM

The church will always be on hand to encourage you to dodge your parental responsibilities in this field by ignoring them and pretending they don't exist, and telling you children should be allowed to be children. that is to say uninformed and ridiculed for their natural interest in what is making them tick.

Children become interested in sex at a very young age, though they don't necessarily know it as something called "sex," and explore as they are allowed. School yard conversations to do with boyfriends and girlfriends, the jokes that make the rounds all express a vast misunderstanding of what is involved in sex. I remember a few that were told in junior high school, that seemed funny then because I was clueless as to what was really involved. Now I remember them as non-sequiturs, created by kids who were trying to guess at it themselves. If parents aren't frank and don't answer questions, kids end up with odd information and will get it from their often misguided peers. My parents left books around that we could stumble upon and read, but books written in the 1960s weren't very helpful.

I told my kids that I don't expect them to wait until they get married, but I do expect them to practice safe sex and under safe situations. Underage kids can get into trouble with the law (see my remarks way up there about the law usually hitting boys with sex offenses, but not girls). My daughter saw an ob/gyn for the first time when she was 17, because she decided she'd rather see a woman (my doctor) than a pediatrician for her annual physicals. We talked about her going to college and choosing birth control. No point in being shy about it. I was proud of my daughter for being open and researching methods and then asking for the Rx she needed when she met the fellow who is her boyfriend (for two years now).

Regulation is not benign and often has many unintended consequences. When Uncle Sam (or the local version) gets involved, special interests get involved. Sometimes consequences are not unintended, they represent hidden agendas.

I had that though when I was posting earlier. It isn't much of a stretch of the imagination to see corrupt officials as pimps, is it?

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: freda underhill
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 05:04 AM

There's a very good film that was produced in Australia last year, called The jammed.

It's a film which tells the story of women sold as sex slaves. It manages to tell the story truthfully without being gratuitous. It's worth getting this film, it will destroy any notions of empowerment to do with the sex industry.

yes, it's about slavery and some people choose to work in that industry. but there are so many people who make that "choice" who have addiction problems or who are impoverished.

two sisters i knew who worked in the sex industry had ongoing problems afterwards, problems including an inability to have unselfconscious sex or to relax during sex. They were big on making comparisons with other women based on physical appeal/attributes, and one told me she could only relate to her post prostitution industry partner/husband as if he was a customer. Their dreams about their future lives were based on getting an ideal partner who would support them.

Despite the bravado they came out with, and comments about empowerment, I think they were hardened, exhausted and corrupted by it.

however... so many people have such different experiences of sex. no-one can know either what other people experience or what is possible, and there are people who can feel degraded within a marriage as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 04:38 AM

I think its fairly impossible that children should know 'all about sex' by the age of five Or a hundred and five come to that.

One of the big problems is that there isn't much in the way of knowledge and education about sex available to anybody. Once you start looking, having yourself as an individual or a couple become in need of help and guidance - you become a punter in the sex trade. Someone to be sold useless books and incredibly stupid videos and dvds.

I'll be honest. I made a total bollocks of the physical side of marriage, with the person I loved the most. I had parents who 'kept me a child' too long and there was no sex education to speak of. And though few people come forward and admit as much, so many marriages disintegrate - and I'm willing to bet a hell of a lot of the rest are held together by one party or the other looking for sex outside marriage - which must be the richest pickings for the prostitution trade.

All I'm saying is. If a child comes to you with his or her sexuality. Don't reject it. Because you haven't the sense or the stomach to take it in your stride. I've seen it happen in my own family with ultimately disastrous consequences.

The church will always be on hand to encourage you to dodge your parental responsibilities in this field by ignoring them and pretending they don't exist, and telling you children should be allowed to be children. that is to say uninformed and ridiculed for their natural interest in what is making them tick.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: GUEST,Appaloosa Lady
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 04:18 AM

Sorry Mick,

I'll leave this discussion. For me, it's not about data, this is about emotion. It's about putting yourself in the place of the woman, imagining her life...every single day of her life.

But maybe you're right, maybe it should all be just viewed clinically, in ratios, facts and figures and that way we don't have to think too deeply about the trauma caused to some 'sex workers' or about the danger of sexualised children growing up to be 'sex workers' and seeing nothing wrong with it.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 01:21 AM

That's a good way to put it Maggie.

Legalization could result in a further dichotomy between those who engage in sex work and those who occasionally or periodically resort to prostitution, or who are forced into prostitution. It could have the effect of pushing prostitutes (distinguishing here between protitutes and sex workers) even further beyond the pale in terms of protection.

I'm gonna backtrack now and say I do not know enough or have enough information to say that I think legalization is probably a good idea. If a majority of women who sell sex are professional sex workers who chose this as a way to make a living (and that implies other viable choices), then legalization is a good thing. If that is not the case, then I need to go back to school on this one.

Regulation is not benign and often has many unintended consequences. When Uncle Sam (or the local version) gets involved, special interests get involved. Sometimes consequences are not unintended, they represent hidden agendas.

Think of the waitress or low-paid worker who may prostitute on the side or between jobs to try to make enough money to make the rent and feed the kids, the 'crack whore' giving head to a dealer who may also be a cop, the low-paid secretary to the President of the local bank who is good friends with the sheriff. They are not likely to register as sex workers, pay the licensing fees, or have the money for mandatory periodic health checks. Typically, when government licensing fees are involved, there are penalties and interest to be paid when the license is not obtained or renewed on time. Then toss in union dues. Many women could find themselves further criminalized, risk greater fines and financial penalties if busted for 'practicing without a license', and driven even further underground by legalization. Legalization could end up strongly favoring 'big business' interests. Don't know about prostitution, but I sure do know what happened to small, local organic gardeners when government got in the business of 'certifying' organic growers. The really small folks could not handle or afford the process.


Not surprisingly, I can't find any reliable data on the number of 'sex workers' vs. 'prostitutes.'

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 12:25 AM

Just as there is a sliding scale involved with the sex worker/prostitution conundrum, there is a sliding scale involved with the erotica/pornography conundrum. And the two (or four) are excruciatingly intertwined.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 25 Mar 08 - 12:04 AM

Thinking about sex work vs. prostitution.

Currently both sex work and prostitution are lumped together under the term prostitution. What we are gradually seeing is a distinction between the two. Legalization will add protections and some measure of legitimacy to sex work and will empower some women who are professional sex workers. This is not an arguement against legalization, but let those of us who may think legalization is a good idea be clear-eyed. legalization would have no (or very little) effect on the many women who are not professional sex workers but who engage in prostitution at various times. Legalizing sex work is likely to have little effect on trafficking, sexual slavery, or sexual trade in children.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 11:54 PM

Interesting about Korea. The stigma of the forced WWII "comfort women" hasn't haunted these modern day sex workers?

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 11:34 PM

Informative post, Jeri. I'm glad you decided to chime in. I've got a bunch of questions you may or may not have answers for.

What did you mean when you talked of making sure the women were registered? And what do you mean by "free-lanced?" Did most of the women work for themselves?

Are you saying the health checks were provided by the US Military? Did the women get treatment as well as diagnostic work? Did they pay for it or was it provided gratis as a means of also protecting the military men from contracting STD's? Would the same thing have been done if it were a military base on US soil - say, here at Ft. Bragg?

Do you think that women who are comfortable identifying themselves as a sex worker are more likely to take advantage of the health services offered than are women who do feel a sense of shame or are sensitive to being considered pariah by families or society? What did you see in terms of drug problems or indications of abuse by pimps or customers? What kinds of attitudes did you hear expressed by the military men about the women from whom they purchased sex?

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Big Mick
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:41 PM

One more thing. Yes, Jeri, they should be organized. And I will come out of retirement to do it......***chuckle***

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Big Mick
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:39 PM

I will remind all of a couple of things.

One, this thread is not a place for men to post opinions. We are here on this one to observe, learn, or post questions. Consider it moderated, and I will delete anymore that don't follow this rule. No hijacking is going to happen.

Appaloosa Lady, get off the rants. The thread is about a discussion of prostitution as women see it now, whether it should be legal, if it were so, is it a tool for women to become empowered. Jeri's warning to you, spoken in her role as a moderator, is being repeated by me as a moderator. You will not be allowed to throw bombs and fits, and draw threads completely off topic. I don't know if you thought this new personna fooled anyone, but it did not. You are being allowed to post only so long as you follow the rules. You are getting close to the line, and forewarned is forearmed.

The reason I want it to be a women's discussion, is because it strikes women, given the physical way it happens (penetration of your body)and the psychological implications that society has foisted on them, plus the emotional ties, in a way that is entirely foreign to men. I believe we, as men, can only benefit from reading and learning here. And I believe that women will learn much from each other as they always do.

Please....back to the discussion. I am sorry for the tone, but I consider this to be a very important discussion and far from running its course.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Jeri
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:27 PM

You know, some people troll by pissing folks off until the thread goes off-topic and it's about the troll.

Some bomb threads with in amazing volume of annoying blather in what appears to be an attempt to 'shout down' others, piss people off, and make the thread all about the troll.

The thread's about prostitution, not the sexualization of children. Lizzie, folks have let you go because you seemed to be able to control the behavior that got you deleted the last few times, but you've reverted to form again. Don't expect it to be tolerated for long.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:18 PM

Lizzie,

I am assuming you have read the posts to this thread. If that assumption is correct, then you are aware you are preaching to the choir.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: GUEST,Appaloosa Lady
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:16 PM

Nope....children should be children. They should NOT be sexualised. Nature has arranged it that most kids recoil when it comes to matters of sex....until one day, when they're old enough, they no longer do that...and nature takes over once again.

Paedeophiles want to over-ride nature. They are out there folks, sexualising our children in the most worrying way, in ways that we never had around us. Watch 5, 6, 7 year olds dancing these days...sure ain't how my little girl danced, until The Spice Girls turned up of course (Lord help us all)...and even then she didn't dance like that, but all her pals did..helped along by their parents who thought it was an absolute hoot.

When I rang up Next a while back now, after they'd had some clothes for kids having to be removed, due to public outrage about how provocative they were, I spoke to their chief buyer, in the Childrenswear. She ended up in tears, not from me being horrible to her, but from stress of knowing that what her company was doing was wrong! She was in her mid 40s, had two girls of her own, aged 7 and 9 and she was worried sick about how they wanted to dress and how they danced, used their bodies etc....I calmed her down a bit, but another reason she was worried was that she was one of the older staff at board meetings, and she was doing all she could to keep kids clothes, as 'kids' clothes, but the younger people on the board wanted the new fashions, the decidely dodgy fashions, because they couldn't see anything wrong with it...

Our kids are being 'groomed' and sadly, many of them already have parents who've lived through the same treatment.

Children are children. They are NOT miniature sexualised adults! They have been robbed of their childhoods and they need them back! They do not need to know all about sex by the time they're five years old. We do not have to dump all adult knowledge, anxieties or behaviour on our kids, because we can't cope with it all.

It's time for adults to grow up and become the protectors again, rather than continuing to want to be like kids and shift all responsibility on to someone else, namely the very ones they should be protecting.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: GUEST,Appaloosa Lady
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:02 PM

"....though I can't be sure because of the lack of clarity with which you have written, is that sex for sale is morally wrong, whether or not it is exploitive."

Lack of clarity Janie ????

"Let me get one thing straight first though. If someone is perfectly happy being a prostitute, then that is fine by me. That is their choice and their life. It's the ones who are *trapped* in prostitution, that I'm talking about."

I don't judge people, apart from on their souls.

Of course Sex For Sale is morally wrong if it exploits anyone. Absolutely 100% wrong! How can it be anything but wrong, if the woman does not want to be a prostitute in the first place. Maybe she's been coerced or forced into it by some complete bastard, be they male or female...or she's seen it as her *only choice* in life, having had a young life filled with family misery or has been branded 'FAILURE' by an education system that, for many, so often de-sensitises and destroys, rather than illuminates and inspires. (but don't get me going on that one again)

The Path To Prostitution is the one that dismays me, because it seems to be never-ending.

If a woman absolutely adores sex and has worked out that she's damned fantastic at it and can therefore earn a fortune, well...good luck to her. She'll make herself deliriously happy and certainly make her various clients even more delirious, I'm sure.

But for the girl whose there for other reasons...no....that should not be happening in the 21st century!

Occupation: Legalised Sex Worker.

Huh?????????????????????

So MORALLY that's now OK? Because society has given these girls a shiny, bright new name, to put on their passport, one that gives them fantastic rights, such as erm..not being beaten up, or less risk of sexual diseases? GREAT! What a job girls! Roll up! Roll up!

I'm missing the blindingly obvious again aren't I?

Shouldn't she being helped out of a world that she may hate? Shouldn't she be given new opportunities for a better life?
Shouldn't she be given encouragement, support, understanding, belief in herself? You know, all that 'stuff' that school and parents should have given her, so long ago, to set her up so positively for life?

Next we'll be having Sex Work NVQs and Sex Work University Degrees!

I mean?????????

Some poor spirit, who's been messed up by a crappy education system, labelled 'FAILURE' then got tossed out into a harsh world, probably turned to drink and drugs to numb the pain, drifts into prostitution, goes down and down in her own estimation and that of others and FINALLY she earns the 'respect' of society by becoming stamped 'Legalised Sex Worker'

???????????????

Someone bring back William Wilberforce...FAST!

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 09:00 PM

I feel a bit in the situation of the the two boys in that short story in The Dubliners - A Strange Encounter. they wag a day off school and encounter a pervert in the park - who they first think to be very liberal - he thinks 'every little boys
should have a little girlfriend.'

he then then starts raving and ranting and whacking off.

Yes I do think that we need to be more explaining of sexuality and love to children. I think it is inevitable that children become 'sexualised'. I think this is infinitely preferable to young men climbing into bed on their wedding night. or even with their first serious grlfriend, without knowing one end of a woman from the other.

Thats why men end up going to prostitutes.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Jeri
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 07:49 PM

It's a service occupation with a lot of taboos attached. I don't have any problem understanding how love can be considered sacred, but sex and love are NOT the same thing. Sex is often separated from every other thing in life as sacred and secret and... just plain taboo. People teach their kids about all sorts of things, but they have to be 'old enough' for their parents to talk about sex. Why isn't it just a matter-of-fact thing like every other aspect of biology? Taboo...

I have a problem with people being forced against their will and that includes people who feel like the HAVE to turn tricks to make the money they need to survive. I don't have any problem whatsoever with people who choose to be sex workers.

I was a military public health technician in South Korea, where prostitution was illegal but ubiquitous and overlooked most of the time. Our office, the local 'businesswomen's' association and the local health authorities made sure the women were registered and had monthly health checks. This helped keep them free of disease and helped keep the guys they serviced free of disease. There were women who freelanced and we used to warn the guys about them because they weren't checked.

Some of these girls had had to leave their homes because of economic reasons, and likely wouldn't be welcome at home anymore. They made pretty good money and most that I talked to didn't have a problem with self-esteem. Some people tried to hand them a big load of shame, but the smart ones left it

Sex as a job can be demeaning and raunchy, mostly because that's how 'righteous' people view it, and sex workers can easily be marginalized and treated as pariahs.

Personally, I don't understand why anyone would choose to be a sex worker, but I don't understand why people choose to do a lot of the things they do. A thing shouldn't be illegal just because I, or anyone else doesn't understand it. So yeah, legalize prostitution - then organize. (right Mick?)

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Janie
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 07:28 PM

There is also a 4th view regarding the legalization of prostitution that might arise out of a belief that it is morally wrong and also exploitive. That is the view that I *think* is what takes place in Sweden from the brief blog ientry that Maggie linked to much earlier. In that situation, it is not illegal to offer sex for sale, but it is illegal to solicit sex for sale. The customer commits a legally criminal act but the prostitute is deemed to not have done so. In this instance, the prostitute does have some protection and is able to seek out appropriate medical care and file police reports when abused without fear of arrest. It may make it less likely that a customer will be physically abusive, though I certainly don't have any information to know that one way or another.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 07:13 PM

I suppose to hark back to films is one way to bring this view more into the open. One I saw probably 20 years ago was Cinderella Liberty, and had a young and matter of fact hooker who was in charge in that setting with the inexperienced young man (wasn't that Randy Quaid?), and The Last Picture Show--the book, at least; I haven't seen the film but I imagine that part was in it. That was an odd drive to a situation where the young men saw a culture of poor and powerless women who took this work as a matter of course and survival. The portrayals were of young men who weren't very worldly with women who were just women down on their luck and did the work to make ends meet. It was seamy but not judgemental.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: GUEST,Nameless Mudcat Member
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 06:50 PM

Many of you say you have not met any man who will admit to using the services provided by a prostitute. I'll come out halfway (no name). I went to a prostitute in a long dry spell between relationships. It was in a place where the service was legal.

The working woman was young (maybe mid twenties) and sweet, very kind, and pleasant. Her working name was Belinda. She treated me with kindness and made me feel special. She played the part of a concerned lover very well. She told me about her son and that she enjoyed her job. We spent a long time talking. I knew it was an act but I let go of my disbelief for that time.

I admit that my experience is limited to that one time which makes my viewpoint somewhat skewed.

There is a book out there called Working Sex by a journalist who wrote several newspaper columns about the sex industry. She expanded her columns into a book that looks at the variety of services in the sex industry from prostitution to pornography to the newer web sites. I think the majority of our views come from an older time when women had less power and were more oppressed. I think that women will continue to be preyed upon until the services are legalized.

By the way, as I see it porn is also prostitution. The people just have sex with a limited clientele.

Subject: RE: BS: Is Prostitution just women...........;
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 06:48 PM

Well said, Janie, indeed!