Prostitution is one of the most controversial professions in the world. Legal and regulated in only 22 countries, as well as 11 counties of the state of Nevada, it is considered immoral by most of the world. The issues around prostitution are more complex, however, than a simple question of morality. Factors include crime, public health, the economy, freedom, and exploitation.
So, how do the numbers break down? Will legalizing prostitution solve the problems caused by black market prostitution, or create new problems? Should morality even be part of the discussion?
Here’s a look at the facts:
The Numbers
It’s difficult to know exactly how many people are or have been prostitutes, especially in areas where it is illegal, but it’s estimated that there are around 40 million prostitutes worldwide. Thailand is home to the most booming sex industry, bringing $35 billion per year to its economy, whereas in the U.S., taxpayers are stuck for $200 million per year in jail and court fees for prostitution busts. In some countries, prostitutes aren’t considered criminals, but their customers are. In the U.S., anyone involved in prostitution can be arrested, though statistics show that the prostitutes themselves are arrested 90% of the time, while only 10% of arrests are those who use them.
Pro-Legalizing Arguments and the Statistics That Betray Them
Proponents of legalized prostitution argue that a woman should have the right to make a living using her own body, and that legalizing the industry would allow prostitutes to enjoy proper healthcare, work in a safer environment with legal protection against abusive customers and pimps, and boost the economy through taxes. On paper, the arguments are sound, but the reality of prostitution tells a different story. A survey of 169 female prostitutes in the Chicago area showed that the average age at which they turned their first trick was 14, 75% had been abused as children, 58% have been assaulted, 20% carry STDs, and a whopping 92% would quit if they could afford to. Perhaps the assaults and the STDs would be improved by legalization and close regulation, but the numbers indicate that prostitution is rooted in abuse and tragedy, and that few would choose to be prostitutes if they didn’t have to.
Prostitution in Other Countries
In countries other than the U.S., prostitution comes with problems whether it is legal or not. In most countries where it is illegal, the black market sex trade booms anyway, usually to the detriment of the women and girls who are forced into sex work. In countries where it is legal and regulated, smuggling and sex trafficking are a major problem. In Bangladesh, for example, prostitution has limited legality, while pimping and brothel ownership are both legal—and yet, estimates of underage girls being sexually exploited there range from 10,000 to as many as 29,000. Legal prostitution in less corrupt countries, such as Belgium, which has highly-regulated, technologically advanced brothels (think fingerprint scanners and ID numbers), appears to be less problematic and is the gold-standard for proponents of legalization. However, even countries with seemingly successful legal prostitution attract smugglers supplying girls to other places.
Types of Prostitution in America
The word “prostitute” tends to conjure a picture of a scantily clad street-walker, and these are the type most often busted by law enforcement. However, much prostitution in the U.S. occurs through escort services and spas or massage parlors acting as a front for sex services. If you’ve ever been to Vegas, you may have seen signs for escorts or gentlemen’s clubs that are clearly shilling for johns. Nevada is the only state with legal prostitution, but all big cities have similar businesses advertising openly.
Escort services are careful to only advertise social companionship, though it’s understood that sexual encounters are often a part of the deal. Escort businesses protect themselves by remaining separated from any private arrangements that the escorts may make with individual clients. Law enforcement turns a blind eye, preferring to focus on the more visible street prostitutes.
Massage parlors are such obvious fronts for prostitution you would think they’d all be closed down by now, but they are proliferating throughout the U.S. with estimates as high as 90% of massage parlors offering sex in some areas. Like escort services, these establishments advertise openly, but avoid specific references to sex. The sheer number of them makes enforcing prostitution laws to raid and shut them down a nearly impossible task.
12 comments
Kenneth
I just want to ask with the "seperation of church and state" how can the "state" determine what is "moral" "amoral" with that being said how is trading sexual favors for money "illegal" because on our dollar it states good for all debts public and PRIVATE. So our government knows that we make PRIVATE dealings so there is my two cents.
Diana
Private encounters by consenting adults should be decriminalized. Escorts almost always use condoms, and any spread of STI's are usually from those who are unprepared for their sexual encounters because they are either in a relationship or married already and don't want to take the risk of carrying condoms around with them because their mates might find them. So they go out with their friends to a club or party and meet up with someone who they just want to encounter quickly and so fail to protect themselves from the exchange of body fluids.
If there are no pimps involved or panderers who coerce women into doing something with their bodies for money that they wouldn't do or couldn't do on their own, if it doesn't involve underage prostitutes and doesn't involve human traffickers, and if the woman didn't choose her career direction when she was still a minor, and if no one else lives off the profits of the prostitute, if she can manage to protect herself from assaults, can manage her money on her own, doesn't need a bodyguard while meeting men, and doesn't ply her trade in public or under the guise of a business façade, then it should be decriminalized. The numbers of those will decrease, as the sensationalism and lure and mystique and excitement of doing the taboo and forbidden is removed from the situation. Often if you can do it you don't want to, but if you cant it challenges you to see if you can do it and get away with it.
Russ
Regardless of whether you agree with prostitution or not, the right to legalize it has been inferred with several supreme court cases even though the last supreme court case to involve prostitution directly was Hoke v. United States (1913) (Supreme Court upheld the Mann Act though decided that prostitution was a state issue and not a federal issue).
The first case: Roe v. Wade (1973) decided that women had a fundamental right to an abortion if they so chose to have one. It could be inferred that if women are able to act like "hoes" and not think about the consequences of sleeping around then why can't they do that as a profession. Tongue in cheek, wasn't it the Joker who said in The Dark Knight that if you're good at something you "should never do it for free"? But in all seriousness, that case proved that a woman had a right to her body and not let it be state controlled. Sure, many women in prostitution are trafficked -- but not all women are. To say that is defamatory and is a faulty analogy.
The second case, Pap's A.M. v. Erie (2000), decided that strippers not being able to nude dance was not a violation of the first amendment because the message could still be conveyed with pasties and g-strings. The supreme court did not abolish the act of dancing erotically rather it left it up to the towns of the states to decide whether or not strippers could dance nude. The reason this supports prostitution is because in over 70 cities it has been found in several reports that one of the secondary effects of strip clubs is prostitution. In a study done by Princeton University in 2009, it found that when men view women in bikinis the right side of their brains create certain "action" impulses that cause women to become seen as objects; kind of a natural thing. So for a man to be able to view a woman naked legally, but not be able to pay her for sex is hypocritical. It violates the 5th amendment in a way as to incriminate him if viewing a woman and her becoming an object is a natural reaction as found in the Princeton Study.
The third case, Lawrence v. Texas (2003), abolished all fornication and sodomy laws and rendered them unenforceable as the court ruled that the states could not control the destinies of homosexuals or anybody else for that matter. Though the ruling did not encompass commercial sex, it must restudied that there are several citizens of our country who spend their whole lives single and lonely because of disabilities they were born with or other difficulties they face. We live in a materialistic world unfortunately and dating isn't all that easy. So, just as Justice O'Connor wrote for Lawrence v. Texas, the states are controlling the destinies of the disabled,
The fourth and final case, Agency for International Development v. Alliance for Open Society International (2013), allowed non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to be able to avow a pro or neutral prostitution stance which was contrary to the belief of congress who opposes it and funded NGOs that only avowed an Anti stance. This is where legalized and regulated prostitution would come in i.e. brothels, as it could be inferred from this case that a brothel could be established in a state with the opposite view of the state government.
The four cases help me get to my point: the legalization of prostitution is inevitable in our country. Just last year, Canada's supreme court -- who is very similar to our country with its legal system as we both are common law countries -- found prostitution bans in that country to be unconstitutional. The question though is how soon that will happen in our country. That is the benefit of the slippery slope: once you legalize one thing you open doors for other things. Gay marriage -- which i support -- shows that we have moved from the traditional view as does numerous states legalizing marijuana.
As a paralegal, I can't help but notice bias in this writer's article. While she may have good facts, she fails to mention the abuse that goes on in non-commercial sex and domestic violence. She fails to report the numerous cases of campus sexual assaults. She forgets to mention that numerous studies have found that "hook-up sites" help spread diseases in young people. She forgets to mention the rapes and muggings that occur on those sites from people luring others with fake profile pictures. Sadly, violence will continue in sexual partners -- whether they be paid or not -- but that should not be a reason to criminalize something. Just as Justice O'Connor said in 2003, the states cannot control the destinies of people.
If one thing stands true it is this: criminalizing prostitution does not work. But maybe -- just maybe -- legalization might work as seen with the Nevada legal brothels which have not had one AIDS case since AIDS was discovered in the 80s and which work closely with the local sheriffs departments in licensing their girls and testing them. We have to hope for that "maybe" instead of just keeping it from happening.
Bruce
"A survey of 169 female prostitutes in the Chicago area showed that the average age at which they turned their first trick was 14, 75% had been abused as children, 58% have been assaulted, 20% carry STDs, and a whopping 92% would quit if they could afford to. "
MMmmmmmm...........looks exactly like Chicago's general population!
Jack
I think it would be better to legalize it. Then we could get Groupon deals. Cheaper than dating and being teased.
Lynne Bedford
One additional comment. These women are very savvy entrepreneurs. The high end of this market uses online escort services, manages their business with no pimp involved. They trade johns among themselves when overbooked or if out of town. There are many layers and levels to this industry. At this level, it's not about being forced into the business to survive. They chose it because they are making six figures.
Lynne Bedford
I fully disagree with your position for several reasons. First, the prostitutes have no integrity and no respect for laws now , so what makes you think they are going to obtain a federal identification number and begin paying taxes on their tricks? I knew a prostitute personally. From just one ( of many) regular ( prominent men ) customers she earned 60,000.00 in one year. Dhe had about 10 regular customers so do the math. She was a salesman for Chanel on the side , drove a new Mercedes Benz and had a nice 3,000 square foot home that was fully paid for. All her income from prostitution was tax free. I assure you if prostitution was legalized she still would pay no taxes. I am a health professional, spent 10 years in college and preparing for my career. I pay taxes that are astronomical and it infuriates me to know these things continue to exists. In our country legalizing prostitution would not correct the problem and would not serve a tax benefit for this country. Secondly , I feel that the more we condone and become desensitized by amorality acts and make them acceptable, the more our society becomes filled with a higher percentage of wrongs than rights from a religious perspective. We are not headed the the path that our Father wishes for us. We should continue to monitor and make arrest. We should also focus more attention on arresting the johns as well. Lastly, we should monitor and regulate "Men's" Clubs, Strip Clubs as these are many times the training ground for these "ladies of the night". The particular prostitute I mentioned, first worked in a high end " elite" clientele strip club. Her clientele included prominent businessmen of Atlanta, celebrities, well known sports athletes, etc. She earned $500-600$ a trick. As a very hard working health professional, this whole situation nauseates me. No, prostitution should not be legalized for any reason!
dont worry bout it
i believe the point is that most of these women have no other skills, have been abused and so beat down in this life, they feel like they have nothing else to offer and wind up selling themselves--- and anyone who pretends this is an acceptable way to live, to survive is only doing so cause they dont want to face the truth....no woman truly wants to sell her self to some man on the streets....quite frankly, i think most women's problems could be easily eliminated....by terminating about half the population---guess which half.
kalisita
Legalization with proper regulation and enforcement could be beneficial in protecting the workers from violence and theft by clients and pimps, protecting both workers and clients from disease (as well as providing a paper trail in case of a health emergency), and reducing human trafficking by providing a safe alternative to illegal forced prostitution. There has seemingly always been a need in society for isolated and lonely men to seek intimacy and companionship for as far back as recorded history goes. Ignoring this need, and trying to subvert it via religious or other moral censorship has led to the abysmal state of the American sex industry today. Instead of a black market perpetuated by the abuse, abduction, and trauma of children and women and the stigmatization of those involved in the industry on any level, wouldn't it be better to have a regulated, inspected, taxed business that has been licensed and insured, with workers receiving adequate healthcare and training or education in counselling and psychology? Isn't it finally time that we as a country stop viewing sex through the unhealthy double-standards of Puritanical 'sin' and juvenile objectification, and started seeing sex as a normal human need and function? Are we ready to lay aside our preconcieved notions of ourselves, and look into the mirror with open eyes? Are we ready to face the truth, and accept the reality of the human condition? After all, in the end people will always behave as they do, and not as anyone may think they should...
Steve
Oldest profession in the world. ..
Jolene
I think they should make it legal.i had a friend who was an escort.most of guys where descent people.one guy raped her and beat her up bad.called her phone and lift a nasty message saying what he would do to her daughter next.I tried telling her to go to the police
Dave
I don't support prostitution, but I'll bet 92% of the general population would quit any job if they could afford to.