Umm, no.

Some would say that folks writing poetry are selling their very self.  Others would say that musicians who play because they can do no other thing are selling their self. 

Each person alters their being to make a living.  

Honestly, the person on the street long ago gave up that power over their body.  The time when they stuck the needle in their arm pretty well tied up most of their options.

Givng them a safe place to have sex is a reasonable thing to do in our society.

Kimmio, I know the family of someone who was murdered while being a prostitute.  They would have preferred she had a safe place to meet her john.

I have never said we shouldn't make it safer for the people doing it! I have never said that! What I said was that we should be looking at how to phase it out down the road. Lessen the demand for it. Not open it up to more marketing, more profit 'opportunity', not make it more attractive for people to work in brothels, and purchase sex, by treating it like every other service job. It most definately is NOT. I think the way we do it is by not criminalizing prostitutes- but we definately need to deter 'johns'. You think that can't be done, or shouldn't. I think it can, and it should. It is a mode of survival- I don't think it is a legitimate service job. It's something that has to exist safely until we can phase it out. Might never happen in this crappy world, not in any of our lifetimes, but I still hold that it should. The Nordic model is still in it's early stages. Maybe there are ideas that will emerge about how they improve upon it.

So a person's body, their sexuality and their self are not integrally connected?

I also think every discipline should be looking at the mammoth problems facing our world- including prostitution: sociology, psychology, criminology, anthropology, biology, neurology...and theology. Liberation theology. Business and entertainment should be the very last in line to have a word to say about the commodification and exploitation of peoples bodies for money. Not the first.

I want to ask a question. Do those of you who think prostitution is just a service job, think that a lesbian should be required to fully 'service' a man that came into a brothel- if they were 'employed' at one? Or a gay man, on the off chance, to fully 'service' a woman? If that repulsed them, terrified them, day after day- and they have to suppress, or dissociate themselves from their fears and repulsion to make a living-would that not be a cruel situation for society to set up and legitimize (think 'anti-gay' therapy. It's offensive- few here support legitimizing it because of mental/ emotional damage)? Wouldn't it be vile, offensive, degrading? A human rights abuse? A type of slavery? If their body and sexuality is not integrally connected to self anymore than other human services or activities- then why would this be unthinkable to anyone? Why more objectionable than a prostitute having sex with anyone else s/he is not attracted to, finds sexually vile, but is required to 'service'? I think we do know that a person's sexuality is connected to their very being and it is very harmful to put, and keep, them in a circumstance where they are forced to detach from it- it is something that money can't, or shouldn't be able to buy. Therefore, it is wrong to legitimize prostitution (I am not saying it's wrong to decriminalize prostitutes or that we don't have a duty to keep them safe. It's wrong to legitimize prostitution as a viable, normative, business)- because it legitimizes keeping people in untenable circumstances. It dismays me that compassionate progressive people can't understand this.

I've said more than my piece. If people don't get it there's nothing more I can say. It's just sad.

Umm, prostitution is not about attraction.   If a woman who is a lesbian chose to service a man, then so be it.  If a woman who is  a lesbian chose only to service wwomen, then they would advertize as such.

You presume that prostitution is about attraction or desire.

I was listening on the radio to a report on slavery on fishing boats in Thailand.  I don't think everyone is saying we shoud cancel fishing.

No, I don't think it's about the prostitute's attraction or desire at all. I've made it clear already that I don't think that. You were the one upthread who asked me to consider that someone who enjoyed sex might just want to do it for a living, and that I just had hang ups. I was asking people to consider what kind of emotional trauma a person faces over time to have to put away or disassociate from their sexual being in order to 'service' a perceived need- to pretend they're not gay because of other's expectations, to pretend they're attracted to someone who causes them to feel repulsed, or afraid- whether it's society that binds them, their 'boss' who binds them, or the person who they're having sex with binds them to it- for survival- it's still wrong.

If you make the argument that a service is a service, then why should it make any difference if the prostitutes were gay and servicing straight clients or not? Or straight, and servicing gay clients? If we're to legitimize it as a business and invoke the Charter about non discrimination in the provision of services? (I don't feel this way, just proposing the question) And what makes a person being expected to service a gender they're not attracted to any worse, any more degrading, than requiring them to service anyone else they're really not attracted to.

Kimmio, every individual will have some areas that they are better at than others.  Shucks, sex worker would be a skilled trade, and as such, there will be specialties.

Okay. And I am sure some people only a few decades ago (like my uncle for instance, who had a fake girlfriend to please redneck elements of the family, suffered from severe depression and committed suicide-I don't know the whole story of exactly why btw, because it's not discussed, but having to put his sexuality in the closet was part of it) had to get pretty skilled at pretending they're straight when they're gay- they had to 'sell' it to everyone to survive in the world (he was not a prostitute but he had to sell himself out most of his life to others expectations regarding his sexuality)-and we agree now that is an affront to their dignity and human rights.

I am drawing parallels- because we agree, and LGBT rights is a good example- that sexuality is inalienable from personhood. So I just don't think we should legitimize prostitution as a business and back people into an untenable corner.

Kimmio, you presume that there wouldn't be an option on who you service.  

Note:  http://www.amsterdam-advisor.com/amsterdam-prostitutes.html

Average charge of $65 for 15-20min.  

note: based on your numbers of 20 patrons a day that would be 1300 / day.  

If you go with the 365 days a year you seem to indicate tht would be 400,000 / year.

Now, the problem is that honestly, there aren't that many customers typically for them.

Costs are relatively low, as well.

There might not be much choice, in reality. Just like lastepoint has no choice in who her patients are. It's a slow day at the brothel? Boss has extra utility bills to pay? Just bring 'em in. There isn't much of choice for strippers about who walks into a club any given night- and the house wants to make money. "Get to work ladies!"

Well, my friend made $1000 a night stripping sometimes. Good money. Horrible, abusive, job. Disgusting bosses, disgusting clients. A lot of the girls had alcohol and drug problems- to get them through the shifts night after night. And a lot of money went there. My friend cleaned up, smartened up, and started saving money to get out of it for good. She bought a house, started a legit business, nothing remotely to do with the sex trade. No one who loved her was telling her- it's good money, stay! She was a fortunate one. She started to see the dark side of it and got the hell out. She had an exit plan.

The house takes a big cut- or the 'staff' has to pay upfront, a fee, to work there.

We could stop over-emotionalizing the topic by redefining the loaded term "selling her body". Much  better term: limited access rental agreement.  Similar to the one held by my employer over my brain for 7 hours per day.

A very well-balanced European article on the human rights of sex workers: http://www.humanrightseurope.org/2014/02/witness-sonja-dolinsek-respecting-the-rights-of-sex-workers-in-our-democratic-societies/

Okay. Limited access rental agreement. It's not like it's one time. She's still has to have intercourse or give oral sex to hundreds if strangers in a year. The bad memories don't just disappear.

Being worried about what this does to their emotional and psychological well being over time is logical. To dismiss it is totally illogical. if someone is raped and it scars them with PTSD we are concerned- and that's the case for many prostitutes- they were abused early, have PTSD and other mental health issues. If someone participates in sex via a 'limited access rental agreement' with people who scare and repulse them we shrug it off and say 'work hazard'? Even though the nightmares, the fears, are the same? Seriously? That's awful.

I've heard the opinions of the pros who want to legitimize it like any other job. And I have heard opinions from the former ones who don't- I am for safety, absolutely. And that safety extends to getting people out of the business long term.

I can understand people who work for keeping clients (the prostitues being the clients the agency protects) safe. Like those who work at WISH in Vancouver. I don't understand women looking at it through a business lense advocating it as a legitimate business option long term. We've had tho wool pulled over our eyes and I don't buy the argument for it. And this is not just about me not being convinced- this is about asking why we should legitimize it as a business when it's one founded on abuse. Bette: you rent out your mind for a specific purpose- you weren't abused or coerced into believing you had no other options when you were a teen. And the work you do, I hope, doesn't perpetuate those early emotional scars. And if it did- society should stand up on your behalf and ask- is that a legitimate place for someone to earn money?

Kimmio, can you imagine someone have sex for sex's sake?

No emotional connection. just sex.

Yeah. I can. It catches up to people after awhile. Unless they're sociopaths incapable of empathy. But, yes, I can. I can imagine leaving intimacy off to the side to get it on. I can only imagine what it would take psychologically not just to do that once in awhile in the context of a relationship with someone you're attracted to and trust- but with someone you have no attraction to and no reason to trust. Can you imagine someone having sex,for sexes sake- day after day- with strangers they are not even sexually attracted to let alone intimate with- the reason their emotions are dulled is because they were abused young- then trying to ever have a real relationship after that. You condone using women in this circumstance as a legitimate business? You think that's good for society long term- that people engage in more and more emotionless sex? I guess 'Welcome to the jungle'. Modern jungle. That's regression- going backwards in our evolution.

I truly believe that sex can be a commodity, a service, which can be sold, and which people should be allowed to sell.

I do not agree with your base premises.

Then you're ignoring, or do not care about, the statistics that say that most women go into it young, and abused.

ps, dang, didn't realize how many of us are sociopaths.....

Our society is turning sociopathic. I believe. We're giving up empathy for others in favour of profit. Look around.

umm, there was no profit in having sex for sex 's sake, and yet, you name it as related to being a sociopath.

Kimmio, just wow.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy

In many respects I think society is becoming more psychopathic sociopathic as a whole. Opportunistic behaviour is encouraged, even praised, in business and other areas- empathy's not on the table.

Well, we are talking about sex for profit and who profits.

Kimmio, seriously. You said earlier that only sociopaths would have sex for sex's sake.  You have extreme opinions, which seem to have little room for the grayness of life.

Note: I am done chatting with Kimmio on this one.  There is clearly a major disconnect between Kimmio's and my understanding of the issue.  

I said if that emotionless sex catches up to most people after awhile, unless they are incapable of empathy (therefore see no need for it). No empathy, diminished ability to have intimacy? Lack of ability to feel guilt about it? What do you think sociopathy is? It's all over the place in our society. Getting worse.

You could say legitimizing prostitution as a legitimite business is extreme, abd we've almost arrived at that extreme. We live in the greyness of life. That is true. I do too. And we do a dance of compromises. Some of us hope that one day it won't be so grey and sad for the majority in the world while a few thrive. Some of us look into "what's making it so sad?" because we have to if it's going to ever change. Other's give in to thinking the status quo's okay. It's just how the world works. Live with it. If there weren't idealists we'd stagnate. I don't see my opinions making big changes. I just have them.

My opinions aren't extreme. They're idealistic, sure. I don't expect automatic change in the world. At best, slow change in attitude. Maybe I try to look a little deeper than some others do.

And sometimes I'm wrong. Often. But, this is an issue I feel strongly about. A women's issue that affects, I believe, our society long term. I am worried about the immediate safety of women, and also worried about the health of women and society long term if prostitution is legitimized as a business. I don't think it's a rosey picture. I don't think the commodification of everything under the sun is a rosey picture anyway- and certainly not women for sex.

Nordic Model- what they're doing in Iceland. With future improvements and a long term vision of totally phasing out prostitution- even if there's no end in sight- keep it safe, but educate towards that vision.

omg, i saw three posts on this thread.  I come back.  It is Kimmio having updated two posts from further back, and adding one more.  Seriously.

Kimmio

You have written your heart out. I find so much truth in what you are saying.  I've done the bar scene and I've met lots of the women and the  men whom  you reference. You have enough of your own  material in this thread  to write a  very informative book. I hope you will save it and perhaps publish it one day.

P.S. I have a neice in Van. who lives in your area. She bought one of the new expensive condos $550. or so that were built  to push the poor residents out when Van. held the Olympics.

Pinga

I understand that you and Kimmio don't agree but I believe she is very passionate about the topic. Its possible she could be a leader in the field similiar to the founder of A A. You never know. She might be able to help both women and men  and save a lot of lives one day.

She posts twice or three times because she has so much to say and there is no reply. I sometimes do the same. Its not such a big sin? Only people who are really interested need to read her posts.

Kimmio

Here is the latest news my sister sent me today about downtown east side Van.  crack pipes being sold in vending machines for 25 cents. Its very very sad what is happening to the people living there.

http://globalnews.ca/news/1137670/crack-pipe-dispenser-in-vancouvers-dow...

Edit:

My link on the crack pipes may not have explained that the problem is that people  use other people's crack pipes until the pipes  get old and they break . This results  in the drug users being cut on the lips which spreads aids  and other diseases. I forget the price of the pipes, perhaps $10. which is why the addicts share them.

Sorry... off topic... although in all probability most prostitutes are addicted to crack and other  drugs.

I'm off to bed...LOL....I promise...

But here's a video from downtown east side Vancouver. I believe Gary Paterson's UC church where he was a pastor at one time  is in the heart of this place ?  Kimmio goes to church there now I think.

Hi stardust,

Thank you for your support. I don't have any letters beside my name, just observations and I doubt anyone would read my book! Lol.

I don't go to that church but one not far from it. Yes, many prostitutes, if not most, are addicted to some substance. To keep going, keep from crashing. I remember when my friend was dancing. She had a nice apartment she leased in Gastown (downtown eastside). I rememer thinking that the 'glamorous' life she was living, and the lives of those in the alley behind her- was not such a far fall. One day it's coke at stripper parties- before too long, crack in the alley. It really dawned on me, in a moment looking out from her balcony. She was lucky. Every single dancer she worked with had been abused when they were young. Every single one of them was at greater risk for addiction and mental health problems, abusive relationships, and homelessness and the whole gamut. Through a Blue Lens made an impact on me, too. I saw it when it first came out (actually that was the follow up. The original documentary was Behind a Blue Lens). Made me realize how easily someone like my friend could end up there. Anyone can, but prostitution and related work carries a higher risk- one that I don't think we should enable by legitimizing it as a business.

This is the position I share that I would propose to our legislators. From the Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres (CASAC)

http://www.casac.ca/content/position-paper-reform-prostitution-laws

Double post

I would also point out that we can't say, in good conscience, that we support a society that promotes and creates an environment of equality for women on one hand- and legalizes, and therefore legitimizes, paying for gropes (and whatever else) with the other- go ahead and use that.

Kimmio, your position paper proposes criminalizing prostitution - for consumers/johns.

How could you possibly think this would work in any sort of long term? Do you not understand the effects of suppressing something?

So, you think these johns have a 'right' to others' bodies? Like I said before, if they didn't have hands, I'd feel more compassion. If orgasms via masturbation doesn't relieve their itch enough to function normally in society, then I would be concerned that their problem is pathological anyway. We shouldn't commodify every compulsion we have- especially at someone else's expense- a group of people, statistically (and in reality) marginalized and abused. This is, I think, about men (mainly) abusing power over women. They can't do it with force, so they do it with money instead.

Sexual Assault Centres of Canada does very good work helping abused women, and has for many years. If you want a reply to questions about their position paper, take it up with them. I'm sure they've seen enough sex work survivors and other women to have expertise, and would be happy to answer your questions.

Criminalization could mean that these 'johns' get helped without having to use the bodies of marginalized and abused women to do it- give them and teach them about other options to control their urges without hurting or oppressing anyone else to do so.

Prostitution started as a ritual sacrifice to 'the gods'- in affluent societies it later became commodified, and women who did it were in the lowest class- sex slaves sold into bondage. A caste system. It was about servitude to affluent men, a status and power thing. Mix that with the primitive amygdala- we have an ongoing problem. Like Michael Dowd says- the primitive amygdala is about: food, fight, and f'k. It is about domination and control to guarantee the continuation of the gene pool, the survival of the species. In primitive humans, for dominant males to secure the ideal proliferation of their genes, perhaps it was necessary in our early history, to exert force over females to get that. With money, they could buy it- wives were generally a commodity for this purpose too. But as with many things, we evolve. Violence is not tolerated. We have learned about equality, and the distance between our primitive impulses and their place in modern civilized society- I don't think we solve the problem by going backwards. Men buying prostitutes no longer has anything to do with the gene pool, and hasn't for a lobg time, but the impulse to control is still there. It's the same one that's causing men to force women to fully cover their bodies and faces. We need to recognize that we can't be using a (historically and currently) marginalized and abused group of human beings, women, to that end.

Interesting to note, also, that in primitive humans- the female instinct was to have sex with as many men as possible to secure the gene pool, too. But she naturally selected, by getting the attention of the ones who would be the healthiest and best providers for her children. In the case of forced marriages and with prostitution, we have men exerting control- not women selecting ideal mates- it has nothing to do with genes, either. Prostitutes have to have sex with whoever pays them, regardless of their physical attributes or stength of their genes, and they're not trying to get pregnant. Again, we're not apes anymore- and it's primitive male dominance and control at the root of this- and as evolved humans who care about equality, we can do better than commodify women who've suffered abuse, to capitulate to a primitive urge that doesn't serve a purpose in modern society. If the urge to dominate and control weaker people, and subject then to abuse and ongoing inequality, serves any good purpose for society anymore if it ever even did, I'd like to know what that is.