JustThinking | prostitution

Victims or whores | Danielle Strickland

I‘ve been immersed recently in prostitution legislation. A year and a half ago I was neck high in a raging debate around the legalising of prostitution in Canada. Some very vocal proponents were upholding the ‘rights of women’ to prostitute themselves. After all - it is their body. This neo-liberal feminism (far from the classic feminism that spear-headed abolition, women voting and the rights of children around the world) suggests that prostitution isn’t oppression but a profession and should be dignified with proper acceptance, education and wages - with protection of workers rights. There is a classic case of a ‘co-operative brothel’ operating right now (albeit illegally) in Victoria, BC on the west coast of Canada.

The problem is that the rhetoric around legalising prostitution sounds pretty good (in promised form anyway): a society that no longer judges women or uses morality as a grid to punish those who don’t adopt a pure lifestyle, billed as a liberation and a right. It makes opposing it sound like a puritanical rant against the freedom of women. You’d think the only people left opposing legalizing prostitution were a bunch of old- fashioned, purist holy rollers trying to save poor lasses from the den of iniquity and the fires of hell.

The truth is that classic feminism rages on and presents from a women’s right perspective, an impressive argument against legalising prostitution. Not simply theoretical, in recent years they have presented a new model many governments around the world are adopting to combat violence and oppression against women through sexual slavery and prostitution.  It all started in Sweden.

Gunilla Ekberg was at the helm of the new legislation that suggested (with a proper understanding of prostitution) any society that seeks to uphold the rights of women and children must stop it. On its website at the height of the experiment Sweden had written, ‘We want the world to know that in Sweden, women and children are NOT FOR SALE.’  This women’s right perspective suggests abolition as the only proper feminist response to prostitution. But why? Well, it’s all about understanding oppression. Let’s break it down:

Who are they?
Prostituted women are almost always oppressed women. Studies the world over suggest that women who end up working by selling their bodies are desperate. 84% of prostituted women in Australia (where prostitution has been legalised for 14 years in the State of Victoria - but more on that later!) said they would do anything else if they could. They are most likely to be uneducated, from low economic backgrounds, minorities, addicted and abused. It’s not exactly a poster child for women’s rights. Unlike the popular media suggests, prostituted persons do not consist of young sexually liberated women choosing to exercise their ‘right’ to sell themselves  - they are overwhelmingly poor, uneducated and neglected - suffering from abuse. For more information, visit this site.

What do they do?
Ekberg spells it out much clearer than I can given the readership of this article -  suffice to say it’s a list of things that include rape, gang rape, oral sex, vaginal tearing, beatings, bondage and death.

What are the costs?
The costs to the women themselves are astronomical. There is damage to their body and their emotions, fear, addiction (70% of women develop an addiction while involved in prostitution), 80% suffer physical harm, 60% suffer sexual assault, 80% emotional abuse, 70% verbal threats, not to mention post traumatic stress disorder, death (suicide is a common death for prostituted persons), and murder. Click here to read more.

The costs to society are also shocking. Violence toward all women increases with society’s assumption that it’s completely normal to purchase women’s bodies. Marriage breakdowns, infectious diseases, police intervention and trauma are just a few of the costs.  Not only that, but the problems of illegal trafficking only increase with legalisation according to several studies.

Fourteen years ago in Australia (in Melbourne) The Salvation Army looked into the situation and decided to support the State of Victoria’s new initiative to legalise prostitution. I’m pretty sure it was in an attempt (I’ve talked with the folks who made the decision at length) to help women involved. Although this was a heart-felt decision meant to help the victims of organized crime rackets and police corruption - it was short sighted, naïve and perhaps one of the most tragic decisions in recent Australian history.  I’m urging Australian’s thoughtful citizens to reconsider - it’s time to revisit the legislation. Whatever happened to The Salvation Army’s resolve to actually confront wickedness? Have we really become content to risk manage the darkness?

Writer: Capt. Danielle Strickland is currently the Social Justice Director of the Southern Australia Territory. She digs traveling, reading, running, speaking, basketball and movies. Her passion is grace, mercy and justice… and all the stuff in between. Her favourite question is ‘how hard can it be?’ and most of her days are spent answering it.

5 Comments to JustThinking | prostitution

1. Out of interest: what were the consequences of legalising prostitution in Victoria? You mention the motives for the Army’s support, and say it was tragic, but you seem to have missed the details of the tragedy as it exists in Victoria.

   My personal opinion is that holding the victim responsible for her own oppression won’t stop her being a victim. But does the issue have to be so polar? What is it about prostitution that we *should* legislate against? What can we legislate against? What should we allow, even if it is different to our own sense of morality?

   And ultimately, what should be our response to the victim? We should think very carefully about that before we advise the government on how it should respond.
Cameron Horsburgh on November 18th, 2008

2. Probably the consequences will be hard to see over just 14 years and the data would be disputed.

   Take for example, selling your organs - illegal everywhere (except Israel). Why? Because a general consensus has emerged that just because someone is willing to sell his/her organs does not invalidate that doing so would exploitation.

   Just because selling sex is something people are willing to do doesn’t mean that it isn’t inherently exploitation.

   The Swedish approach has been to prosecute the johns, rather than the prostitiutes, which is a new paradigm of dealing with this particular crime. (Recalling how the Mayflower Madam got off by threatening to release her johns list.)

   Excellent work on this subject has been done by Dr. Donna M. Hughes of the University of Rhode Island.
   http://www.uri.edu/artsci/wms/hughes/
Maureen Diffley on November 18th, 2008

3. yep - great questions and Maureen you are on to the next two parts in a series of three blogs on prostitution…I’m a Hughes fan and am reading some Jeffrey stuff at the moment on the history of neo-feminism and the ‘idea of prostitution’ - it’s amazing.
   Cameron I do get to the bottom of the results of legalizing prostitution and offer some responses in the next few blogs… hope you can hang in.
   Grace
   D
Danielle Strickland on November 18th, 2008

4. Hi Danielle,
   I’ve often wondered what an ideal Christian response should be to such a complicated issue. I haven’t wrestled with this as much as you seem to have done so I, like Cameron, would be interested in hearing your thoughts on what a better response the Salvation Army in Melbourne could have been. I have been leaning towards the best response being that of somehow not criminalizing the women (and men) working in the sex trade but perhaps turning up the heat on the johns and pimps.

   As always, with much respect,
   your old friend
   Dion
Dion Oxford on November 18th, 2008

5. yep. that’s it…. it’s modelled by Sweden and led by Gunilla Ekberg and it’s a three pronged approach to prostitution.
   1. de-criminalize the women caught in the oppression of prostitution (obviously this requires believing it’s an oppression)
   2. criminalize the johns… it’s considered a hate crime against women in Sweden to buy sex and it’s enforced.
   3. major funding to exit programs and re-education for women caught in the oppression of prostitution…

   it’s working incredibly well in Sweden.. they seem to have gotten to the root of oppression… stay tuned for more details on the next two blogs coming up..
   Grace.
   D
Danielle Strickland on November 19th, 2008

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