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>“If prostitution is really just physical labor, if it’s no different than serving coffee or fixing a car, then why would we see rape as such a traumatic thing?

>“If prostitution is really just physical labor, if it’s no different than serving coffee or fixing a car, then why would we see rape as such a traumatic thing? If there’s nothing different about sex, then what’s so bad about rape?” That was my thought too, I found this story to be really depressing. But I feel like the author is trying to present this as a general and wide-adopted trend when it's probably quite marginal.

efaref 10y ago
Well, forced-coffee-serving and forced-car-fixing also has a name: slavery. That's pretty traumatic, too.
- lawless123 10y ago
  Did something like it happen in Japan? compensated dating?
- ebbv 10y ago
  That's a bit of a stretch. If you're forced to serve someone coffee one time most people would agree that's messed up but not that big of a deal. If you're forced to have sex once, you've been raped and that's a life shattering event.
  - djschnei 10y ago
    You're completely missing the point. The point isn't which is more life shattering (no one is arguing that), the point is that our laws should protect against coercion against one's body. Forced labor and rape are differing levels of infringement on ones body. However, sex and labor are still products of one's body and the individual has the right to do with their body as they wish.
    - ebbv 10y ago
      Sorry but it's you who is missing the point here. Nobody's arguing about whether we should be able to be forced to do anything. Everybody agrees that we should not. The point is that there's a difference between regular labor and sex.
      - djschnei 10y ago
        That difference is (should be) determined by the individual (owner of the body). That is the point, and you are missing it.
        ebbv 10y ago
        I'm not missing that point. I didn't address that point of individual choice at all. I was highlighting the cultural difference. If you would take two seconds to stop being so dismissive and pedantic maybe you could actually understand what other people are saying.
        djschnei 10y ago
        What are you even arguing then? What's the importance of highlighting that difference? My point was that ANY coercive act against someone else's body should be prohibited and punishable under the law. The law should NOT allow the majority (in this case society) to dictate what I can do with MY body. I'm not being pedantic. It sounds like you are arguing "rape is bad, therefore we need to remove partial ownership of your own body and decide what you can and cannot do with it." That "logic" is offensive to me. If that's not what you're saying, I apologize. Maybe I am reading you wrong.
      - imgabe 10y ago
        We may consider coerced sex to be more traumatic than coerced labor, but it's a difference in degree, not in kind. The author is arguing "If sex is just labor then it's ok to coerce people to do it" which is absurd. It's not ok to coerce people to do labor or have sex.
        10y ago
  - deleted 10y ago
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morsch 10y ago
That's one of those non-sequiturs so bizarre that it's hard to reply. I think it's because it's misleading in two dimensions: obviously rape is different from (all kinds of) consensual sex because it's, well, non-consensual; lets call this the dimension of coercivity. It's also different from other (consensual or non-consensual) activities because it's sex; the same way that it's different from playing frisbee or (relating to the sibling comment) fixing a car; let's call this the dimension of intimacy. So in binary terms, we have four quadrants, with prototypical examples of playing frisbee (non-coerced, non-intimate), forcing someone to fix a car (coerced, non-intimate), prostitution (non-coerced, intimate), rape (coerced, intimate). I hasten to add that prostitution is often, in fact, very clearly coerced (by threat of violence), and of course there's an argument to be made that many other instances are also coerced (by threat of poverty). Edit: Re-reading my comment, calling it misleading and bizzare seems unkind, I apologize. Thinking in terms of these two dimension is (I think) helpful, but it's also an arbitrary choice. When you choose other (or fewer) "variables", the point made in the article follows.
- mc32 10y ago
  There is an obvious difference between being coerced by force and having no option due to circumstance. Someone purposely pushing someone over a cliff is not the same as someone running out of water in the middle of a trek across a desert because the oasis they expected had run dry.
deleted 10y ago
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flangloria 10y ago
Well, if one is forced into labor, that is slavery, and slavery is bad. Therefore, forced sex i.e, rape is also bad. This is not to say that I am completely comfortable with this thing, though. For someone like myself, this Sugar-daddy-baby thing feels like a 180 degree departure from the values that I grew up with, which society itself promoted as the right thing. Now I just feel lost and alone. Everything is depressingly transactional. In all honesty, I'm quite comfortable with that when it comes to most of my daily interactions. But when it comes to relationships, I feel shocked. Maybe I'm a hypocrite.

efaref 10y ago

Well, forced-coffee-serving and forced-car-fixing also has a name: slavery. That's pretty traumatic, too.

lawless123 10y ago
Did something like it happen in Japan? compensated dating?
ebbv 10y ago
That's a bit of a stretch. If you're forced to serve someone coffee one time most people would agree that's messed up but not that big of a deal. If you're forced to have sex once, you've been raped and that's a life shattering event.
- djschnei 10y ago
  You're completely missing the point. The point isn't which is more life shattering (no one is arguing that), the point is that our laws should protect against coercion against one's body. Forced labor and rape are differing levels of infringement on ones body. However, sex and labor are still products of one's body and the individual has the right to do with their body as they wish.
  - ebbv 10y ago
    Sorry but it's you who is missing the point here. Nobody's arguing about whether we should be able to be forced to do anything. Everybody agrees that we should not. The point is that there's a difference between regular labor and sex.
    - djschnei 10y ago
      That difference is (should be) determined by the individual (owner of the body). That is the point, and you are missing it.
      - ebbv 10y ago
        I'm not missing that point. I didn't address that point of individual choice at all. I was highlighting the cultural difference. If you would take two seconds to stop being so dismissive and pedantic maybe you could actually understand what other people are saying.
        djschnei 10y ago
        What are you even arguing then? What's the importance of highlighting that difference? My point was that ANY coercive act against someone else's body should be prohibited and punishable under the law. The law should NOT allow the majority (in this case society) to dictate what I can do with MY body. I'm not being pedantic. It sounds like you are arguing "rape is bad, therefore we need to remove partial ownership of your own body and decide what you can and cannot do with it." That "logic" is offensive to me. If that's not what you're saying, I apologize. Maybe I am reading you wrong.
    - imgabe 10y ago
      We may consider coerced sex to be more traumatic than coerced labor, but it's a difference in degree, not in kind. The author is arguing "If sex is just labor then it's ok to coerce people to do it" which is absurd. It's not ok to coerce people to do labor or have sex.
      - 10y ago
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

morsch 10y ago

That's one of those non-sequiturs so bizarre that it's hard to reply. I think it's because it's misleading in two dimensions: obviously rape is different from (all kinds of) consensual sex because it's, well, non-consensual; lets call this the dimension of coercivity. It's also different from other (consensual or non-consensual) activities because it's sex; the same way that it's different from playing frisbee or (relating to the sibling comment) fixing a car; let's call this the dimension of intimacy. So in binary terms, we have four quadrants, with prototypical examples of playing frisbee (non-coerced, non-intimate), forcing someone to fix a car (coerced, non-intimate), prostitution (non-coerced, intimate), rape (coerced, intimate). I hasten to add that prostitution is often, in fact, very clearly coerced (by threat of violence), and of course there's an argument to be made that many other instances are also coerced (by threat of poverty). Edit: Re-reading my comment, calling it misleading and bizzare seems unkind, I apologize. Thinking in terms of these two dimension is (I think) helpful, but it's also an arbitrary choice. When you choose other (or fewer) "variables", the point made in the article follows.

mc32 10y ago
There is an obvious difference between being coerced by force and having no option due to circumstance. Someone purposely pushing someone over a cliff is not the same as someone running out of water in the middle of a trek across a desert because the oasis they expected had run dry.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

flangloria 10y ago

Well, if one is forced into labor, that is slavery, and slavery is bad. Therefore, forced sex i.e, rape is also bad. This is not to say that I am completely comfortable with this thing, though. For someone like myself, this Sugar-daddy-baby thing feels like a 180 degree departure from the values that I grew up with, which society itself promoted as the right thing. Now I just feel lost and alone. Everything is depressingly transactional. In all honesty, I'm quite comfortable with that when it comes to most of my daily interactions. But when it comes to relationships, I feel shocked. Maybe I'm a hypocrite.