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The idea that otherwise well-behaving members of society would resort to rape without sex workers is, first, pretty fucked up, but more importantly not backed b

The idea that otherwise well-behaving members of society would resort to rape without sex workers is, first, pretty fucked up, but more importantly not backed by any reputable scholarship that I'm aware of. And plus I mean even if it were true that's not a solution to anything. If some significant portion of the population has an apparently uncontrollable urge to sexual violence (not a worldview I share!) then sacrificing our most vulnerable to them to ensure the safety of the rest of us is not a position I can support.

Ericson2314 6y ago
> but more importantly not backed by any reputable scholarship that I'm aware of. See what the other reply linked: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/all-about-sex/201601/evidence-mounts-more-porn-less-sexual-assault https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/all-about-sex/201601... > The idea that otherwise well-behaving members of society would resort to rape without sex workers is, first, pretty fucked up Well change the framing. Yes preventing the tradeoff in absolute term raises icky moral issues. But we don't live in a trolley problem world. Instead use the language of "harm reduction" i.e. marginal gains, and also drop the "otherwise well-behaving". "otherwise well-behaving" is a bit fraught. I don't want to get into "there's tons of a bad people", because I don't want to prop of criminality as a immutable aspect of character. But explanation is not justification: just because some denial of something empirically pushes people towards crime, doesn't mean it is or isn't a justified excuse. > then sacrificing our most vulnerable to them to ensure the safety of the rest of us is not a position I can support. This is flat-out wrong. Sex work != trafficking. "Sacrificing" implies once a sex worker, always a sex worker, which is no law. The fact is in a world of shitty service jobs, alienating gig economy, etc., sex work often does pay better. Vice prohibitions never work, so if one really wants sex work to go away, the only solution is to simply make other things and the social safety net pay better.
GB7813AB 6y ago
You're looking at it wrong. There's plenty of people that appear "well-behaved" but they exist on the precipice of "right and wrong" in their psyche. Obviously there are plenty of very criminal people - the c-suite and politicians are disproportionately psychopathic if we're to follow the narrative that psychology has been spinning. And you can see it, there's a wide gamut of extortion and wars. And you'd do well to consider the number of people in prison and those outside of prison simply due to favorable probability. And that's what it boils down to. The probability that some unsexed, psychically distal individual is pushed to the point where they consider the risk reward to be favorable. Introducing sex work into the equation eliminates that specific group, and may buffer, to some extent the truly sinister people who are inclined to exercising their power wantonly. As far as evidence is concerned, do you need a study to do a study to produce evidence that man lives in fear of death? Of course if one really wanted to present the curative, we'd do well to trivialize sex, but that would destroy marketing culture.
- jonfromsf 6y ago
  When Rhode Island accidentally legalized prostitution, rape dropped dramatically. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/07/17/when-rhode-island-accidentally-legalized-prostitution-rape-and-stis-decreased-sharply/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/07/17/when-...
DoreenMichele 6y ago
The definition of rape hinges on the detail of consent and in many countries the laws are written such that only a man can be guilty of rape and only a woman can be a victim. Many such laws specify that rape occurs when forced vaginal sex occurs and forced anal sex would be called sodomy in many cases. Lots and lots of "first time sex" acts -- by which I mean first time sex between two specific people -- involves alcohol. Alcohol is the number on date rape drug and men sometimes ply women with so much alcohol that they are falling down drunk and incapable of legally consenting. Most people imagine that rape involves violent assault where some thug drags a woman by her hair screaming into a dark alley. Most incidents of rape aren't even violent. Date rape and acquaintance rape are probably far more common than violent assault of that sort. Rape is a hard topic to discuss and there is lots of misinformation out there and people are very uncomfortable with someone trying to educate them. I've had people accuse me of being a rape apologist for talking about what really goes on.

Ericson2314 6y ago

> but more importantly not backed by any reputable scholarship that I'm aware of. See what the other reply linked: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/all-about-sex/201601/evidence-mounts-more-porn-less-sexual-assault https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/all-about-sex/201601... > The idea that otherwise well-behaving members of society would resort to rape without sex workers is, first, pretty fucked up Well change the framing. Yes preventing the tradeoff in absolute term raises icky moral issues. But we don't live in a trolley problem world. Instead use the language of "harm reduction" i.e. marginal gains, and also drop the "otherwise well-behaving". "otherwise well-behaving" is a bit fraught. I don't want to get into "there's tons of a bad people", because I don't want to prop of criminality as a immutable aspect of character. But explanation is not justification: just because some denial of something empirically pushes people towards crime, doesn't mean it is or isn't a justified excuse. > then sacrificing our most vulnerable to them to ensure the safety of the rest of us is not a position I can support. This is flat-out wrong. Sex work != trafficking. "Sacrificing" implies once a sex worker, always a sex worker, which is no law. The fact is in a world of shitty service jobs, alienating gig economy, etc., sex work often does pay better. Vice prohibitions never work, so if one really wants sex work to go away, the only solution is to simply make other things and the social safety net pay better.

GB7813AB 6y ago

You're looking at it wrong. There's plenty of people that appear "well-behaved" but they exist on the precipice of "right and wrong" in their psyche. Obviously there are plenty of very criminal people - the c-suite and politicians are disproportionately psychopathic if we're to follow the narrative that psychology has been spinning. And you can see it, there's a wide gamut of extortion and wars. And you'd do well to consider the number of people in prison and those outside of prison simply due to favorable probability. And that's what it boils down to. The probability that some unsexed, psychically distal individual is pushed to the point where they consider the risk reward to be favorable. Introducing sex work into the equation eliminates that specific group, and may buffer, to some extent the truly sinister people who are inclined to exercising their power wantonly. As far as evidence is concerned, do you need a study to do a study to produce evidence that man lives in fear of death? Of course if one really wanted to present the curative, we'd do well to trivialize sex, but that would destroy marketing culture.

jonfromsf 6y ago
When Rhode Island accidentally legalized prostitution, rape dropped dramatically. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/07/17/when-rhode-island-accidentally-legalized-prostitution-rape-and-stis-decreased-sharply/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/07/17/when-...

DoreenMichele 6y ago

The definition of rape hinges on the detail of consent and in many countries the laws are written such that only a man can be guilty of rape and only a woman can be a victim. Many such laws specify that rape occurs when forced vaginal sex occurs and forced anal sex would be called sodomy in many cases. Lots and lots of "first time sex" acts -- by which I mean first time sex between two specific people -- involves alcohol. Alcohol is the number on date rape drug and men sometimes ply women with so much alcohol that they are falling down drunk and incapable of legally consenting. Most people imagine that rape involves violent assault where some thug drags a woman by her hair screaming into a dark alley. Most incidents of rape aren't even violent. Date rape and acquaintance rape are probably far more common than violent assault of that sort. Rape is a hard topic to discuss and there is lots of misinformation out there and people are very uncomfortable with someone trying to educate them. I've had people accuse me of being a rape apologist for talking about what really goes on.