5 ms·

Sweden bans the purchase, but not the sale of sex because all sex work is exploitative https://archive.is/CsMX4 https://archive.is/CsMX4

by known 5y ago

msla 5y ago
That's a great way to ensure diseases spread through sex work due to the legal implications of saying you caught something from a sex worker. It isn't exactly a good way of doing things.
- Godel_unicode 5y ago
  Why would you need to say where you got it from...?
  - geoduck14 5y ago
    Contact testing
    - Godel_unicode 5y ago
      I understand that's why the government would want to know. My point (thus the word "need" in my question) is that at least in the United States there are very few groups of people (largely healthcare/childcare workers) who are required to disclose to the state. You're frequently required to disclose to partners, but that's obviously a completely different thing. Even then, disclosing where you got it from is not a legal requirement, merely the fact of the infection.
  - msla 5y ago
    To keep them from giving it to others. Basic epidemiology.
    - Godel_unicode 5y ago
      Nope. Telling the state in no way keeps you from giving it to others. The existing legal requirement to disclose STIs to partners is targeted at that. In terms of actual epidemiology, the government just needs to know O() how many new cases have been found in a population, not specifically who has been diagnosed with what.
fwip 5y ago
If all sex work is exploitative, then all work is exploitative. There's no great difference between giving a person a massage and a hand-job. Nor between an attractive person modelling for a clothing shoot, vs modelling nude to sell sexy photos. Sex hotlines are not exploitative if advice hotlines are not - it's simply a person using their skills to provide a service.
- hilbertseries 5y ago
  I think exploitative in this context refers to the prevalence of sex trafficking in sex work.
  - Ericson2314 5y ago
    But that's always been a straw man. There are tons of non profits that just assume this to get on with their moralist agenda. All the organizations actually involved with current or former sex workers strongly rebut this non-truth. The history of vice criminalization is also informative. - Prohibition was anti-irish, and anti-immigrant in general. KKK resurgence in the 1920s involved in part them being anti-alcohol vigilantes too. - Original criminalization of cannabis after in the 1930s to not abolish the prohibition bureaucracy saw Mexicans as expendable scapegoats. This is why there is little use of "marijuana" in English before this time. - Current drug war initiated in conjunction with the "southern strategy". Now I think a lot of the bad morality is genuinely held, just as there were probably non-nativist teetotalers a century ago. But the clear negative structural consequence of anti-sex-work is to continue to try to keep the public sphere and less shitty parts of the formal economy male-dominated.
    - Dracophoenix 5y ago
      >>Prohibition was anti-irish, and anti-immigrant in general. KKK resurgence in the 1920s involved in part them being anti-alcohol vigilantes too. Is that true? From my understanding, Prohibition on a national scale was championed by women's movements and temperance activists (Susan B Anthony was a leader of both) as states across the entire country were enacting these laws on there own. If the KKK was involved, that wouldn't explain why Massachusetts and Maine were among the first to initiate such laws.
Ericson2314 5y ago
It's a terrible policy: - Making only one side of a transaction illegal is absurd. - Because the customer assumes more risk, they are often more antagonistic. Sex workers have to more explicitly offer to protect their customers from legal repercussions to maintain their business, rather than the the mutualism of same risk (with legal or illegal for all). - Legal work is always the least exploitative; that's why big agriculture wants migrant workers etc.
- herbst 5y ago
  - Making only one side of a transaction illegal is absurd. Kinda standard practice in europe. Ex. Drug laws are also often written like this. Basically to make sure to hurt those most who profit most, ex. it doesnt make much sense to bill a junkie every other day.
  - Ericson2314 5y ago
    A) I understand many of those countries also have government-dispersed drugs, which dramatically changes the situation by making there be legal drug transactions legal too. Unless someone is proposing government run sex work, it's not a fair comparison. B) Drug dealing and sex work are also quite different in that the former in it's modern day incarnation can be highly anonymous with dead drops and whatnot, but that isn't possible for most sex work. C) Finally, maybe the above does make drug dealing a nastier business, but few people are worried about the well being of drug dealers that aren't also for legalization.
    - herbst 5y ago
      > Unless someone is proposing government run sex work, it's not a fair comparison. Even thats a thing. Sex workers for mentally challanged people, is a state organized programm, which is paid by health insurance.
PeterisP 5y ago
While it may seem that such a policy that criminalizes purchasers but decriminalizes sex workers is pro-sex-worker, the sex workers themselves in Sweden were and are against this policy as it de facto makes their work more risky from customer violence.

Sweden bans the purchase, but not the sale of sex because all sex work is exploitative https://archive.is/CsMX4 https://archive.is/CsMX4

by known 5y ago

Sweden bans the purchase, but not the sale of sex because all sex work is exploitative https://archive.is/CsMX4 https://archive.is/CsMX4

msla 5y ago

That's a great way to ensure diseases spread through sex work due to the legal implications of saying you caught something from a sex worker. It isn't exactly a good way of doing things.

Godel_unicode 5y ago
Why would you need to say where you got it from...?
- geoduck14 5y ago
  Contact testing
  - Godel_unicode 5y ago
    I understand that's why the government would want to know. My point (thus the word "need" in my question) is that at least in the United States there are very few groups of people (largely healthcare/childcare workers) who are required to disclose to the state. You're frequently required to disclose to partners, but that's obviously a completely different thing. Even then, disclosing where you got it from is not a legal requirement, merely the fact of the infection.
- msla 5y ago
  To keep them from giving it to others. Basic epidemiology.
  - Godel_unicode 5y ago
    Nope. Telling the state in no way keeps you from giving it to others. The existing legal requirement to disclose STIs to partners is targeted at that. In terms of actual epidemiology, the government just needs to know O() how many new cases have been found in a population, not specifically who has been diagnosed with what.

fwip 5y ago

If all sex work is exploitative, then all work is exploitative. There's no great difference between giving a person a massage and a hand-job. Nor between an attractive person modelling for a clothing shoot, vs modelling nude to sell sexy photos. Sex hotlines are not exploitative if advice hotlines are not - it's simply a person using their skills to provide a service.

hilbertseries 5y ago
I think exploitative in this context refers to the prevalence of sex trafficking in sex work.
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  But that's always been a straw man. There are tons of non profits that just assume this to get on with their moralist agenda. All the organizations actually involved with current or former sex workers strongly rebut this non-truth. The history of vice criminalization is also informative. - Prohibition was anti-irish, and anti-immigrant in general. KKK resurgence in the 1920s involved in part them being anti-alcohol vigilantes too. - Original criminalization of cannabis after in the 1930s to not abolish the prohibition bureaucracy saw Mexicans as expendable scapegoats. This is why there is little use of "marijuana" in English before this time. - Current drug war initiated in conjunction with the "southern strategy". Now I think a lot of the bad morality is genuinely held, just as there were probably non-nativist teetotalers a century ago. But the clear negative structural consequence of anti-sex-work is to continue to try to keep the public sphere and less shitty parts of the formal economy male-dominated.
  - Dracophoenix 5y ago
    >>Prohibition was anti-irish, and anti-immigrant in general. KKK resurgence in the 1920s involved in part them being anti-alcohol vigilantes too. Is that true? From my understanding, Prohibition on a national scale was championed by women's movements and temperance activists (Susan B Anthony was a leader of both) as states across the entire country were enacting these laws on there own. If the KKK was involved, that wouldn't explain why Massachusetts and Maine were among the first to initiate such laws.

Ericson2314 5y ago

It's a terrible policy: - Making only one side of a transaction illegal is absurd. - Because the customer assumes more risk, they are often more antagonistic. Sex workers have to more explicitly offer to protect their customers from legal repercussions to maintain their business, rather than the the mutualism of same risk (with legal or illegal for all). - Legal work is always the least exploitative; that's why big agriculture wants migrant workers etc.

herbst 5y ago
- Making only one side of a transaction illegal is absurd. Kinda standard practice in europe. Ex. Drug laws are also often written like this. Basically to make sure to hurt those most who profit most, ex. it doesnt make much sense to bill a junkie every other day.
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  A) I understand many of those countries also have government-dispersed drugs, which dramatically changes the situation by making there be legal drug transactions legal too. Unless someone is proposing government run sex work, it's not a fair comparison. B) Drug dealing and sex work are also quite different in that the former in it's modern day incarnation can be highly anonymous with dead drops and whatnot, but that isn't possible for most sex work. C) Finally, maybe the above does make drug dealing a nastier business, but few people are worried about the well being of drug dealers that aren't also for legalization.
  - herbst 5y ago
    > Unless someone is proposing government run sex work, it's not a fair comparison. Even thats a thing. Sex workers for mentally challanged people, is a state organized programm, which is paid by health insurance.

PeterisP 5y ago

While it may seem that such a policy that criminalizes purchasers but decriminalizes sex workers is pro-sex-worker, the sex workers themselves in Sweden were and are against this policy as it de facto makes their work more risky from customer violence.