5 ms·
There is at least one such argument: prostitution as a crime of danger. I try to articulate it below. Prostitution by itself is not wrong, but the social dynam
by occamrazor 5y ago
There is at least one such argument: prostitution as a crime of danger. I try to articulate it below.
Prostitution by itself is not wrong, but the social dynamics around it put the prostitutes in a weak position, in which they are at high risk of abuse and exploitation. Under this interpretation, prohibiting prostitution harms the few prostitutes which would mot be abused and their clients, but benefits the majority of prostitutes who would be abused and is overall positive for society.
The logical structure of the argument is sound. As a society, we regularly accept to forbid behavior that is not necessarily harmful, but has an very high risk to be, and a limited social value if allowed. Gun laws, speed limits, age of consent laws follow this principle. [Aside: the social benefits of gun ownership are valued more in the US than in Europe, therefore gun laws are more permissive]
There are however at least three problems with this argument:
1. It supports punishing pimps and clients, not the prostitutes themselves. This is in fact the approach chisn by e.g. France and Sweden, but not by the US.
1. It assumes that a substantial proportion of prostitutes are exploited or abused and that there are no alternative policies to prevent this.
3. It ignores second order effects. It assumes that forbidding prostitution will eliminate it and doesn’t consider the additional risk of harm resulting from pushing prostitution to the black market.
- matt-attack 5y agoSeems like all the risks you just associated with not-prohibiting prostitution would also apply to farming. Given its deplorable history in the US vis-a-vis slavery, it seems to be we can’t possibly risk more individuals being exploited in such a manner. Granted I’d concede that farming has substantial benefits, but frankly so does sex to those who cannot obtain it socially. Arguably the need for sex is tantamount to the need for food itself.
- jeroenhd 5y agoIf people cares as much about the safety of people working on farms as they pretend to care about the safety of sex workers, farms would've been banned a long time ago. There's a lot of people working a lot of hours for little money under bad circumstances on a lot of farms. That doesn't mean all farms are bad, but many of the same dangers do exist to the workers down the chain and regulation seems to avoid having to raise prices more than protect workers. In my opinion, political opposition of the basic concept of sex work is all about politicians' personal morals and a lot of fear mongering to convince the masses of their point of view.
- occamrazor 5y agoFor farms, the social benefits of having farms are arguably higher. Hence the government tries alternative approaches, i.e. labor laws. Admittedly, the government is not enforcing labor laws effective ly, but the reasons are beyond the scope of my answer.
- haroldp 5y ago> 3. It ignores second order effects. It assumes that forbidding prostitution will eliminate it and doesn’t consider the additional risk of harm resulting from pushing prostitution to the black market. At it's heart this is an argument of pragmatism, but it is never checked to see if it actually works. Like many prohibitions, the negative unintended consequences are worse than than the original problem they purport, but entirely fail to fix.
- occamrazor 5y agoI agree. I am not endorsing the argument, just presenting it and highlighting the implicit assumptions and trade-offs.
- haroldp 5y agoI got that, and I appreciated you articulating the argument.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]