12 ms·

It would be nice if we could just regulate this industry to protect the people in it and start the work of reducing the stigma. Similar to abortion, people are

It would be nice if we could just regulate this industry to protect the people in it and start the work of reducing the stigma. Similar to abortion, people are going to do it whether or not it's legal. It will never have an "end". It's one of the oldest professions in human history. I do not understand why people fight this battle. The number of hoops these people jump through only to be eventually assaulted and robbed anyway are ridiculous. It's a very dangerous job and it doesn't really have to be! The ongoing stigma around sex is ridiculous... censoring female nippes (not necessarily even related to sex!), bans on "suggestiveness," etc... I've heard of people who run OnlyFans accounts (not escorts) essentially get run out of town if they live in conservative areas... and they really only get found out because the men in the area are patrons! The tech industry supports these stigmas in huge ways by automating it (often unsuccessfully I might add! at one point I was suspended from Facebook for sharing a sculpture). Push back against this nonsense if you can.

ParoxysmalVigor 5y ago
Assassination. Burglary. Similar to abortion, people are going to do it whether or not it's legal. It will never have an "end". It's one of the oldest professions in human history.
- habeebtc 5y ago
  Some might argue that assassination and burglary have a victim where prostitution does not. There are arguments against prostitution as a victimless crime, but it is not straightforward in any argument to demonstrate victim and perpetrator like it is with assassination, burglary, assault, etc.
- micromacrofoot 5y ago
  You're seriously out here comparing consensual sex between two consenting adults to murder for hire? You can at least try to make a point in good faith first.
  - ParoxysmalVigor 5y ago
    I never voiced my attitude towards legalization of prostitution. I addressed very specific weak argument. Sorry, if you found my comment rude, i assure you that this was not my goal. You used abortion there. I don't think we could get a consent from fetus, law just assumes that female parent have a power over it's life until some development point. People consensually participate at gambling, dueling, pyramid schemes, become criplled drugs and alcohol addicts, selling themselves and they family to slavery, do suicide. Nor consent, nor something being an old and persistent part of the human culture are good reasoning.
    - micromacrofoot 5y ago
      I said sex work is an old profession to exemplify why banning it doesn't work. I certainly didn't present the age of the profession as the sole reason for legalizing it. I don't think you consider assassination and prostitution equivilant crimes, yet you made the comparison. Why? What's the point of taking something out of context to invalidate it? If you have reasons for opposing the legalization of sex work, they're completely lost on me. Maybe start there instead of pedantry.
loxias 5y ago
> It would be nice if we could just regulate this industry to protect the people in it. Amen to that. As an ignorant outsider looking in, the first thing that comes to mind is the possible huge safety benefits gained by collective bargaining. Even if it's not certified and recognized by the NLRB, there's gotta be something.
- Aella 5y ago
  Decriminalization, that's mostly what sex workers want. I'm pretty wary of regulation, which often is done in misguided ways by people out of touch with sex workers' actual needs.
  - pugz 5y ago
    How do you feel about the approach being taken in Victoria, Australia? It's been legal in licensed settings for quite a while, but they're now changing to make it legal in more situations in response to requests from solo sex workers. I'm rather happy with the situation (and new improvements) as a client and my understanding is that workers are happy about it. https://www.vic.gov.au/review-make-recommendations-decriminalisation-sex-work https://www.vic.gov.au/review-make-recommendations-decrimina...
  - loxias 5y ago
    Decriminalization is implied. Necessary but not sufficient. That most certainly should (have) happen(ed by now). By regulation, I'm thinking the worker safety axis, not nec. the consumer protection one; agreed, if existent, it should be steered by those with understanding of actual needs, and not the peanut gallery. Like all regulation should be...
  - _z6tl 5y ago
    How do you feel about the policies in the Netherlands?
  - slothtrop 5y ago
    You don't speak for sex workers.
iammisc 5y ago
Legalizing for protection of those involved is one thing, but it is completely orthogonal to 'reducing the stigma'. Frankly this is where these movements lose people, including the abortion movement.
- micromacrofoot 5y ago
  It's much harder to fight the stigma around anything that's illegal because it instantly gets equated with crime. It's hard to talk about an experience that will get you branded a criminal... Decriminalization of marijuana in many places is getting people talking about it more openly, for example. It's not everything but it's a start.
  - iammisc 5y ago
    > Decriminalization of marijuana in many places is getting people talking about it more openly, for example. It's not everything but it's a start. sure... and that's the best argument to recriminalize. Having yet more drugs that disrupt mental faculties is not a good thing
    - fighterpilot 5y ago
      Drug gangs destroying South America, tens of thousands dying due to Fentanyl-laced pills, lost tax revenue, huge taxpayer expense, petty crime used to fund overpriced drugs, are all signficiantly worse things than what you are afraid of. It's a laugh to see all these right-leaning people who pretend to be libertarians (not sure if that's you, but in general) but are actually in favor of a large state and authoritarian government intervention on topics such as drugs.
      - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
        How is there any lost tax revenue if it's not taxed? Why should everything be taxed be default?
        5y ago
14 5y ago
It is also dangerous for a man as well. Some report being robbed or have their picture take upon arrival and blackmailed. It would be beneficial to both sides if people didn’t have to hide what they do.
- Aella 5y ago
  Out of my 415 clients from the survey, 6 reported being arrested, 7 physically assaulted, 26 got a STI, and 92 were stolen from.
  - manquer 5y ago
    Thank you for this insightful post. I can only imagine the courage it takes to write something like this (you briefly hinted at the end). Really appreciate your efforts to bring light and improve safety in a difficult line of work. I too hope it doesn't affect your work, although I suspect you would get some unwanted attention with this exposure.
  - staticautomatic 5y ago
    92/415 is a lot!
    - kfarr 5y ago
      Wow you should just plan to be robbed
      - gitfan86 5y ago
        It is probably a similar rate to what happens at a las vegas strip club. They get you drunk then ask for your credit card and put 5k on it.
        throwaway0a5e 5y ago
        They don't do that to ~25%(!!!!) of customers. You can't continuously run an above the table business involving card processors if even 1/10th of those people do a charge-back.
analog31 5y ago
There's a recent HN thread on truck driving, which is legal and regulated, and has relatively less stigma. Yet the industry has apparently also figured out every possible way to skirt the regulations and abuse drivers physically and financially if possible. Granted, that's not a statistical assessment, but it at least suggests to me that legalization and regulation are not enough by themselves to make an occupation safe and wholesome. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28916771 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28916771
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  Very few people (as a fraction of the population, spare me the wall of text about the edge cases) are negatively effected by trucking. If every dude who wanted to get laid could do so as easily as arranging an LTL shipment that would negatively effect a far larger subset of the population.
  - micromacrofoot 5y ago
    >If every dude who wanted to get laid could do so as easily as arranging an LTL shipment that would negatively effect a far larger subset of the population. In what way? has the population been negatively affected in places where it's already legal?
- micromacrofoot 5y ago
  Of course it's not enough by itself, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be done. Right now a lot of sex workers are afraid to even report crimes committed against them... hard to get much worse than that. Even a slight improvement is improvement.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

ParoxysmalVigor 5y ago

Assassination. Burglary. Similar to abortion, people are going to do it whether or not it's legal. It will never have an "end". It's one of the oldest professions in human history.

habeebtc 5y ago
Some might argue that assassination and burglary have a victim where prostitution does not. There are arguments against prostitution as a victimless crime, but it is not straightforward in any argument to demonstrate victim and perpetrator like it is with assassination, burglary, assault, etc.
micromacrofoot 5y ago
You're seriously out here comparing consensual sex between two consenting adults to murder for hire? You can at least try to make a point in good faith first.
- ParoxysmalVigor 5y ago
  I never voiced my attitude towards legalization of prostitution. I addressed very specific weak argument. Sorry, if you found my comment rude, i assure you that this was not my goal. You used abortion there. I don't think we could get a consent from fetus, law just assumes that female parent have a power over it's life until some development point. People consensually participate at gambling, dueling, pyramid schemes, become criplled drugs and alcohol addicts, selling themselves and they family to slavery, do suicide. Nor consent, nor something being an old and persistent part of the human culture are good reasoning.
  - micromacrofoot 5y ago
    I said sex work is an old profession to exemplify why banning it doesn't work. I certainly didn't present the age of the profession as the sole reason for legalizing it. I don't think you consider assassination and prostitution equivilant crimes, yet you made the comparison. Why? What's the point of taking something out of context to invalidate it? If you have reasons for opposing the legalization of sex work, they're completely lost on me. Maybe start there instead of pedantry.

loxias 5y ago

> It would be nice if we could just regulate this industry to protect the people in it. Amen to that. As an ignorant outsider looking in, the first thing that comes to mind is the possible huge safety benefits gained by collective bargaining. Even if it's not certified and recognized by the NLRB, there's gotta be something.

Aella 5y ago
Decriminalization, that's mostly what sex workers want. I'm pretty wary of regulation, which often is done in misguided ways by people out of touch with sex workers' actual needs.
- pugz 5y ago
  How do you feel about the approach being taken in Victoria, Australia? It's been legal in licensed settings for quite a while, but they're now changing to make it legal in more situations in response to requests from solo sex workers. I'm rather happy with the situation (and new improvements) as a client and my understanding is that workers are happy about it. https://www.vic.gov.au/review-make-recommendations-decriminalisation-sex-work https://www.vic.gov.au/review-make-recommendations-decrimina...
- loxias 5y ago
  Decriminalization is implied. Necessary but not sufficient. That most certainly should (have) happen(ed by now). By regulation, I'm thinking the worker safety axis, not nec. the consumer protection one; agreed, if existent, it should be steered by those with understanding of actual needs, and not the peanut gallery. Like all regulation should be...
- _z6tl 5y ago
  How do you feel about the policies in the Netherlands?
- slothtrop 5y ago
  You don't speak for sex workers.

iammisc 5y ago

Legalizing for protection of those involved is one thing, but it is completely orthogonal to 'reducing the stigma'. Frankly this is where these movements lose people, including the abortion movement.

micromacrofoot 5y ago
It's much harder to fight the stigma around anything that's illegal because it instantly gets equated with crime. It's hard to talk about an experience that will get you branded a criminal... Decriminalization of marijuana in many places is getting people talking about it more openly, for example. It's not everything but it's a start.
- iammisc 5y ago
  > Decriminalization of marijuana in many places is getting people talking about it more openly, for example. It's not everything but it's a start. sure... and that's the best argument to recriminalize. Having yet more drugs that disrupt mental faculties is not a good thing
  - fighterpilot 5y ago
    Drug gangs destroying South America, tens of thousands dying due to Fentanyl-laced pills, lost tax revenue, huge taxpayer expense, petty crime used to fund overpriced drugs, are all signficiantly worse things than what you are afraid of. It's a laugh to see all these right-leaning people who pretend to be libertarians (not sure if that's you, but in general) but are actually in favor of a large state and authoritarian government intervention on topics such as drugs.
    - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
      How is there any lost tax revenue if it's not taxed? Why should everything be taxed be default?
      - 5y ago

14 5y ago

It is also dangerous for a man as well. Some report being robbed or have their picture take upon arrival and blackmailed. It would be beneficial to both sides if people didn’t have to hide what they do.

Aella 5y ago
Out of my 415 clients from the survey, 6 reported being arrested, 7 physically assaulted, 26 got a STI, and 92 were stolen from.
- manquer 5y ago
  Thank you for this insightful post. I can only imagine the courage it takes to write something like this (you briefly hinted at the end). Really appreciate your efforts to bring light and improve safety in a difficult line of work. I too hope it doesn't affect your work, although I suspect you would get some unwanted attention with this exposure.
- staticautomatic 5y ago
  92/415 is a lot!
  - kfarr 5y ago
    Wow you should just plan to be robbed
    - gitfan86 5y ago
      It is probably a similar rate to what happens at a las vegas strip club. They get you drunk then ask for your credit card and put 5k on it.
      - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
        They don't do that to ~25%(!!!!) of customers. You can't continuously run an above the table business involving card processors if even 1/10th of those people do a charge-back.

analog31 5y ago

There's a recent HN thread on truck driving, which is legal and regulated, and has relatively less stigma. Yet the industry has apparently also figured out every possible way to skirt the regulations and abuse drivers physically and financially if possible. Granted, that's not a statistical assessment, but it at least suggests to me that legalization and regulation are not enough by themselves to make an occupation safe and wholesome. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28916771 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28916771

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
Very few people (as a fraction of the population, spare me the wall of text about the edge cases) are negatively effected by trucking. If every dude who wanted to get laid could do so as easily as arranging an LTL shipment that would negatively effect a far larger subset of the population.
- micromacrofoot 5y ago
  >If every dude who wanted to get laid could do so as easily as arranging an LTL shipment that would negatively effect a far larger subset of the population. In what way? has the population been negatively affected in places where it's already legal?
micromacrofoot 5y ago
Of course it's not enough by itself, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be done. Right now a lot of sex workers are afraid to even report crimes committed against them... hard to get much worse than that. Even a slight improvement is improvement.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]