7 ms·

Much like with drugs, the best way to reduce human trafficking and abusive prostitution would be to fully legalize and regulate sex work. In countries where pro

by hedgew 11y ago

Much like with drugs, the best way to reduce human trafficking and abusive prostitution would be to fully legalize and regulate sex work. In countries where prostitution is accepted and legal, it's safer for both the sex workers and the customers, with less risk of disease and abuse. Sex workers are treated humanely and not condemned. Society in general benefits too, through properly paid taxes, lower crime rates, and reduced healthcare costs.

dagw 11y ago
In countries where prostitution is accepted and legal, it's safer for both the sex workers and the customers, with less risk of disease and abuse. Do you know any good studies that back this up. While I certainly want to believe it and it does fit nicely with my own general political/economic narrative of the world, I've yet to find any conclusive evidence for it.
- chad_oliver 11y ago
  You might want to read the execute summary of this report [0]. It was produced by a panel whom the New Zealand government commissioned to examine the effect of legalising prostitution in New Zealand. The results are perhaps more ambiguous than anyone would like, but at least you know that the report isn't politically slanted. (For a little bit of context: prostitution became legal in New Zealand in 2003.) [0] http://www.justice.govt.nz/policy/commercial-property-and-regulatory/prostitution/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/plrc-report/documents/report.pdf http://www.justice.govt.nz/policy/commercial-property-and-re...
  - peteretep 11y ago
    Not to state the obvious, but it's considerably more difficult to traffic anything to New Zealand than it is to Holland or Germany.
- chronial 11y ago
  Unfortunately, it is not true. In germany prostitution was legalized a few years ago and what mostly happened was a massive increase in it. The situation of prostitutes barely improved and human trafficking went up. But you have to keep in mind that that is also the effect of only one country doing it. What would happen if the whole EU legalized prostitution is a different question.
  - 127 11y ago
    Seems to me that the real issue is pimping and how difficult it is to control. http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/human-trafficking-persists-despite-legality-of-prostitution-in-germany-a-902533.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/human-traffickin... The women go there knowing that they will trade sex for money. What they do not know is how difficult and exploitative the work is.
    - digi_owl 11y ago
      The German system seems odd to say the least. They have legalized the activity, but they seems to not want to get involved with the operational rules. To borrow the drug comparison from further up, this would be like legalizing hard drugs but not putting down any ground rules for labeling or certification of content. Consider alcohol. Most places it is legal to sell, but there are still regulations in place, and hopefully policed, detailing when and to whom it can be sold. When people talk about legalizing drugs, they likely envision a similar system of regulations surrounding it. Similarly regulations have to be put in place regarding working conditions etc for prostitutes as part of the legalization process. Removing the sex aspect and the article reminds me of some of the shit the construction business has with exploiting foreign workers. I recall reading about people living 6 to the room in what was supposed to be a single occupancy apartment etc.
      - brazzy 11y ago
        > They have legalized the activity, but they seems to not want to get involved with the operational rules. That's exactly the problem. Campaigning for tougher laws against sex trafficking is great voter bait, but actually enforcing the existing laws? That costs money!
- peteretep 11y ago
  Prostitution is legal in the UK, and has essentially always been legal. Running a brothel and pimping are illegal. A government report estimated "that 6% of prostitutes were 'deceived and forced' into the work". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_the_United_Kin...
erikb 11y ago
Does it help anyone to put out statements one has read somewhere on the internet without being involved with the topic at all?
saiya-jin 11y ago
like this little country that got most of the things just right called Switzerland
edias 11y ago
I've heard that the human trafficking numbers increase with legal prostitution since volume increases also, even if the percentage is lower. The Netherlands has huge problems with drug smuggling and human trafficking despite both being largely legal there. While I don't disagree that prostitution should be legal, it's a bit more complicated than the utopia you just painted.
- ZeroGravitas 11y ago
  I have also heard that human trafficking increases after legalisation. This makes sense to me since other relatively unpleasant jobs are also done by illegal immigrants in many countries. My remaining question is how we draw the line between voluntary illegal immigration and human trafficking for this class of work. I'd guess from my perspective even the voluntary immigration would seem beyond harrowing and carries risk of abuse and death along the way, so it would be easy to paint all of it as bad, yet clearly many think this is the best chance for them and their families.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
- corin_ 11y ago
  The situation in the Netherlands is also a lot more complicated. Drugs are not largely legal at all, they're largely illegal. In fact, they're entirely illegal, there's just a gray area when it comes to a few soft drugs (pretty much just weed now - and I believe truffles in some head shops possibly... but no longer mushrooms.) Bringing weed into the country: still technically illegal. Other drugs: very much illegal. Regarding drug law, I would suggest looking to Portugal as a closer representation to that perfect utopia. Regarding prostitution, I don't know enough to have much of a personal opinion on whether legalisation would help. I used to think very strongly that it would. Last year I visited (as a tourist, not as a customer) Europe's largest brothel [0], in Germany, and came away with the opinion that if people are going to pay for sex, in a legal system like this is the best way for it. And I still see the benefits, but I've also since read up a little and found out many of the girls in that brothel were still trafficked over, still have pimps, etc. But... don't be too quick to jump to one conclusion or the other. Maybe the NL situation would be better if the entire world also legalised it? Maybe there are different ways of doing it to the way NL has done it. Etc. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascha_%28brothel%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascha_%28brothel%29
swampthinker 11y ago
Unfortunately, that is not statistically true. I can't find the study, but it has been proven that legalizing prostitution does not reduce human trafficking. While it's still the right thing to do -and its benefits are numerous- reductions in trafficking are not one of legalization's benefits.
- coldtea 11y ago
  Just jobs being legal doesn't reduce human trafficking of immigrants, people who pay good money upfront to some trafficker and end up working like slaves in their destination countries to repay him.
violentvinyl 11y ago
The problem I have with this logic, is that I suspect with legalization/regulation, supply increases to meet or exceed demand, and drives prices down. This isn't a tremendous economic problem with drugs, because it should be relatively straightforward to ramp up production (and employment and tax revenue increases with it). With prostitution however, trying to increase the supply and driving down costs creates problems. Willing prostitues no longer earn as much, making the job much less appealing, and trafficing potentially increases in order to meet new demand or a decreasing supply of willing prostitutes.
- Ygg2 11y ago
  Hmm, I wonder if making semi-realistic sexbots would be the solution to this supply/demand problem. You can make them way, way faster than you can breed humans. I know it sounds icky, but urge for sex often drives technology.
  - digi_owl 11y ago
    The Japanese may already be on the case. I recall seeing a video where someone had combined a early Rift headset with a robotic arm holding what i believe they call a tenga. Strap on the headset, sit in the proper location, and have a 3D anime style girl give you a session...
- reddytowns 11y ago
  If people quit, then supply goes down. If it goes down, the price would rise until more people willingly take up the job again. A decrease of price isn't going to cause more women to be trafficked. Instead, the opposite would happen because there is less money to be made. I suspect whats happening here is that its easier to bring women over, willing or not because before, this kind of work was illegal, so if caught they'd just send them back. This whole sex slavery thing seems like hyperbole to me, though. If you've ever been to a third world country, you'd see that prostitution is rampant, even in countries where its technically illegal. There really isn't any shortage of girls, so I suspect they wouldn't have any trouble finding prostitutes willing to go to somewhere they could make more money, that they'd need to kidnap someone and force them into it.
Ygg2 11y ago
That wasn't the case with Germany. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany It seems to reduce the violence against workers, but increases human trafficking, because Germany now acts as a safe haven for traffickers. Maybe trafficking would disappear, if all societies made prostitution illegal and not a looked down profession, but I somehow doubt it[1]. So if your goal is to reduce human trafficking, it might not be the most worthwhile of means. Also there is the silly issue, of woman losing her unemployment status because she didn't refused to work as a prostitute. [1] Even if all countries made prostitution legal, nothing stops a gangster from kidnapping a woman and dragging her from say Mexico to US to serve as sex worker. She could escape and there would be less stigma; but it sounds to me like those poor workers trapped in Dubai/Quatar and they had no reprieve. As someone mentioned, there is a supply/demand problem that can't be solved via prositutes.
- a_bonobo 11y ago
  I don't agree with your points - they echo the recent campaign by Spiegel Online; looking at your Wikipedia article, it seems more to be an issue with open borders and no passport control, and the fact that Germany is in the "middle" of Europe and a relatively rich country, which makes Germany a good target for trafficking. The numbers of yearly cases seem to be fairly low (about 700-800 cases per year in your Wiki-article), and pimps who force people into prostitution are arrested and jailed. If anything, I'd say that legality makes it much better for these forced prostitutes to escape - they don't have any fear of persecution. >Also there is the silly issue, of woman losing her unemployment status because she didn't refused to work as a prostitute. That was a single mistake - the Arbeitsagentur accidentally sent along a job offer which was from a brothel, and the media made it into a big case (see http://www.spiegel.de/karriere/berufsleben/arbeitsagentur-in-augsburg-wollte-19-jaehrige-an-bordell-vermitteln-a-881825.html http://www.spiegel.de/karriere/berufsleben/arbeitsagentur-in... ). Of course she didn't have to take the job, there have been rulings that you can't force unemployed to work as prostitutes (see same article).
  - Ygg2 11y ago
    You do make a fine point that case regarding unemployment status. But, I think there is a difference between legalizing prostitution and preventing what's essentially human enslavement. I'm not saying legalizing prostitution won't help or shouldn't be done, I just don't think it will have as big impact as people claimed, and that it will have possible negative impact if other states don't adopt it. IMO it's akin to legalizing drugs, just legalizing it won't make drug problem disappear. For instance in cases where some states legalized drugs and most didn't; a state that legalized drugs can become safe haven for criminals from other countries, where drugs aren't legal.
dataker 11y ago
Also worth mentioning we shouldn't limit ourselves to domestic legalization. Because prostitution would still be illegal in developed countries, human trafficking would continue to happen, as prostitutes will need someone to "take care of stuff". If they could become independent with technology, they wouldn't be vulnerable to violence, rape,...
comrade1 11y ago
Seems to work well in Switzerland. Every now and then there's a trafficking bust that usually involves Asians that aren't legal workers. Prostitutes have to be able to legally work in Switzerland which means that nearly all of them come from Schengen countries. For the most part it seems to work well, with most of the workers independent and temporary for 30 days at a time. Pimps are illegal, prostitutes must be legal and independent. Brothels are often integrated in neighborhoods and not confined to red light districts, although there are some areas where there are more brothels, like around the train stations. Brothels are nothing more than a place where the prostitute rents out a room for the night or week - there's no madam or anything like you see in the movies. Prostitutes can't advertise on the street.
- maurits 11y ago
  Not to sure about this. Street prostitution is a common thing in Genève.

by hedgew 11y ago

dagw 11y ago

In countries where prostitution is accepted and legal, it's safer for both the sex workers and the customers, with less risk of disease and abuse. Do you know any good studies that back this up. While I certainly want to believe it and it does fit nicely with my own general political/economic narrative of the world, I've yet to find any conclusive evidence for it.

chad_oliver 11y ago
You might want to read the execute summary of this report [0]. It was produced by a panel whom the New Zealand government commissioned to examine the effect of legalising prostitution in New Zealand. The results are perhaps more ambiguous than anyone would like, but at least you know that the report isn't politically slanted. (For a little bit of context: prostitution became legal in New Zealand in 2003.) [0] http://www.justice.govt.nz/policy/commercial-property-and-regulatory/prostitution/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/plrc-report/documents/report.pdf http://www.justice.govt.nz/policy/commercial-property-and-re...
- peteretep 11y ago
  Not to state the obvious, but it's considerably more difficult to traffic anything to New Zealand than it is to Holland or Germany.
chronial 11y ago
Unfortunately, it is not true. In germany prostitution was legalized a few years ago and what mostly happened was a massive increase in it. The situation of prostitutes barely improved and human trafficking went up. But you have to keep in mind that that is also the effect of only one country doing it. What would happen if the whole EU legalized prostitution is a different question.
- 127 11y ago
  Seems to me that the real issue is pimping and how difficult it is to control. http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/human-trafficking-persists-despite-legality-of-prostitution-in-germany-a-902533.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/human-traffickin... The women go there knowing that they will trade sex for money. What they do not know is how difficult and exploitative the work is.
  - digi_owl 11y ago
    The German system seems odd to say the least. They have legalized the activity, but they seems to not want to get involved with the operational rules. To borrow the drug comparison from further up, this would be like legalizing hard drugs but not putting down any ground rules for labeling or certification of content. Consider alcohol. Most places it is legal to sell, but there are still regulations in place, and hopefully policed, detailing when and to whom it can be sold. When people talk about legalizing drugs, they likely envision a similar system of regulations surrounding it. Similarly regulations have to be put in place regarding working conditions etc for prostitutes as part of the legalization process. Removing the sex aspect and the article reminds me of some of the shit the construction business has with exploiting foreign workers. I recall reading about people living 6 to the room in what was supposed to be a single occupancy apartment etc.
    - brazzy 11y ago
      > They have legalized the activity, but they seems to not want to get involved with the operational rules. That's exactly the problem. Campaigning for tougher laws against sex trafficking is great voter bait, but actually enforcing the existing laws? That costs money!
peteretep 11y ago
Prostitution is legal in the UK, and has essentially always been legal. Running a brothel and pimping are illegal. A government report estimated "that 6% of prostitutes were 'deceived and forced' into the work". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_the_United_Kin...

erikb 11y ago

Does it help anyone to put out statements one has read somewhere on the internet without being involved with the topic at all?

saiya-jin 11y ago

like this little country that got most of the things just right called Switzerland

edias 11y ago

I've heard that the human trafficking numbers increase with legal prostitution since volume increases also, even if the percentage is lower. The Netherlands has huge problems with drug smuggling and human trafficking despite both being largely legal there. While I don't disagree that prostitution should be legal, it's a bit more complicated than the utopia you just painted.

ZeroGravitas 11y ago
I have also heard that human trafficking increases after legalisation. This makes sense to me since other relatively unpleasant jobs are also done by illegal immigrants in many countries. My remaining question is how we draw the line between voluntary illegal immigration and human trafficking for this class of work. I'd guess from my perspective even the voluntary immigration would seem beyond harrowing and carries risk of abuse and death along the way, so it would be easy to paint all of it as bad, yet clearly many think this is the best chance for them and their families.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
corin_ 11y ago
The situation in the Netherlands is also a lot more complicated. Drugs are not largely legal at all, they're largely illegal. In fact, they're entirely illegal, there's just a gray area when it comes to a few soft drugs (pretty much just weed now - and I believe truffles in some head shops possibly... but no longer mushrooms.) Bringing weed into the country: still technically illegal. Other drugs: very much illegal. Regarding drug law, I would suggest looking to Portugal as a closer representation to that perfect utopia. Regarding prostitution, I don't know enough to have much of a personal opinion on whether legalisation would help. I used to think very strongly that it would. Last year I visited (as a tourist, not as a customer) Europe's largest brothel [0], in Germany, and came away with the opinion that if people are going to pay for sex, in a legal system like this is the best way for it. And I still see the benefits, but I've also since read up a little and found out many of the girls in that brothel were still trafficked over, still have pimps, etc. But... don't be too quick to jump to one conclusion or the other. Maybe the NL situation would be better if the entire world also legalised it? Maybe there are different ways of doing it to the way NL has done it. Etc. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascha_%28brothel%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascha_%28brothel%29

swampthinker 11y ago

Unfortunately, that is not statistically true. I can't find the study, but it has been proven that legalizing prostitution does not reduce human trafficking. While it's still the right thing to do -and its benefits are numerous- reductions in trafficking are not one of legalization's benefits.

coldtea 11y ago
Just jobs being legal doesn't reduce human trafficking of immigrants, people who pay good money upfront to some trafficker and end up working like slaves in their destination countries to repay him.

violentvinyl 11y ago

The problem I have with this logic, is that I suspect with legalization/regulation, supply increases to meet or exceed demand, and drives prices down. This isn't a tremendous economic problem with drugs, because it should be relatively straightforward to ramp up production (and employment and tax revenue increases with it). With prostitution however, trying to increase the supply and driving down costs creates problems. Willing prostitues no longer earn as much, making the job much less appealing, and trafficing potentially increases in order to meet new demand or a decreasing supply of willing prostitutes.

Ygg2 11y ago
Hmm, I wonder if making semi-realistic sexbots would be the solution to this supply/demand problem. You can make them way, way faster than you can breed humans. I know it sounds icky, but urge for sex often drives technology.
- digi_owl 11y ago
  The Japanese may already be on the case. I recall seeing a video where someone had combined a early Rift headset with a robotic arm holding what i believe they call a tenga. Strap on the headset, sit in the proper location, and have a 3D anime style girl give you a session...
reddytowns 11y ago
If people quit, then supply goes down. If it goes down, the price would rise until more people willingly take up the job again. A decrease of price isn't going to cause more women to be trafficked. Instead, the opposite would happen because there is less money to be made. I suspect whats happening here is that its easier to bring women over, willing or not because before, this kind of work was illegal, so if caught they'd just send them back. This whole sex slavery thing seems like hyperbole to me, though. If you've ever been to a third world country, you'd see that prostitution is rampant, even in countries where its technically illegal. There really isn't any shortage of girls, so I suspect they wouldn't have any trouble finding prostitutes willing to go to somewhere they could make more money, that they'd need to kidnap someone and force them into it.

Ygg2 11y ago

That wasn't the case with Germany. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany It seems to reduce the violence against workers, but increases human trafficking, because Germany now acts as a safe haven for traffickers. Maybe trafficking would disappear, if all societies made prostitution illegal and not a looked down profession, but I somehow doubt it[1]. So if your goal is to reduce human trafficking, it might not be the most worthwhile of means. Also there is the silly issue, of woman losing her unemployment status because she didn't refused to work as a prostitute. [1] Even if all countries made prostitution legal, nothing stops a gangster from kidnapping a woman and dragging her from say Mexico to US to serve as sex worker. She could escape and there would be less stigma; but it sounds to me like those poor workers trapped in Dubai/Quatar and they had no reprieve. As someone mentioned, there is a supply/demand problem that can't be solved via prositutes.

a_bonobo 11y ago
I don't agree with your points - they echo the recent campaign by Spiegel Online; looking at your Wikipedia article, it seems more to be an issue with open borders and no passport control, and the fact that Germany is in the "middle" of Europe and a relatively rich country, which makes Germany a good target for trafficking. The numbers of yearly cases seem to be fairly low (about 700-800 cases per year in your Wiki-article), and pimps who force people into prostitution are arrested and jailed. If anything, I'd say that legality makes it much better for these forced prostitutes to escape - they don't have any fear of persecution. >Also there is the silly issue, of woman losing her unemployment status because she didn't refused to work as a prostitute. That was a single mistake - the Arbeitsagentur accidentally sent along a job offer which was from a brothel, and the media made it into a big case (see http://www.spiegel.de/karriere/berufsleben/arbeitsagentur-in-augsburg-wollte-19-jaehrige-an-bordell-vermitteln-a-881825.html http://www.spiegel.de/karriere/berufsleben/arbeitsagentur-in... ). Of course she didn't have to take the job, there have been rulings that you can't force unemployed to work as prostitutes (see same article).
- Ygg2 11y ago
  You do make a fine point that case regarding unemployment status. But, I think there is a difference between legalizing prostitution and preventing what's essentially human enslavement. I'm not saying legalizing prostitution won't help or shouldn't be done, I just don't think it will have as big impact as people claimed, and that it will have possible negative impact if other states don't adopt it. IMO it's akin to legalizing drugs, just legalizing it won't make drug problem disappear. For instance in cases where some states legalized drugs and most didn't; a state that legalized drugs can become safe haven for criminals from other countries, where drugs aren't legal.

dataker 11y ago

Also worth mentioning we shouldn't limit ourselves to domestic legalization. Because prostitution would still be illegal in developed countries, human trafficking would continue to happen, as prostitutes will need someone to "take care of stuff". If they could become independent with technology, they wouldn't be vulnerable to violence, rape,...

comrade1 11y ago

Seems to work well in Switzerland. Every now and then there's a trafficking bust that usually involves Asians that aren't legal workers. Prostitutes have to be able to legally work in Switzerland which means that nearly all of them come from Schengen countries. For the most part it seems to work well, with most of the workers independent and temporary for 30 days at a time. Pimps are illegal, prostitutes must be legal and independent. Brothels are often integrated in neighborhoods and not confined to red light districts, although there are some areas where there are more brothels, like around the train stations. Brothels are nothing more than a place where the prostitute rents out a room for the night or week - there's no madam or anything like you see in the movies. Prostitutes can't advertise on the street.

maurits 11y ago
Not to sure about this. Street prostitution is a common thing in Genève.