4chan archive /lgbt/ (index)
2013-07-27 02:47 1020345 Anonymous (prost.jpg 320x213 21kB)
I'm curious about the attitudes of the LGBT community with regard to prostitution. Here are some questions for discussion. In the real world is there really such a sharp line between voluntary and involuntary prostitution? Do you think permitting the former might increase the latter? How do we improve the lives of sex workers? Why do men and women buy sexual favors? Why do men and women sell sexual favors? What are the risks and benefits of banning the purchase of sexual favors?

14 min later 1020374 Anonymous
>>1020345 >In the real world is there really such a sharp line between voluntary and involuntary prostitution? the line is anything but sharp, even some of the people who choose to do it and have no qualms with doing it are only doing it because of their situation, not many people actively choose prostitution over other avenues of revenue, that being said there are people who do it completely voluntarily, and even those that are victims of their situation aren't always a far cry from under-qualified people who take minimum wage jobs. >Do you think permitting the former might increase the latter? only if the industry isn't monitored properly, in which case I can see a lot of people hiding behind supposed "voluntary prostitution" and using to get away with some pretty nasty stuff, but if hand;ed properly there is no reason why this would need to be the case. >How do we improve the lives of sex workers? if it's legalized you can impose laws to protect them, things like basic health and safety, not to mention they won't have any reason to go to the police if anything serious happens. >Why do men and women buy sexual favors? because it's easy and there are no expectations placed on them, it's an easy and casual relationship where they can be comfortable, sometimes you just want the intimacy without the relationship. >Why do men and women sell sexual favors? usually because it's easy money that doesn't require any qualifications, that or because they've been oppressed into the situation, perhaps by drug addiction or something. >What are the risks and benefits of banning the purchase of sexual favors? there are plenty of risks placed on those within the industry, not to mention all the cash that's essentially flushed down the drain, the benefits are pretty much null and void, the industry still booms and instead of weeding out the less favorable parts the whole thing is illegal so it all thrives without any sort of favorable intervention.

39 min later 1020436 Anonymous
>>1020374 I'd argue that if you planned to legalise prostitution, your best bet to avoid a good chunk of the potential issues would be to nationalise it and have the whole thing run by the government. Prostitution is an industry that could potentially get really nasty if left in the hands of the private sector (see: prostitution as it currently is).

1 hours later 1020626 Anonymous
Here's a piece of rhetoric you can use, as long as you don't mind being a bit heteronormative. If we are really concerned with the well-being of sex workers, the relevant question isn't 'would you have no problems with your own daughter becoming a prostitute?' but rather 'if your daughter became a prostitute, would you prefer that her occupation continue to be banned and involve the current stigma?'. I can't see how any decent person could answer 'yes' to this latter question.

2 hours later 1020708 Anonymous
I've always thought it should be legal. It'd work out way better for everyone involved. The girls would be safer, the men wouldn't get arrested, and STD spread would drop off a lot because obviously no one would go to prostitutes who couldn't verify they were clean.

2 hours later 1020720 Anonymous
>>1020626 >heteronormative Golly gee, what'll the homos think up next?!

2 hours later 1020732 Anonymous
>>1020720 Don't feed it, folks.

2 hours later 1020793 Anonymous
>>1020708 It might not work out better, depending on who runs it. I can easily see larger pimping companies forcing their employees to get plastic surgery just to keep their jobs, or imposing sales quotas on them. I agree legalising it would probably improve in some areas, but the implementation needs to be handled very carefully.

2 hours later 1020844 Anonymous
>>1020793 Do you have any examples of countries where it has worked in the way you're imagining?

3 hours later 1020921 Anonymous
>Paying for sex >Ever Pathetic. Don't care if it's legal or not, but all parties involved are human waste.

3 hours later 1020954 Anonymous
>>1020844 Unfortunately I'm not all that knowledgeable about which countries have legalised prostitution (though I wouldn't be surprised if there were all that many). I'm just applying what I know of capitalism and the effects of large companies in other industries to prostitution.

3 hours later 1021039 Anonymous
>>1020793 Considering that current pimps use drug addictions to completely control their lives, I fail to see how even that unlikely scenario is worse.

4 hours later 1021124 Anonymous
>>1021039 Fair point, but trading out one problem for another, slightly smaller problem isn't as good as fixing the problem in the 1st place.

4 hours later 1021140 Anonymous
>>1020345 only the "T" of LGBT cares about prostitution. They need a day job doing something.

4 hours later 1021213 Anonymous
>>1021140 Not true. Some statistics suggest that gay men selling sex to other gay men is a big part of the business.

4 hours later 1021226 Anonymous
>>1021124 That's true. But that's just the world we live in. There are always going to be problems. Our job is to make big problems smaller.

4 hours later 1021255 Anonymous
>>1021226 But surely if you have the option to fix the problem altogether you should take that instead, right?

4 hours later 1021293 Anonymous
>>1021255 Yep. But I don't see a way to do that. If you do, by all means implement it.

4 hours later 1021308 Anonymous
>>1021293 I do for a lot of things, but no-one listens to me.

5 hours later 1021364 Anonymous
>>1021308 Then they're probably not problem free and you just don't notice it because of your narcissism.

5 hours later 1021418 Anonymous
>>1021364 No I mean I never get a chance to actually implement anything because no-one listens to me. If there are problems with my ideas, I'd be more than willing to alter the idea to fix those problems too if anyone were to actually point them out.

5 hours later 1021537 Anonymous
>>1021418 >I have a solution that will fix all the problems associated with the phenomenon of prostitution. Oookay.

6 hours later 1021684 Anonymous
>>1020844 I've heard brothels exist like that in Australia. I didn't have that much interaction with the girl I knew in that line of work. But she did comment that everything done is clean, verified. STDs are on lock down, the girls are tested frequently. She participated in that work of her own free will and interest. Personally? I don't think you can get worse than having an illegal trade run by individuals that may participate in additional criminal activities. I think by creating a legitimate, taxable work, imposed with standards and regulations - sex workers would probably be worlds safer as a result. Anyone visit or work in Nevada? >>1021140 Imagine a world where chasers can get that one cute trans girl, even if only for a night, and have it be legal? Can't be so bad. Now if you can promise the 'T' more job security nation-wide at day jobs, sure a lot less would probably seek out sex work. But we have some fucked up rates of unemployment and mistreatment.

6 hours later 1021788 Anonymous
>>1021684 >legitimate, taxable work, imposed with standards and regulations The problem with that is that prostitution actually thrives best when not fully condoned. If it became a 100% legal and respectable profession like any other, supply and demand would drive the prices down.

6 hours later 1021847 Anonymous
>>1021788 And? Prices would go down but there'd be a much larger and easier access to clients. Not to mention, the high end prices probably wouldn't go down much. I'd rather make a little less and be sure I'm not going to be murdered or abused. And I've done sex work before.

6 hours later 1021901 Anonymous
>>1021847 I've also done sex work, when I was rather younger and more handsome than I am now. I could make 50 quid in half an hour, this being over 15 years ago too. Yet of course, prostitution is a clear example of unskilled labour; any young reasonably attractive person can do it. I don't think driving down prostitution pay to that of a cleaner or shop worker would be doing sex workers a service.

7 hours later 1022020 Anonymous
>>1021901 I don't know about you, but most of my time when I was selling myself, I had a lot of waiting around for clients. If it was legal, it'd be a hell of a lot easier to find clients. So even if I could only make half what I did before, I could end up making more money by working more. But even if they do make less money, and I doubt it'd ever get down to minimum wage because while it's not skill intensive, it's not like other minimum wage jobs where anybody on the street is willing to do it, then I still think it's worth it for the safety. If I didn't fear for my life and my health, I'd probably still be doing sex work because otherwise it wasn't really that bad.

8 hours later 1022325 Anonymous
Bamp, cause I thought LGBT would be more opinionated than this.

9 hours later 1022947 Anonymous (nigga-is-you-serious[1].jpg 200x143 7kB)
>>1020436 >Government sponsored whores also, are you seriously comparing the legal private sector to the illegal one?

9 hours later 1022983 Anonymous
>>1020954 so basically, you're talking out your ass. How about you go do some research? Spain has legalised prostitution, why don't you start there.

9 hours later 1022990 Anonymous
>>1021255 >implying you could ever get rid of the world's oldest profession

19 hours later 1026970 Anonymous
>>1022983 Or New Zeeland, where it has been very successful.

33 hours later 1030086 Anonymous
I just dropped in to say there is a serious lack of lesbian pros. I would be their number one client.

33 hours later 1030184 Anonymous
I support legalizing sex workers/prostitution because, well, why not? It already exists as things stand and it's far harder to regulate shadow businesses in order to maintain basic standards of care than it is to regulate open/real ones. Plus, we're in the twenty-first century, and we need to get over the whole protestant morality. In response to comments that I don't remember: Prostitutes are legal in Thailand, and the women who do it there aren't utterly ostracized. It's kind of just a job for them, and they have husbands who aren't bothered by it because it's normal. I don't know anything about STD rates in Thailand, but I do know that as things stand the upper class "escort" agencies do require proof that their customers are clean, and encourage their workers to refuse if necessary. I imagine/hope that legalization would make this more common/mandatory. There are kind of already sale quotas as things are now... I don't think legalization would necessarily drive prices down. Also, I wish I was handsome/goodl-looking so I could do sex work... >tfw unemployed college student >tfw no bf

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