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Should Prostitution be Legal?
I'm male, and I say "Yay!" 66%  66%  [ 103 ]
I'm male, and I say "Neigh!" 14%  14%  [ 22 ]
I'm female, and I say "Yes" 15%  15%  [ 23 ]
I'm female, and I say "No" 5%  5%  [ 7 ]
Total votes : 155

puddingmouse
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26 Oct 2012, 11:44 am

ArrantPariah wrote:
puddingmouse wrote:

Women don't 'give' or 'reward' you with sex. It's not a commodity. It's an activity with two or more people involved.

When people see it as commodity, I just find it very sad.


It is an activity that requires mutual agreement and coordination.

If two people want to play tennis together, that's fine. If one person wants to pay another to play tennis with him, that is also fine.

Any activity that requires the cooperation of two or more people could be regarded as a "commodity." There is nothing to get sad about.


I just think that sex is special amongst activities because of the amount of intimacy involved. If that makes me a prude, fair enough. It's not something I can shake and I have tried to (you get 'coolness points' with men if you can pretend to not feel that way).



ArrantPariah
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26 Oct 2012, 11:44 am

puddingmouse wrote:
I lack respect for johns because they pay to have sex. I think doing that shows a low level of self respect.


What is the link to "self respect?" I don't perceive the association.



puddingmouse
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26 Oct 2012, 11:47 am

ArrantPariah wrote:
puddingmouse wrote:
I lack respect for johns because they pay to have sex. I think doing that shows a low level of self respect.


What is the link to "self respect?" I don't perceive the association.


I think paying for sex is quite a dumb thing to do. You risk STDs and getting pickpocketed if you go on the lower end of the market, and you have to pay an extortionately high price to avoid that risk. You're also paying for the services of someone who probably has no respect for you and sees you as a commodity as much as you see them as one. It just seems like a waste of money and an abuse of one's own sexuality.



26 Oct 2012, 1:57 pm

puddingmouse wrote:
ArrantPariah wrote:
AspieRogue wrote:

Also, the perceive Johns to be low status men who can't get laid so they turn to prostitutes. There is a belief that if you can't attract a woman to you and shag her free of charge then you shouldn't be allowed to have sex. :roll:


As non-females, we can only speculate. Part of it, too, might be that if men are able to satisfy their cravings for a few dollars with a willing administrator, then fewer men might be inclined to attempt to perform the wining, dining and romancing for which coitus is the desired reward, over which women exercise considerable control.


Women don't 'give' or 'reward' you with sex. It's not a commodity. It's an activity with two or more people involved.




Correct. So what is wrong with a man paying a woman do engage in sexual activity with him if she agrees to it? Commodities include services as well as goods. A service can be engaging in a shared activity with someone in exchange for payment from that person.

Like it or lump it, sex is fungible. Plenty of women use sex to manipulate the men in their lives by withholding it if they don't get their way; which I find as contemptible as you find Johns.



26 Oct 2012, 2:03 pm

androbot2084 wrote:
Sex should not be a marketplace. Also because time is money there is too much pressure to get the business transaction over with as fast as possible rather than making it a date and a girlfriend experience.



What if she isn't interested in going on a date with him and being his girlfriend? This idea that sex and relationships cannot be mutually exclusive is totally old fashioned, stupid, and factually wrong.



visagrunt
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26 Oct 2012, 2:14 pm

Sex is an activity to be engaged in by two--or more--mutually consenting adults for whatever reasons they choose.

That fact that I am not interested in exchanging money for the purpose of securing consent does not mean that I do not support other people doing so. I do not expect people to live their lives according to my standards, and I expect people to leave me free to live my life according to my own.

To resist the legalization of prostitution on the basis of one's personal dislike of the idea of exchanging money for sex is, I suggest, the imposition of personal standards upon others. Yes, there are risks--but those risks can be managed--just as risks in any number of other activities can be.


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ArrantPariah
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26 Oct 2012, 2:42 pm

puddingmouse wrote:
ArrantPariah wrote:
puddingmouse wrote:
I lack respect for johns because they pay to have sex. I think doing that shows a low level of self respect.


What is the link to "self respect?" I don't perceive the association.


I think paying for sex is quite a dumb thing to do. You risk STDs and getting pickpocketed if you go on the lower end of the market, and you have to pay an extortionately high price to avoid that risk. You're also paying for the services of someone who probably has no respect for you and sees you as a commodity as much as you see them as one. It just seems like a waste of money and an abuse of one's own sexuality.


A good portion of the risk stems from its illegality.

STDs are a risk in any non-monogamous encounter.

People like to waste their money in different ways.

The difference in viewpoint may stem from the biological differences in men versus women. For most men, an ejaculation is a pleasant experience and not necessarily any big deal. For many women, coitus is a big messy deal.

I don't see how paying someone to give me an orgasm would represent an "abuse" of my sexuality. And, if the ejaculatory administrator has no respect for me, so what? As long as she fakes respect during the session, that is all that a client can ask. Many therapists don't respect their clients, either. And, they certainly regard their clients as "commodities." Therapists have bills to pay, too.



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26 Oct 2012, 2:43 pm

Well because of the economic recession there are prostitutes that are looking at alternative ways of receiving economic support from men. There used to be a rule that sex would be a business transaction only and there would be no romantic involvement at all and not even kissing would be allowed. But if a prostitute cannot find a John she has to result to alternative methods. She could marry a wealthy man but most of them are taken. Instead she approaches a more respectable man and offers a girlfriend experience for a price. The man takes the girl to church, she meets his parents she does everything that a real girlfriend does. She could be rightfully called a female gigolo. If there is a stigma in a cash transaction she might not even accept cash but rather a gift that she later cashes in. Of course I do not hang around these people.



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26 Oct 2012, 3:15 pm

puddingmouse wrote:
Women don't 'give' or 'reward' you with sex. It's not a commodity. It's an activity with two or more people involved.

How is selling sex fundamentally different from selling a massage?



ArrantPariah
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26 Oct 2012, 3:27 pm

enrico_dandolo wrote:
puddingmouse wrote:
Women don't 'give' or 'reward' you with sex. It's not a commodity. It's an activity with two or more people involved.

How is selling sex fundamentally different from selling a massage?


Massages that end in ejaculation are the best kind.

A massage without an orgasm is just plain incomplete.



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26 Oct 2012, 3:43 pm

enrico_dandolo wrote:
How is selling sex fundamentally different from selling a massage?


It's different for the same reason paying a child to wash your car is okay, but paying a child to have sex with you is wrong. I don't know exactly why humans function that way, but having sex under coercive circumstances seems to lead to traumas. Given that traumatised people aren't very productive, nor very happy, it's wrong.



26 Oct 2012, 3:52 pm

Threore wrote:
enrico_dandolo wrote:
How is selling sex fundamentally different from selling a massage?


It's different for the same reason paying a child to wash your car is okay, but paying a child to have sex with you is wrong. I don't know exactly why humans function that way, but having sex under coercive circumstances seems to lead to traumas. Given that traumatised people aren't very productive, nor very happy, it's wrong.



First of all, you analogy is both factual wrong and in poor taste. Sex with a CHILD is a whole other kettle of fish than sex with a (voluntary) hooker because the latter involves consent. If she regrets it later on then she shares the blame for giving her consent.



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26 Oct 2012, 3:55 pm

enrico_dandolo wrote:
How is selling sex fundamentally different from selling a massage?


That's a question I've raised before myself, as the line between sex and massage is actually quite blurry if you think about it. In the same vein, so long as there is no violence or coercion you can argue that a pimp is no different than any other manager or agent, a logistics person who doesn't do the actual "work" buts gets paid for arranging it. Much of the judgment against the whole industry is hypocritical at best, often based on ignorance and moral righteousness.


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26 Oct 2012, 4:07 pm

puddingmouse wrote:
Women don't 'give' or 'reward' you with sex.


Then what is the objective of "dating?"



Threore
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26 Oct 2012, 4:39 pm

AspieRogue wrote:
First of all, you analogy is both factual wrong and in poor taste. Sex with a CHILD is a whole other kettle of fish than sex with a (voluntary) hooker because the latter involves consent. If she regrets it later on then she shares the blame for giving her consent.


Poor taste? I saw similarity between two things and made an analogy. I didn't condone anything, so I don't understand why you consider it poor taste. Is it simply because you disagree with the analogy?
Anyway, whether one consents and the other doesn't is as irrelevant to the analogy as whether one is taller than the other. The analogy was made because both prostitutes and abused children are often traumatised in some way by their experiences and looking back wish they hadn't been in that situation.
Now your hypothetical prostitute that probably also won't get traumatised and doesn't want anything else from life than to be a prostitute might be unhappy, but that seems a small price given that it's essential to saving those who are traumatised.



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26 Oct 2012, 5:04 pm

ArrantPariah wrote:
puddingmouse wrote:
Women don't 'give' or 'reward' you with sex.


Then what is the objective of "dating?"

That should be obvious.

Social relationships do not inelectuably lead to sex. Also, in a date, the relationship is expected to be relatively equal and reciprocal.

Threore wrote:
enrico_dandolo wrote:
How is selling sex fundamentally different from selling a massage?


It's different for the same reason paying a child to wash your car is okay, but paying a child to have sex with you is wrong. I don't know exactly why humans function that way, but having sex under coercive circumstances seems to lead to traumas. Given that traumatised people aren't very productive, nor very happy, it's wrong.

The issues of gratuitously adding children to the discussion and of using productivity as a criteria of moral utility notwithstanding, I don't see how prostitution is necessarly "coercive". It is not rape. Or rather, prostitution is to rape what selling an apple is to being mugged by someone who wants your apple.