In my previous post, I discussed
how the vagaries of human nature make it difficult to determine the line that
separates a “criminal” and a “victim” in recent cases of police shooting “unarmed”
black males, which have become causes
célèbres in the media. Because it has
been made a racial issue centered on the “civil right” of persons not to be
shot because of the arbitrary and presumably unwarranted actions by police,
this requires that the public remain mystified as to any actions by the shooting
victim that may have precipitated the event. Not that knowing what it is makes
it any more “justified,” but the fact that even discussing the possibilities
brings outrage and accusations of condoning injustice.
Now, this brings me to the
subject, once more, of gender politics—which as we saw in that now discredited Rolling Stone story concerning an
alleged sexual assault at a University of Virginia frat house—seems to thrive
on fabrications, hypocrisy and tyranny in the U.S. more than in any other
country. In regard to a federal “human trafficking” law heading for passage, the
New York Times tells us that “The
Senate trafficking bill, which was intended to increase penalties for
perpetrators and support for victims, particularly the preadolescent girls who
are targeted, would also strengthen the ability of law enforcement to
investigate trafficking, including through the expanded authority to intercept
communications. It would also make patrons of traffickers equally responsible
for the crimes, imposing harsher punishments on the so-called johns.”
I think it is fairly easy to see
the base hypocrisy and unjustness of this law. Besides the doubt that female-run
“escort services” will be targeted, by taking away a prostitute’s living by
targeting their “customers” and arresting “pimps”—calling them “traffickers”
now—that will only force more prostitutes to look for a more fearful clientele out
in the open. One also wonders if it is being proposed to “pay” newly unemployed “victims” with your tax
dollars—or just turning them into real victims by taking away what in most
cases is a personal choice of livelihood, by forcing someone else’s “morality”
on them.
Furthermore the “trafficking” in
children is clearly a bit of self-serving propaganda to serve the agenda of a
radical base that has no interest in facts. I’ve pointed out here that one
actual field study to track down children working in the sex industry in high
density urban areas not only found what could only be construed as an infinitesimal
percentage of what advocacy group claimed were 300,000 “children” being forced
into sex trafficking in the U.S., but the vast majority they did find under 18 admitted
that they did so out of their own accord, for money. In fact, only 7 percent
said they were working for a “pimp.”
The “300,000” number that
advocates quoted was in fact only an estimated number of underage runaways in a
given year; the advocates were too lazy to conduct their own data search (they
always are), so they thought the public would be dumb enough—or scared enough—to
believe what they are told without actually checking its veracity. The truth is more likely this: The number of children you will encounter being "sex trafficked" in your lifetime is closer to zero than any number the "advocates" come up with.
In a September, 2014 article in
the left-wing Atlantic Monthly, the disconnect
between what the public is being told about the “trafficking” in prostitution and
the reality is quite wide. Here are some excerpts, just so that you know that I
am not pissing in the wind alone on this subject:
Most current government and nonprofit policies on sex work define their
goals as “rescue,” which makes perfect sense if the age-of-entry statistic is
central to your understanding of the sex industry. Child abuse and trafficking
are crises that require certain types of interventions. But these crimes do not
characterize the sex industry more generally. In reality, many sex workers come
into the industry as adults and without coercion, often because of economic
necessity. By seeing the sex industry through the lens of the misleading
age-of-entry statistic, we overlook the people who are most affected by
discussions about sex work—the workers themselves…
But the biggest problem with the claim is that it automatically remakes
any discussion about sex work into its own image. When you start the
conversation believing that prostitution is rooted in the rape of children, any
suggestion that sex workers can be adults who have made an economic choice
sounds like an attempt to provide cover for the rapists…
"It distorts the dialogue because it's a very narrow view of how
the sex industry functions," Audacia Ray says. "It also means the
impulse is that all people are in the sex industry are victims of their
situation who are disempowered and have no autonomy and no other skills. That's
really damaging. And also, when you treat a whole population as victims, that
very process is victimizing because it takes away agency and individual
narratives about how they got there."…
"It distorts the dialogue because it's a very narrow view of how
the sex industry functions," Audacia Ray says. "It also means the
impulse is that all people are in the sex industry are victims of their
situation who are disempowered and have no autonomy and no other skills. That's
really damaging. And also, when you treat a whole population as victims, that
very process is victimizing because it takes away agency and individual
narratives about how they got there."…
Kristina Dolgin, a former sex worker and activist with the San
Francisco chapter of the Sex Workers Outreach Project (SWOP-Bay) agrees:
"By framing the discourse around sex work—and prostitution
specifically—around children, you are taking away the agency of people and
instilling a moral panic."…
At its heart, the reality of sex work is rather dull and pedestrian.
The main reason that people go into sex work is neither because of predatory
gangsters, nor to indulge some uncontrollable nymphomania: It's all about
money. It's about the need to pay your rent, put gas in your car, and buy
groceries. Like becoming a waitress, a store clerk, a plumber, or a mechanic,
going into sex work is driven by the economics of everyday life. If we were
start to think of it as being primarily about work instead of sex, the
headlines would quickly become much less sensational. "I think that media
coverage needs to be less of a dichotomy between people who freely and happily
choose the sex industry and people who are coerced into the sex industry,"
Ray says. "Because there's a vast gray area of economic circumstances in
between. Economic circumstances are the reason most people enter the sex
industry. I think coverage and conversations about that need to be much more
complex."…
Are there really people out there
who do not understand any of this, besides self-serving “victim” advocates,
politicians, city attorneys and law enforcement looking to improve their PR?
And besides, what makes a “john”
any less a “victim” of the predations of a prostitute than, say, a junkie is to
a dope dealer? The prostitute is taking advantage of some males’ weakness in
their libido (frankly, I don’t understand it—you can “have” any woman you wish
in your “dreams,” and it doesn’t cost anything). Not only that, but
prostitution isn’t called the world’s “oldest profession” for nothing; in
ancient Greek and Roman times, prostitutes were often held in high esteem, so
much so that the emperor Augustus felt the need to promulgate a law that tried
to force more Roman men to enter into legitimate marriages. It has only been in
prudish Victorian times when legislating “morality” came into vogue that
prostitution became a “crime.”
And it has only been in more
recent years that gender fanatics have been allowed to become powerful enough
to set a tyrannical national agenda, trying to pass off anecdotal evidence as being
the “reality.” An atmosphere of fear and paranoia fed through self-promoting
advocacy journalists in the national media, leading to injustice not only for
the so-called “criminals”—i.e. “johns”—but turning the people who are actually
doing the selling (prostitutes) into helpless “victims” for real, instead of
people just looking to make a “living.”
Of course, it is in Europe with
its long history in the “business” where we can find truth rather than
propaganda. The UK Guardian had a story
about a prostitute seeking to decriminalize her trade. I found most of her
story a self-serving whine for public consumption for why she felt “forced”
into the prostitution business, but one thing she said made sense: “People have
sex for all kinds of reasons. My reason was to escape the poverty trap. I've
been told that prostitution is degrading and self-abuse, but how many other
people feel abused by their jobs?”
What will be interesting is to see how the aforementioned law will be enforced. I think its potential for abuse will be rather strong. There are indeed many children in this country who are victims; the problem is that nearly all of this victimization is occurring not on the street but in the home. What is more, perpetrators and victims are of both genders--perhaps equally so.
What will be interesting is to see how the aforementioned law will be enforced. I think its potential for abuse will be rather strong. There are indeed many children in this country who are victims; the problem is that nearly all of this victimization is occurring not on the street but in the home. What is more, perpetrators and victims are of both genders--perhaps equally so.
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