Prostitution in Canada

Initial Essay

The Situation:

1. Summary: It's even worse than you thought.
2. A More Detailed Explanation: If you had asked me a year ago, I would have guessed (from a few anecdotes) that most prostitutes were drug addicts in their teens and 20s who sold themselves to support their habits. The men who bought (hired?) them were those who didn't approve of chasity and lacked the social skills for seduction. It was a thoroughly unsavory branch of society and I wanted nothing to do with it. It turns out that most prostitutes are essentially slaves (isolated, no money, threats against them and their families if they try to escape, etc.) and the men who hire them (called johns or tricks for some reason) are more interested in power/dominance that sex. For anyone who has read (and remembers) C. S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters (at least I think it was that book), we are far into "infernal Venus" territory here.
3. Some statistics (from http://prostitutionresearch.com/category/quickfacts/ which provides the sources they got them from):
   • Approximately 90% of prostitutes (they exact number varies by study) would leave the business if they could.
   • Median age entering prostitution: 13.5 - Note that the larger range of possible older ages suggests more than half are younger
   • The mortality rate for prostitutes is 40 times (i.e 4000%) the national average in Canada - I suspect there is no comparable socioeconomic segment to compare them to, although I believe that it is usually higher for poor people.
   • 60-80% prostitutes are also raped "on the job" (although definitions can get fuzzy here). The lowest average rate I have seen is 8 times a year . I don't know if this average includes the ones who escaped entirely. However, I also picked up the claim that 3/4 rapes go unreported (how would anyone know?) and I suspect that this number would be higher for prostitutes (who tend to have bad relationships with the law).
   • About 70% of prostitutes meet the criteria for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) - I don't actually know what this is, but it sounds bad.

The Swedish Model:

• The basic assumption here is that the prostitutes are victims. The primary villains are the pimps who control the industry (and get rich off it) and the secondary villains are the johns who buy the prostitutes.
• The laws are desired on this assumption. Prostitutes are given access to programs to get them back into proper society. Johns face penalties (in France, a €1500 file for the first offense and more for the second; in Sweden there was going to be jail time but their Supreme Court forbid it so they are also doing fines). I am not sure exactly what happens to pimps, but I am sure it is serious.
• The laws have a definite symbolic component. A goal here is to send the message to society that the prostitutes are not evil people worthy of scorn, but hurt people needing help. In contrast, the johns are preying on the weak and vulnerable and willfully ignorant of what is really going on at best.

Results:

1. Prostitution rates have fallen significantly (although not to zero). This is despite the fact that they have been rising the rest of Europe (data 2008 before any other countries adopted similar laws).
   • Street prostitution dropped by more than 50% (650 to 300). This also does not appear to be leading to an increase of other kinds of prostitution.
   • Trafficking rings are now taking their victims to other countries instead (not an ideal solution, but its something).
   • The number of johns fell from 12.7% to 7.6%
   • The 2008 survey found no instances of Swedes traveling to other countries to find prostitutes (I think this is called sex tourism)
   • The laws have high and increasing public support, from about 70% when it was passed to now over 80% (I think, I can't find the reference)
2. There is a vocal group of critics who argue that prostitution has just moved farther underground and presumably the prostitutes are now even worse off. They are having trouble finding evidence for this, although several presumably-big-name people to say that they believe it.
   • The root problem here is that it is very hard to get accurate statistics on things that people want to pretend doesn't exist.
   • I came across a good (if rather forceful) response to this from an a blog (http://www.genderberg.com/phpNuke/modules.php…) written by a woman who seems to have a lot of facts. "This is extortion. It's assumes that men currently abuse, torture and rape prostitutes in horribly high numbers and if feminists don't agree to provide clean bodies for men’s sexual self-gratification, their entertainment, then johns are gonna really beat the living shit out of prostitutes and it will be feminist's fault they did it."

• Circumstances of prostitutes in the Netherlands (which were already bad) have gotten even worse. They are about the same in Germany.
• Both countries are major destinations for human trafficing (i.e. slave prostitutes).
• Prostitution still has major criminal involvement in the Netherlands, and large numbers of prostitutes (estimated 2/3 in 2005) are slaves brought in from poor countries by criminal gangs.
• The Netherlands has started adding more laws to limit prostitution in an attempt to protect the vulnerable. Germany occasionally talks about it, but, as far as I know, all they have actually done is added a tax in 2004.
• Prostitutes are normally afraid to go to the police for help. There is some reason to this, as many prostitutes are in the country illegally (or have had their documents stolen by their masters) and both countries will deport them if so. This would often leave them at the (non-existent) mercy of the men who originally brought them out of their home countries.
• In Germany, only 100 of an estimated 400,000 prostitutes were willing to join the service union (which I assume already existed and does lot of other things too). That is 1/40th of a percent.

Conclusion:

Miscellaneous Notes and Thoughts:

1. I don't think I would approve of prostitution even if it was entirely safe and no one was hurt. In my experience, women are extremely complex creatures and treating one as no more than an apparatus for physical pleasure seems improper. I think this is what is called objectification, although there is probably some form of the great chain of being lurking in there.
2. Prostitutes are commonly referred to as being sold. However, as they are returned to their previous owner after the event, "rented" seems more accurate.
3. I don't have any (biological) sisters or daughters. However, I do have an honorary sister and niece (not related to each other). I would be quite horrified if anything like what is described in here happened to either of them. This leaves me more able to empathize with these unfortunate women who I don't know.
4. The line of what counts as prostitution is very fuzzy. A modern, women who winds up sleeping with some man she has never met before every night is merely liberated (although I am not clear on exactly what from). If the relationship is at least semi-permanent, they are lovers. If her mate is married to someone else, she is a mistress. If the relationship has formal recognition, she is a concubine, and he probably has some sort of responsibilities to her (such as not dumping her when she gets older). If the relationship has full legal status, it is called marriage, she becomes a wife, and most of the same people who condemn prostitution say its a good thing.
5. For Christians reading this: The Bible appears to treat "secular" prostitution (as opposed to religious prostitution in the service of some goddess) as less objectionable - at least for the woman - than the same relationship would have been if no money had changed hands. The justification seems to be that "this is how I make a living" is a quasi-valid excuse. See Ezekiel 16:30-34, Hosea 4:14, and possibly Amos 7:14-17. I am not entirely sure how this fits with my main point. My argument here is a pragmatic one from exploitation, so I suspect that it is irrelevant. However, a case could be made that a society that not merely accepts, but actually celebrates fornication has no right for forbid prostitution. Otherwise-acceptable actions do not normally become forbidden when done in exchange for money.
6. There is a hilarious proposal for introducing religious prostitution into Christianity at http://firstthings.com/…/temple-prostitution-a-modest-prop…/. It was intended to mock the justifications given for accepting gay marriage by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (it uses all the same arguments), but is well worth reading in its own right.
7. Despite some "Get Involved" suggestions, I believe the Canadian government does not actually accept online petitions. I hear they are thinking of changing this sometime soon, but it has not happened yet. This means that, even if you feel strongly about the issue, signing online petitions is a waste of time.

First Follow-Up

Second Follow-Up

Third Follow-Up

1. Being a prostitute will be decriminalized, which means that it is not legal but not so illegal you can get in legal trouble for it. However, it would be fully illegal “next to a school, playground, or daycare centre.”
2. Hiring a prostitute will be illegal.
3. Being a pimp would be illegal.
4. Running adds for prostitution would be illegal for the organization that display the add (e.g. a newspaper), but not for the person who posted it (i.e. the prostitute). This includes online advertising.
5. Ponography is not affected, and is still legal. Which makes sense as it is a different issue, but some people think they should be grouped together.

1. Have prostitutes viewed as victims.
2. Change the common social perception of prostitution to be an issue of exploitation, rather than an issue of personal freedom. Society at present is divided on this and will presumably remain so, but they are trying to change the distribution.
3. Reduce the number of prostitutes.
4. Make men feel bad about hiring prostitutes.

1. The weird combination of illegal and decriminalized stuff constitutes entrapment. For those of you who don't know, entrapment means trying to get someone to do something illegal. In this case, the prostitutes are encouraging law-breaking among those who run their adds or hire their services. I don't think this will be a problem, as the same situation exists for the loan sharks and marijuana smokers I mentioned above.
2. This drive the prostitution industry underground. Which, given that it is already underground, probably means not allow it to come out into the open. This will deny prostitutes the legal protections they would enjoy under full legalization, and thus will make them worse off. I also don't think this one will work, as most of the evidence says the opposite.
3. Maximizing individual freedom trumps (or should trump) all other considerations. To the best of my knowledge, this principle does not appear in any law anywhere (and no one would want it to), but it gets invoked all the same. I would guess (given my normal and semi-partisan cynicism) that this might be enough to overturn the new law, although I hope not.