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Trisha Mulvahill
Professor Lovejoy
Honors English 101
20 November 2014
Legalizing Prostitution and Freeing Your Choices
Germany, Austria, Brazil, and many other countries have legalized the sale and purchase
of sex. There are many who think it is an awful crime against humanity to let sex work go on.
There are other members of society who have grown up looking down on prostitutes because
they are doing something illegal and do not look any farther. However, we are all humans; we
are ruled by our biologic need to breed and will always have sex. People also have a choice. As a
nation, we owe it to people to be able to make an informed and safe decision. That is why
prostitution should be legalized in the United States.
In, Why is Prostitution Criminalized? An Alternative Viewpoint on the Construction of
Sex Work, Rebecca Hayes-Smith and Zahra Shekarkhar bring up the four assumptions that the
opposition to legalized prostitution make. First, that criminalization is a deterrent. Second, that
prostitution spreads disease. Third, that sex workers are more likely to be victimized. Finally,
that prostitution creates social disorder in the community. These arguments are bred by
ignorance and false logic (Hayes-Smith, Shekarkhar 44).
Saying that criminalization is a deterrent has been proven wrong with different examples.
For instance, buying drugs is illegal but it still being done. If someone wants to do something,
they will do it, legal or not. Also, people are always going to have sex. Weve proven that in the
instance of sex education in schools. Schools that teach abstinence only have higher teen

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pregnancy rates than schools that teach about protection and birth control as shown in
"Abstinence-Only Education And Teen Pregnancy Rates: Why We Need Comprehensive Sex
Education In The U.S." which shows that states who teach abstinence only have 73.24 teen
pregnancy rate among 14 to 19 year olds out of 1000 teens. That is much higher than states who
do not teach abstinence which have an average of 58.78 pregnancies among the same age group.
(Stanger-Hall, Kathrin F., and David W. Hall 4). So, why would making the purchase or sale of
sex illegal prevent it from happening?
The second claim that prostitution spreads disease is a fear that we cannot ignore. AIDS
is a very real and very terrifying disease with no known cure. However, we have some protection
against STIs in the form of condoms. Sex workers in brothels use condoms more often and a
study found that sex workers had a lower STI rate than non-sex workers (Begum, Sufia, et al, 86).
We could possibly infer from this that sex workers are well aware of the risk of disease and take
more precautions than the average person.
Thirdly, the claim that sex workers are prone to victimization can have two meanings:
prone to violence from johns or from human trafficking. Sex workers are more likely to be
victims of violent crime, but this is compounded by the fact that prostitution is illegal. These are
people who get into strangers' cars. They are vulnerable and the public may not even notice they
have disappeared. This was the case with the Green River killer who terrorized King County,
Washington, for over a decade. Most of his victims were prostitutes and there may still be
missing victims of his because of the precarious nature of illegal sex work. These were teenage
girls. They were someones daughters. For some reason or another they ended up working the
streets. Because of the illegal nature of prostitution they were left unsafe, alone, and unmissed. If

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there were a registry for sex workers, if it was made legalized, those forty plus women would not
be forgotten.
Sex trafficking is a big deal though. I dont think legalizing sex work would prevent
human trafficking, but it may help reduce it. If there are legal prostitutes, then the only appeal of
an illegal worker would be for even more immoral acts such as pedophilia. Still, fact is that
making the purchase of sex illegal isn't a deterrent, but legalizing it would be a deterrent against
unregulated prostitution. When marijuana was legalized in Washington, people lined up to buy it
legitimately. They still do. There is no need to buy it illegally unless your use of it is illegal, i.e.
underage use. The same can apply to prostitution. People are not going to go to jail for having
sex with an illegal worker when there are legal ways to do it. It makes no sense to. As for
pedophiles and other such scourges on society? Well, there are always divisions of police
officers dedicated to protecting children. Let them do their job.
That also raises the idea of the effects on law enforcement. Law enforcements load would
go down quite a bit from the legalization of prostitution. Law enforcement would not have the
kinds of undercover busts they have to put together now. They also would not need a huge vice
unit. They would only be prosecuting the illegal sex workers. With each arrest of a prostitute
costing $2000 and the national amount spent on enforcing this is about $120million
annually(Becklund, par. 1); we could save so much money on law enforcement by legalizing
prostitution. Not to mention the taxes we could collect. Businesses would still have to pay taxes
on their profits and as weve always been told: sex sells.
The final claim about it creating social disorder in the community is really just a smoke
screen for I dont like this thing so other people wont like it either. This is because the idea of

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social disorder doesnt make much sense. They are either talking about social chaos or social
structure. Social chaos is a theory based off of the chaos theory in mathematics. In "How Chaos
Theory Relates to Sociology", Elizabeth Young states, in general, chaos theory is not about
disorder, it is about very complicated systems of order. In social sciences, chaos theory is the
study of complex non linear dynamic systems of social complexity. (Young, par. 1). This means
if detractors of prostitution are talking about social chaos, they are really talking about reordering
society. Society isnt going to break down and collapse just because of prostitution. There may
be some restructuring but that happens all the time in society. In the 1960s, the idea of
desegregating African Americans would have been thought to create the same social unrest.
However, almost sixty years later, we dont even think twice about African Americans
socializing with and, even, marrying Caucasians.
If they were talking about social structure (i.e. the way society is structured with different
classes and values) their argument falls flat again. Prostitution is already a sect of society. It is
illegal and frowned upon but is still present. By legalizing it, you just reorder the social structure
so that prostitution is acceptable. So, the real question is: is prostitution morally and ethically
acceptable? That is not something that anyone can argue successfully. Individuals will always
have different morals and ethics due to their upbringing, experience, and social standing. I
cannot dictate for you what is right and wrong, but I can tell you that I feel sex work is ethical if
it is regulated properly.
We also need to accept that having sex is not just a choice. For millions of years our
genetics have told us to breed and populate the world. There is no way that that many years of
drive is going to disappear just because the earth is overpopulated and society tells us to wait to
have kids. Sex feels good to most people. Its supposed to; it encourages us to create more

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people. Nowadays, we have medicines to prevent pregnancy and prophylactics to prevent the
spread of disease. We have a choice in this regard but we are still slaves to nature. Our nature
also gives us free will and we will make our own choices. If there is an easy way to get what we
want, we will take it. So, maybe the United States government should ensure that when people
make the choice to have sex with a prostitute it is legal and safe.
I propose we look at other countries and see what their policies are for legalized
prostitution. The first and easiest is to make it mandatory to get regular health screenings for sex
workers. That way if they get an infection, it can be contained and treated. We should learn from
Amsterdam and make sure that sex workers can go into business for themselves and be self
employed. This prevents the monopolies that brothels currently have in Amsterdam. Allowing
brothels to hold a monopoly is a bad idea because the brothels usually charge the workers for the
room and that is a lot like pimping. Germany has made pimping and brothels legal as long as
they are not violent or exploitive.
The one thing we should avoid is the Swedish Model. The Swedish Model is a system of
laws that restrict the purchase of sex but not the sale. In "Should Buying Sex be Illegal" Michelle
Goldberg includes a quote from one of her interviews: Its like saying you can still bake breads,
but no one can buy them from you, says Nadia van der Linde, coordinator of the Red Umbrella
Fund, an Amsterdam-based organization that makes grants to sex workers rights groups
worldwide. (Goldberg, 20). This drives prostitution farther underground than when it was
illegal. It raises a social stigma against these workers and makes their clients even more afraid. If
they are already doing something illegal, whats to stop them from getting violent? Its the same
problem with criminalizing over and over again. Making prostitution illegal creates more

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criminal activity around it by default. Unfortunately, the Swedish Model is in effect in at least
three countries with more countries considering it every year.
This is the fight. Our media is soaked with sexualization and encourages us to express our
sexuality. Though, for some reason, prostitution still holds the stigma of being filled with drug
use, crime and disease. This is our time to change it. This is the most liberal generation so far.
Prostitution is legalized in many countries in the world. There has been no breakdown of society
in the countries where sex work is legal. There has been no outbreak of sexual transmitted
infections. Instead, there has been a growing industry, a fight for social acceptance, and against
ignorance. Maybe society isnt completely ready yet for a full scale change. However, change
has to come; change will always come eventually. It is time to bring this profession out of the
shadows.

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Works Cited
"100 Countries and Their Prostitution Policies." ProCon.org Headlines. Procon.org, 23 Dec.
2013. Web. 10 Nov. 2014.
Becklund, Laurie. "Prostitution Arrests Cost $2,000 Each, Study Finds." Los Angeles Times. Los
Angeles Times, 10 July 1987. Web. 26 Nov. 2014.
Begum, Sufia, et al. "Sex Workers Talk About Sex Work: Six Contradictory Characteristics Of
Legalized Sex Work In Melbourne, Australia." Culture, Health & Sexuality 15.1 (2013):
85-100. Academic Search Premier. Web. 26 Nov. 2014.
Goldberg, Michelle. "Should Buying Sex be Illegal?." Nation 299.7/8 (2014): 18-25. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 26 Nov. 2014.
Hayes-Smith, Rebecca, and Zahra Shekarkhar. "Why Is Prostitution Criminalized? An
Alternative Viewpoint On The Construction Of Sex Work." Contemporary Justice
Review 13.1 (2010): 43-55. Academic Search Premier. Web. 26 Nov. 2014.
Stanger-Hall, Kathrin F., and David W. Hall. "Abstinence-Only Education And Teen Pregnancy
Rates: Why We Need Comprehensive Sex Education In The U.S." Plos ONE 6.10 (2011):
1-11. Academic Search Premier. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.
Young, Elizabeth. "How the Chaos Theory Relates to Sociology." Sciences 360. Helium, Inc., 31
Mar. 2014. Web. 24 Nov. 2014.