1

The Problem with Selling Sex

In Pretty Woman, Edward Lewis “pays [Vivian Ward] $3,000 and they fall in love” as

observed by Jonathan Rosenbaum of the Chicago Reader. This modern Cinderella story the life

of a sex worker in California seems almost glamorous, but this is not the reality that many so

called harlots experience because violence and legal abuses run rampant. Prostitution is

considered the world’s oldest profession and both men and women alike participate in this line of

work. Although the western religious influence has changed things, sex working wasn’t always

frowned upon like it is today. In India, women priests would have sex to appease the gods and

western prostitution was started by the catholic church to allow men to have sex without having

to make an honest woman out of her. Furthermore, the first thing up on the topic board is the

attempts to get rid of and conversely permit prostitution. Next up is why it should be legal to sell

sex and why buying sex should be outlawed. Finally, it will be addressed, how this solution will

allow the sex workers to keep their rights as well as prevent violence that comes from a back

alley business. The way to end violence in prostitution is not through the elimination or

legalization, but through criminalizing the purchase of sex, thereby protecting the rights of sex

workers and prevent the business from going underground.

Violence in prostitution cannot end purely through eradication or by becoming legal.

Elimination of prostitution will only drive the sex industry further underground, making violence

more likely. Although prostitution is largely illegal, it flourishes in those countries, like China

and America. Many of the laws prohibiting prostitution only work to control the sex workers

(Brock and Thistlewaite 128). Because the laws which regulate prostitution only control them,

sex workers feel like they have to avoid law enforcement officers. The situation where
 2

prostitutes have to be secretive in their business creates the underground business of the sex

industry. In an underground business, things have to be done in private which means that those

who are suppose to protect people, police officers, have only a small idea of what is actually

happening. Since the police don’t see the full picture of the sex industry, sex workers are

exposed to violence that they aren’t be protected from. Working men and women can be beaten

by those who pick them up or by the person who manages them, their pimp. Similarly in

countries where sex work is against the law, “such as forty-nine of the fifty states in the United

States, women have no protection socially or legally. The situation is messy at best and, at worst,

violent, dangerous, and all but devoid of human rights” (Klinger 16). Sex workers have no rights

in a system where their work is illegal and people think of them as lowly and undeserving of

rights that most would consider natural born rights. Without protection from the legal system and

few people willing to help them, prostitutes find themselves in a situation where they have to

deal with poor working conditions and violence against them. Because of the stigma placed on

sex workers, many women would rather keep their job a secret which allows the sex industry to

thrive as an underground business. If the stigma placed on prostitutes were to go away, more sex

workers would be willing to come forward to the police and try to file charges against their

assailant. On the other hand, as Kimberly Klinger, a PhD student studying gender and sexuality,

observed streetwalkers living in fear of arrest, assault and even sexual abuse from the police

(16). Because of the persistent stigma, often even the police are the attackers that prostitutes have

to face. The end result is a society of people who cannot believe that sex is a saleable commodity

and want to persecute people who treat it as such and a legal system that has taken advantage of

those people as well. While trying to eliminate prostitution is clearly not the answer, the other
 3

possibility, legalization, is just as flawed.

If the practice is made legal, it will only help to perpetuate violence against women by

making things like pimps into legal business men and being attacked as a job hazard, rather than

a crime. For example, because of the restrictions placed on prostitutes, women aren’t allowed to

have friends in the town, talk to certain people and there are restrictions on what time the

prostitutes are allowed to go into town. In Nevada, the clear benefactors of the system are the

men who frequently brothels, the owners of said brothels and the state (Davis 312). Thus

creating a situation where the women are more restrained than ever and cannot control how they

are treated by the system. Once a sex worker no longer has control over her business, she must

put all her trust into another person and this is where the violence can occur. Such is the situation

for women in a private brothel in Taiwan, an investor in the brothel, Yesd, describes how sex

workers who no longer want to work are punished with gang rape to dehumanize and degrade the

women (Peng 17).Women who want to leave the sex industry are horrifically abused by the men

who are in control of them and this causes the violence to be continuously perpetrated against

women who are sex workers. In Boston, an effort was made to keep sex workers clustered into

one area, to make it easier to control and visible to the public, which caused a surge in “[t]he

numbers of street prostitutes... [and] the violent crime in the area." (Davis 312) as well as an

increase in the number of people frequently the area where the sex workers were. Because of the

attempts to make prostitution more controlled and visible, in the end, it only cause more violence

against the working women. Attempts to control the problem only served to worsen it because it

didn’t create a situation where prostitutes would feel safe reporting crimes against them nor one

where pimps and johns were fairly punished for their actions. Overall, neither total elimination
 4

nor decriminalization are the best solutions for the issues faced by sex workers.

Therefore, only buying sex should be illegal. Prostitutes can be protected by the law

rather than persecuted by it when they are allowed to do their job. Because of the nature of a sex

worker’s job, many people feel that it should be illegal due to the immoral nature of it; however,

seventy percent of prostitutes arrested in China said that selling sex was their primary way to

make money (Davis 96). These women have to break the law to be able to make ends meet and

provide for their family. They aren’t able to provide for their family in a way that they

government deems to be acceptable so the women who sell sex must make money through

explicit means. However, this trend doesn’t only exist for women in China because in the United

States, despite only being 10-20% of the prostitutes, streetwalkers are upwards of 85% of the

prostitutes who are arrested (Davis 313). The system targets women who are visibly selling sex

even though there are other illegal things happening behind closed doors. In the United States,

some states allow police officers to arrest working women just because they have contraceptives

on them. However, if they found a man with condoms on him, then they wouldn’t presume that

he was attempting to solicit a sex worker, rather that he is just trying to have safe sex.

Furthermore, Chinese prostitutes primarily solicit sex from tourists, using non-Chinese currency,

which causes confusion for police officers because it becomes harder to distinguish a romantic

relationship from illegally selling sex (Davis 99-100). Because of the system, neither the sex

workers are targeted nor the johns that solicit them. The police aren’t able to enforce any part of

the laws because of this, but they often arrest prostitutes when it is obvious that they are have sex

for money, but not the johns. When selling sex is legalized, a sex worker is allotted more rights

within the system.’

 5

When sex workers are protected by the law, they can feel safe reporting crimes against them. Sex

workers are often harmed by others because of the business they are in and have very few people

willing to advocate for them. However, when a woman is forced into sex work because of

circumstances like poverty, this provides a reasonable justification as to why they do what they

do. Since poverty is the only thing that rationalizes sex work, those who use these excuses are

the only ones who are “eligible” for protection and human rights (Peng 17). The system only

protects women who are coerced into being a prostitute, not those that sell sex willingly. Those

who willingly sell sex as a commodity, an idea that most people aren’t comfortable with, aren’t

able to receive the same protection as a woman who does it unwillingly because those not forced

into it are deserving of what’s come to them, even if it’s assault or other abuses. Currently, even

if a sex worker is raped, the police will usually brush them off, not realizing that in other

professions, it would be criminal assault and robbery (Klinger 16). The police are unwilling

themselves to think of a sex worker as a person simply because of the profession she works in. In

a system where a sex worker is able doing her job legally, a police officer wouldn’t be able to

brush off these criminal offenses so easily. As stated by Aziza Ahmed, an expert in human rights

and a professor at Northeastern University in Boston, “[s]ex workers deserve not only the right to

choose how they make a living, but also the right to be free from the fear, [and] mistreatment”

(74). As it is currently, most sex workers, especially in the United States, are not allowed to have

such freedoms. They cannot work in the profession they wish to and must live in fear of sex

assault, arrest and other abuse from Johns, pimps and police alike. Even if the workers try to

report crimes to the police or other officials, they aren’t taken as seriously as they should be;

someone working in a more “respectable” profession would receive the proper attention from the
 6

police about a crime, but not sex workers like it currently is.

With only the purchase of sex being illegal, johns can be rightfully punished by the law

and the sex industry wouldn’t go underground. While people think that sex workers, because

they create the opportunity, should be punished, it is often the men who initiate sex with

prostitutes. It is the johns who pay sex workers to “to submit to his sexual demands as a

condition of 'employment'" (Jeffreys 260). Yet despite this, most police officers focus the

attention on prostitutes, rather than the johns and as a result of that, citizens mimic the attitudes

of the law enforcers. An unfair balance is created between the number of sex workers arrested

versus the number of johns who are arrested. While one could say that both are deserving of the

punishment, the johns aren’t the ones trying to do a job, but the sex workers are. In a sting

operation in Midtown, Atlanta caused the arrest of 61 prostitutes but only 8 johns (Wenk). With

such an uneven divid of sex workers arrested but so little johns, exemplifies the overall tone of

how prostitution is handled. Sex workers should not be arrested in any greater numbers than

johns because it takes two to tango, and the johns are just as much at fault. However, johns seek

out sex workers for sex because it is in the job description, and the women who go with them so

they can be paid. Because johns deliberately go to sex workers, they are the ones who need to be

punished, not the other way around. According to Sheila Jeffreys, a feminist activist, "Little

literature exists on the motivations of johns compared with that on prostituted women, because

the men's motivation is considered to be self-evident; only the women are seen as acting

unnaturally." (215). Even scholarly writers refuse to see johns as the key players that they are in

the sex industry. The total lack of proper evaluation of johns when it comes to sex working has

caused a misconception that it is the sex workers who do all the soliciting, but this is simply
 7

untrue. If a man did not want to have sex with a prostitute, no one is preventing him from not

doing so. Therefore, it is the men who should be to blame for the solicitation, not the women

because they go with who pays them, but they don’t force anyone to seek them out. When

women are allowed to sell sex, they can feel safer in their practices because they have protection.

When sex workers feel like they can go to police officers for help, the sex industry

would remain within the public eye and would have little need to remain a secret back-alley

business. Furthermore, when prostitution is illegal the business is forced deeper “underground”,

sex worker cannot access social services like welfare (Meg). Regardless of how one is employed,

all people should have access to the same government issued services. Since prostitution is

illegal, sex workers can’t get access to those agencies and therefore, are being treated as second

class citizens. When selling sex is legal, and in the public eye, sex workers can retain their rights

as people and no longer worry about being treated like a lowlier person just because of their

chosen profession. For example, in Sweden, a law was passed in 1999 that made buying sex

illegal but still allowed prostitutes to work legally (“How Europe Deals” Sweden). Sex workers

in Sweden are able to get healthcare, report problems to the police and be treated like humans

with rights. By allowing women to work as they want to, they are freer, able to protect

themselves and less stigmatized. The people of Sweden are better able to address problems that

face sex workers, rather than just a select few who really see the struggles of people in a

secretive business, like how prostitution is dealt with in America. As Peng suggests,“[i]t is only

through this “normalizing sex work” strategy that we can easily dispute the modified whore

stigma that focuses on “voluntary” sex workers” (17). When sex workers can work legally, they

are “normalizing” sex work, thus creating an environment that keeps sex workers in public
 8

knowledge. When the people knowledge that prostitutes exist in their city, they can become

active in helping to solve problems that face sex workers everyday, like getting health care and

assault. Overall, when sex workers’ business is more public, their rights as humans are better

protected and they can receive assistance from the government if they need it.

By making only the act of buying sex illegal, the rights of prostitutes would be protected

and the sex industry wouldn’t be driven underground, thereby preventing violence in the oldest

profession better than elimination or legitimizing it. Sex work is greatly stigmatized, especially

in America, and as such people want to punish sex worker for their crimes. However, all players

in the system are at fault for how sex work is handled; johns beat sex workers and police often

don’t take complaints of rape and battery seriously. Prostitutes are trying to make a living and

are persecuted for doing what in any other profession, would be considered respectable. By

shining light on the way sex work is handled by law enforcement, there’s has been a better

understanding as to why selling sex should be legalized. If the government tell people who sell

sex that what they do is wrong, who’s to say where that stops? The control that the government

has over what practices are legal and what aren’t, particularly those which aren’t harmful,

eventually it could be any job that doesn’t take place at a desk could be illegal. When more

people know about how sex workers are treated and how little harm they do to a community, it

becomes clear that more people should help with activist groups to make sex working a safer

business. However, many people could help put an end to the whore stigma by not using

derogatory words that amplify the stigma sex workers face; words like “whore” or “slut” only

makes the job a sex worker does seem more harmful than it actually is and prevent sex work

from becoming a legitimate line of work.

9
 10

Works Cited

Ahmed, Aziza. "Think Again: Prostitution." ​Foreign Policy​ January-February 2014: 74+.

Questia

School​. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.

Brock, Rita Nakashima, and Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite. ​Casting Stones: Prostitution and

Liberation in Asia and the United States​. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996. ​Questia School​.

Web. 14 Feb. 2014.

Davis, Nanette J., ed. ​Prostitution: An International Handbook on Trends, Problems, and

Policies​. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1993. ​Questia School​. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.

"How Europe Deals with Prostitution." ​Birmingham Evening Mail (England)​ 15 Nov. 2000.

Questia

School​. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.

Jeffreys, Sheila. ​The Idea of Prostitution​. North Melbourne, Vic.: Spinifex, 1997. ​Questia

School​.

Web. 14 Feb. 2014.

Klinger, Kimberly. "Prostitution Humanism and a Woman's Choice. (Perspectives on

Prostitution)." ​The

Humanist​ January-February 2003: 16+. ​Questia School​. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.

Meg. "Sex Work Fact Sheet." Interview. ​SWOP-Chicago​. Sex Worker Outreach Project, 8 Nov.

2013. Web. 13 Mar. 2014.

Peng, Yenwen. ""Of Course They Claim They Were Coerced": On Voluntary Prostitution,

Contingent
 11

Consent, and the Modified Whore Stigma." ​Journal of International Women's Studies​ 7.2

(2005): 17+. ​Questia School​. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.

Wenk, Amy. "Undercover Prostitution Sting Arrests 79, Mostly Hookers and Johns."​Midtown

Patch​.

Patch Media, 16 May 2011. Web. 02 Apr. 2014.