The people who make profits out of prostitution are really the pimps, traffickers, and other predatory stakeholders, and sadly, the commercial sex trade has devised a great facade that conceals the deeper truth of what it is actually like being in prostitution. So here are some myths about prostitution, debunked, that honestly has changed MY own personal mind about prostitution:
1. MYTH: If you make prostitution illegal it will go underground
This myth is not based on any actual evidence and on the contrary, in Sweden and Norway, where the purchase of sex has been criminalized (but not to ‘sell the use of one’s own body for such services’), the number of men buying sex has declined, hence prostitution as a whole has declined. In 2009, after the law criminalizing the purchase of sex in Norway, the number of prostitution-related advertisement fell by 28%.
2. MYTH: It’s healthier & safer
It’s a common thought that if you legalize prostitution, women will have better health and safer working environments. Plus, it will hep prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS and other STDs as mandatory health checks are implemented, hence the women won’t be afraid to carry condoms, ask police for help, or seek help from health professionals.
But the truth is darker. The decriminalization of prostitution will protect the ‘johns’ more than the women, so that they can keep buying sex without them becoming ill, but does nothing to protect women who might receive life-threatening diseases and psychological traumas from their ‘johns’. For example, under laws the legalize prostitution, health cards are given to women to prove that they’ve been tested and disease free. However, under these laws, the buyers are not required to prove that they’ve been tested and are disease-free. And even when the women are tested, the tests are unreliable and invalid because many tests take days or weeks before the results are out. In that time, the women may see more men who might be infected.
Studies also show that half of all johns request or insist that condoms are not used when they purchase sex. These health checks also do not protect women from Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and studies have shown that 68% of prostitutes will face this trauma.
3. MYTH: Prostitution is a victim-less crime
A recent study surveyed 854 prostituted women in 9 countries. In those 9, 5 of those countries has legalised prostitution. The study concluded that up to 75% of women in prostitution were raped, up to 95% were physically assaulted, and 68% met the criteria for PTSD. 89% of them told researchers that they wanted to escape prostitution.
According to a UK government report, more than half of prostituted women were raped and/or assaulted whilst at least 75% were physically assaulted by their own pimps and johns. A study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology found the death rate of these women to be 200 times higher than that of the general population.
4. MYTH: You cannot conflate sex trafficking with prostitution.
In 2007, the US Department of State reported that sex trafficking would not exist without the demand for commercial sex flourishing around the world, and that prostitution and other related activities encourage the growth of modern-day slavery by providing a pretense in which traffickers can exploit. At places where prostitution is tolerated, there is more demand for human trafficking victims and nearly always an increase in the number of women and children trafficked into sex slavery.
5. MYTH: Prostituted women choose to be there and that choice is an expression of their freedom.
Studies have demonstrated that a majority of prostituted persons enter the sex trade underage, and there for are not capable of making life-altering choices – as per the law. Worldwide, the majority of prostituted women are overwhelmingly suffering from poverty, and urgent financial needs are the most used reason by women in the sex trade – no one chooses to be poor when given other options.
In other countries where women in the sex trade is studied, sexual abuse in childhood prior to entry into prostitution is a highly relevant precondition for entry. Disproportionately, women in prostitution are members of the socially disadvantaged, whether in racial or ethnic groups such as the lower castes in India. No one chooses to be in a disadvantaged racial class.
Moreover, women who give consent to prostitution, rarely, if ever, give informed consent. They would need to be presented with all the available data on the inherent harms of prostitution before they can actually give informed consent or make a ‘choice’.
Header image source from here.
