Letters to the Editor
PJBabiba
Published Letters: 29 Editor's Choice: 4
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Oh geez, this is not that serious!
[Read the article: The art of the pickup]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I love how this discussion instantly turned into a screaming match, with people hurling terms like "misogynist" and "bitter feminist" at each other.
People, it really isn't that big a deal.
I for one now want to check out The Game and tune in for at least part of the VH1 show. Heck, the show always sounds way more entertaining than most of what VH1 and MTV has nowadays. I'd take it any day over Flava Flav.
Repeat after me: It's all a game.
I'm a woman. When I go to a bar or nightclub, I go with the knowledge that some men are going to want to talk to me and buy me drinks to try to get me in bed. It's not a mystery!
What's fun is seeing what methods they deploy. Drinks are standard. Compliments are always there. Every now and then, some guy will throw out something more interesting. One of my friends was offered a trip to Bermuda (yeah right).
But my point is, it's all harmless fun. No one goes to a nightclub or a bar with the pretext of finding "the one." Manipulation is all part of the dance of seduction. It is, frankly, part of the fun!
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Sex is not widgets, but neither is many other professions
[Read the article: The economics of prostitution]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The anonymous commenter two posts before this wrote: "Providing sex (whether male or female) is not selling an object distinct from yourself. it is not selling widgets or donuts or bonds or handicrafts."
I don't see how that makes prostitution different from many other professions: acting, dancing, singing, modelling, playing an instrument. I can even argue that most professions entail selling yourself -- whether it's your writing skills, engineering skills, medical skills, etc. Most professions are not widgets. Saying we need to protect people from harming their physical and sexual selves in prostitution is as ridiculous as saying we need to protect people from harming their creative and physical selves because sex is a creative act, literally and otherwise. It's like saying, Don't put on those ballet shoes, sweetie! We know you like to dance, but we don't want to harm those virginal feet, do we?
And the other hole in your argument is that given a choice, most women would opt out of being pros. I'm sure that's the case in the current environment, in which illegal prostitution makes it dangerous for the women. The study said they on average are assaulted once a month. I'm sure if the profession was regulated that that wouldn't be the case.
Furthermore, I can also imagine that some people are naturally good at sex and should be able to legally exploit this talent. Many people often shrink from imagining prostitution as a profession because of this knee-jerk reaction that sex between strangers, in a monetary transaction, with no love or affection involved -- is repugnant.
I don't think that's the case. And I think that the fact this society still can't embrace prostitution as a legal profession is a sign much of it is still based in some part on ingrained misogyny and a willful, puritanical ignorance when it comes to sex and what it's really about.
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The other side of the coin...
[Read the article: The economics of prostitution]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]@Leeandra: Yes, and with ballet -- you're using a part of your body that God or evolution gave you to walk and dance with. What's your point?
People keep elevating sex to this sacred thing that should not be subjected to the same kind of work and thought that we've given to every other part of our lives. Duh, it's used for reproduction, but it's also a creative (in the artistic sense) and a recreational act.
-- I notice that all the harms of prostitution cited by tina and others have been gleaned from a. ILLEGAL prostitution, in which clients aren't screened and the women or men in the trade aren't given routine medical examinations or b. legal prostitution that's exploited by a poor country to draw in tourists. The same country also lacks the resources or doesn't care to protect its people.
I also find it odd that people on this board apparently haven't thought or didn't want to mention that, ya know, some women like to pay for sex too. And just because some people might find it convenient or desirable to pay for sex doesn't make them morally depraved. What people here are actually denouncing is violence. And repeat after me: Prostitution DOES NOT EQUAL violence.
Lastly. I'm not familiar with the situation in those countries where it's legal already. But, so the pros in the Netherlands might be lower-income and not the average middle-class Dutch girl? Um, so what? Why should they be looked down upon for providing such a service when they're probably earning more money that way than as waitresses?
The sexual double standard doesn't just come from men. It's apparently from women on this board as well.
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Oh geez...
[Read the article: The economics of prostitution]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]@Tina: So you think it's okay to take advantage of a woman's desperation to level your own sexual playing field.
-- You keep assuming that women have to be desperate to go pro. It isn't always like that, and some women would willingly do it if it were legalized because they enjoy seduction, experiencing different partners, perhaps being wined and dined if you're an escort and being able to leave without much emotional baggage.
In fact, many women are already willingly going into the porn industry.