Letters to the Editor
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Magdyln
"Are people who buy cheap clothes made by slave labor guilty of propogating slavery?"
Fuck yes.
Just because its commonplace doesn't make it right.
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Angry Midwest
Loved your comment. Finally, we are asking the root questions.
To the asshat who wants a bibliography every time I make a comment: Google it for yourself. It was a well-known and shocking study that was widely reported and discussed when it came out.
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The dangers of extrapolating from personal experience
There's something else here that's not being discussed--since a majority of men admit that they would rape if they could get away with it, don't you think some men go to these dens and pay these pimps INTENDING to rape these girls--to go in and get their rocks off on their fear, desperation, and pain?
I wouldn't discount it. The men are enjoying themselves not in spite of the squalor of this scenario but BECAUSE of it--it has an allure for them, so asking them to stop is just funny.
Probably most men AND women would rob a bank if they were sure they could get away with it and live a life of ease thereafter. It is human nature. However at some point reality versus fantasy kicks in for most people.
As regards the second question, I suppose it could be true of a small majority of men, but if you read prostitution bulletin boards or blogs you never find this mentioned as a motivation, so surely it is reasonable to assume that the sadists form a tiny minority. Men who want to rape women would not pay to go to a brothel when they can have what they want for free by raping untrafficked women.
I think most men who use prostitutes would find the idea of the woman being coerced very unpleasant, and that it would be a deterrent.
The real problem here in the area of trafficking is that we are dealing with ORGANIZED CRIME, just as in the world of drug trafficking.
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@ Tina
If it's so easy to find, well-known & readily available, you should have no problems pointing us to those studies.
Name-calling. Tsk Tsk, you do have a temper.
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WELL HOW WOULD YOU KNOW?
Really, how would any man know whether or not he was committing rape? He wouldn't. And how does he really know they are not underage?
I like the posters - bring them to America too.
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@tina
Tina, it is a very extreme claim: "a majority of men admit that they would rape if they could get away with it...".
I have googled away for a bit now, and I can't find that study. Silenced may be an asshat, but if you throw an outrageous insult at a whole gender, you probably ought to back it up just a bit.
I myself, as a Y chromosome holder, have never ever wanted to rape anybody, and oddly enough, have never, and have no desire to in the future, patronize a prostitute. And honestly, I don't think many men do. I think there is a relatively small number of pretty active punters, just like there is a very very small number of rapists.
But I could be wrong, men as a group could in fact all be monsters, under the skin. Please prove it though, before you make alarming and hateful accusations.
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Pay to rape
Some people will say anything to justify their access to prostitutes.
For the poster that is happy being prostituted, that's your choice but you aren't helping the majority of prostitutes - most want to be out of the business. You are not, of course, required to care about anyone but yourself. But you are making the world less safe for other prostitutes with your claims that there are no problems with it.
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the study
involved college age men, and was referenced at some point here on Broadsheet, even.
And no--I am not "required" to produce it. I'm not applying for a job or publishing anything. Demanding that I pull it out of my hat is just an underhanded way of derailing the discussion.
C.Bob--I'm not trying to insult the entire gender, just the person trying to create the diversion. And I don't really care if he thinks I've got a temper. I don't think all men are women-hating sadists. But over the years, I have discovered that so many are that it is really, really discouraging and difficult. They don't think they are, but they are. For that matter I have found women to be the same towards men, only in a different way.
Currently I am dating a person who my mother says "just doesn't bring anything to the table"--meaning he isn't extremely rich or conventionally successful; he is, in her parlance, "a loser" (he owns two long-standing businesses but this is not enough for her). She has ordered me--and I do mean ordered--me to drop him. To her, men are only for money. She hates them, hates them, hates them.
Millionaires? I've had two in row. And left two in a row. I didn't marry for money, but if I had, it wouldn't have been worth what I went through.
Men who are extremely jaded about human relationships eventually settle on this cynical view that all women are whores of some variety and they treat them like that. Women who are very cynical look at relationships as a business deal and treat all men accordingly.
This is sad, isn't it?
But dragging prostitution into this arena is beside the point. Prostitution is something specific; it isn't even just "sex for money". To talk about prostitution you have to be willing to acknowledge what it is. And on this thread, Tracy's phrase "wilful blindness" pretty much sums it up. I mean, the British poster is pretty much addressing the lowest rung of the business, the most horrible segment of a horrifying trade (in a country that has taken the mighty, magical step of legalization, no less!). And yet here are people saying that these men aren't willingly hurting these girls. Yeah, right. Of course they are.
Men--lots and lots and lots of men and even probably some of the posters on this thread--do hate women and they do enjoy hurting them (Just because "you" don't doesn't make it not so). And women, because they get hurt, hate men in return. It's nothing exceptional; it's just the sick, evil, bleak way the world is. There is no way to measure the potential depravity of the average, mundane person who thinks he's really a nice guy. We all have our excuses and our ways of being dishonest with ourselves. Look what the Germans allowed to happen in their midst. When we tolerate prostitution, we are tolerating the destruction of the lives of millions of women in our midst.
Let's be honest. It is almost not possible to exaggerate how much men hate and despise women. Women return the favor in spades, thank you very much. We can work on ourselves to stop hurting each other, or not. That's all.
And guys, if you want to stop hurting women, don't pay them for a humiliating five minutes of sex they otherwise would not want with you at all. If you cannot understand how that is stripping a human of their dignity then you're not being honest with yourselves. It's degradation of free choice and dignity whether it takes place in a sordid den or a nice hotel room. It's just what it is. It's not joyful sex; it's an expression of mutual hate and two people cynically using each other at best. That's right, at its very best. Usually, it's just a richer man taking cruel advantage in the most personal way possible of a poorer woman whose choices have been taken away by circumstance. At worst, and I fear much of the time, it's tantamount to rape.
Said my piece. Have at it, nobody ever changes their minds here anyway.