The easiest explanation for the targeting of sex-workers is that they are soft targets. Nowhere in this rambling diatribe is any better explanation offered.

The author does not define prostitution, which is critical because women accepting material consideration in exchange for agreeing to sex takes many forms and includes marriage. In theory, marriage is quite different in that it involves intimate permanent monogamous relations and no explicit fee-for-service. But in practice, marriage is on a continuum with prostitution, in:
a) that such exchange is by far the overwhelming majority of heterosexual relationships
b) requiring value moving from the man to the woman in consideration of the sexual relationship, and
c) a series of non-monogamous relationships.

In prostitution, time and money are limited; in marriage, they are at large.

The author ends by saying:
“But let's be clear about where the violence of prostitution and the stigma of sex work really come from.”

She doesn’t say where the violence and stigma really comes from but presumably its from all those beastly men.

To the extent that violence does come from men there is no issue that this is and should be condemned. But that doesn’t mean that prostitution in general is on a continuum of violent subordination of women, nor that the stigmatising of it comes solely or mainly from men.

The author’s own identification of prostitution with violence is stigmatising and almost entirely false. This is because there is a clear discontinuum, both in morality and in reality, between violent subordination on the one hand, and all consensual relations on the other. So it is false to identify prostitution in general with violent subordination of women, because most prostitution, like most marriage, does not answer this description. Indeed some men kill their wives, but we don’t therefore say that marriage is on a continuum of violent subordination of women, though perhaps the author does.

(cont.)

But more importantly, marriage in the absence of prostitution would tend to cartelise female sexual services. Before marriage existed, any material consideration that a woman might obtain for agreeing to sex must have been, by definition, without permanent commitment. By exchanging the independence but insecurity of such “prostitution” for the security but dependence of marriage, women obtained both the advantages and disadvantages of marriage. The woman, instead of being a “freelancing” contractor being remunerated for sex on a fee-for-service basis, became a “tenured” employee with a joint share in the man’s income and equity. This moral and economic shift in social mores originated the split in heterosexuality, by which marriage became sanctified, and prostitution vilified.

Against the patriarchal orthodoxy of marriage, the prostitute appears as an outsider, a scab, threatening to undercut the female sexual services cartel. Hence prostitutes are vilified as “cheap”, even though they often earn more – and often much more - for their services than other female workers do. Thus it is by no means solely men who vilify and stigmatise the prostitute; and women’s interest in doing so is in many ways much more significant.

It was interesting that Prince William undertook to share his property jointly with Kate, but she refused to undertake have sex with him if she didn’t feel like it. No doubt women everywhere will regard this as a victory for their sex, but the men might like to consider whether they would be better off enjoying the sexual embrace of many and various women at a fraction of the cost!

I sincerely hope that Peter Hume is not defining marriage as, "...women accepting material consideration in exchange for agreeing to sex..." Our marriage is so much more than that. Heck, I even occasionally agree to sex with my wife - at no cost to her!

Sorry, Peter, but I found you argument(s) very hard to follow and the bits I did follow, seemed unrelated to the article.

I tend not to proffer opinions, despite the name of this forum, but I feel I must this time. I believe there is no place for prostitution in a civilised world. When you think, even a little deeply, about the impact it has on all concerned, it's hard to come up with a good result for anyone. The justifications for its existence, and there are many, fail to prove much to me.

I do not lay blame at any group for its existence, gender based or otherwise, though I would guess that men gain much more "benefit" from the transaction.

It would be a better world without it.

The author clearly has a very low view of the abilities of other women, in this case women working in the sex industry. They obviously are unable to make good choices for their own lives unlike their mostly male customers who we can all expect to be entirely responsible for their choices.

"It has also long been known that that there are few distinguishing "markers" of men who prostitute women for sex."

"The single claim that Jeffreys makes that is accurate in the litany above is that anti-prostitution feminists lobby for the criminalisation of the acts of those she calls "clients"."

From what I've read the customers are a mixed bunch. Some will have plenty of access to sex else where but for some reason still like to pay prostitutes for sex. Others are not meeting their sexual needs and or expectations by more conventional means consentual means.

Whatever the reasons for someone choosing to use a prostitute it remains entirely their fault that the women providing the sexual services for a fee do so. I don't see how that logic holds unless you regard women as inherently less able to make adult decisions for themselves but apparently it does.

So where Helen is the bit where women are able to chose for themsleves, where is the bit where women are as responsible for their own life choices as men.

Why is the male who does not have a sexual partner and who chooses to pay for a second rate version of intimacy because it's better than no intimacy somehow more responsible than the women who realises that she can make a lot of money from providing sexual services? I know that there are plenty of alternatives to that scenario (the dynamics when Hugh Grant was busted looks somewhat different) but the model supported by Helen seems to always make it the mostly males responsibility.

R0bert

Gary Ridgeway doesn’t seem all that normal

“While he was a teenager, he approached a young boy playing alone in a field near his house. He befriended the boy and gained his trust, only to stab him and flee.”

http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/00803/Ridgway_Frameset.htm

When will feminists ever develop anything other than a bigoted, narrow, prejuiced, sexist world view.

The concept that men exploit prostitutes for sex is a narrow view only.

Prostitutes also exploite men for money.

The prostitute attempts to lure the man and make him want to have sex with her, and then she wants money.

Certainly prostitution should be banned, because it makes sex into a commodity, and also trains women to think that men have to pay money for sex.