Ever been with, or been, a prostitute?

Which is exactly why I thought it was a stupid question for ILX, b/c enough people are going to be judging each o. based on the responses that you're not likely to get an actual interesting discussion from it.

That makes it sound like he's out molesting 8-year-old girls.

-- libcrypt, Tuesday, September 4, 2007 7:12 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link
yes, exactly, that is what it sounds like!

You can make a reasonable argument that prostitution is wrong, exploitative, and sexist, but it's far more tenuous to attempt to equate molestation with (soliciting) prostitution.

i'm just saying pedos use the same language to justify what they do.

They're on the same waterslide, eh?

"Babies are legal. Fucking is legal. Why isn't fucking babies legal?"

Yeah, bell, but I wd use the exact same language to defend lots of things from people who I think are wrong...? It's not like pedophiles have the market cornered on disagreeing w/ people about their opinions.

Where's nabisco when you need an OTM?

Ie "I don't understand people's hang-ups about shooting guns/swimming in deep water/heights. I've enjoyed shooting/swimming/free-climbing the few times I've done it."

Bill Magill = NS? (hi 1PE!)

Yeah, multiple x-posts, I'm not on that waterslide. I do enjoy sex though. I've bought illegal drugs before too, god forbid.

Sorry I don't meet your standards, bell labs.

I suspect we mostly agree that sex should be safely (for both parties) available for hire, if there's a market for it in the first place?

I just don't know that I agree with that.

see, laurel those things are different, because they don't involve paying someone to have (most likely very exploitative) sex, and therefore don't make me shudder in revulsion.

you're both right, in a way, i think: Laurel in theory and Bell in practice.

Yeah, well, everyone's lines are different -- I've had some one-night stands that I might as well have gotten paid for, altho I didn't. So...I'm not gonna judge on this little data.

I'm still laughing at the concept of the crepe vibrator.

...speaking of very exploitative. xp

yeah, i guess that's where i draw the line. i'm not usually shrill or moral about things, honest.

xp to Dan - It's very thin.

I know! I'm sort of surprised, actually. xp

Well, you're entitled to that opinion. I've done it three times, and twice it was legal in the place I happened to be. If you don't like it, don't do it, but don't judge people who may feel differently.

Have you ever seen the Cathouse series on HBO? Those women aren't being "exploited", they're raking in the dough, and seem to love what they do.

xpost

The thought of sex with a prostitute gives me the willies for personal reasons... I've had perfectly consensual sex with strangers before, and the sex was awful, even though nobody was getting paid and nobody was telling lies. It's a bad feeling. It makes me feel bad, personally. A prostitute would make me feel *horrible*.

Those women aren't being "exploited", they're raking in the dough, and seem to love what they do.

Uh-huh. Just keep telling yourself that, big boy.

Sure, will do.

Empirically speaking, the women featured on "Cathouse" are raking in the dough (presuming that they aren't lying about their take-home cut) and they do give the impression that they are enjoying what they are doing (though they could be lying). The logical fallacy lies in assuming that the Cathouse situation is the norm, not the exception.

My belief is that prostitution ought be legal and that prostitutes ought have rights encoded in law to protect them from at least some forms of exploitation. And I don't deny that prostitution is exploitative, but then, so are most jobs, although perhaps to a lesser degree, depending on yr viewpoint. The best argument I've heard against this is that if prostitution is legal, then for example, welfare-to-work programs would have to count prostitution as an acceptable form of employment transition, coercing women into prostitution who otherwise wouldn't have gone there. While exploitation is bad, it's a fact of life. Coercion, though, shouldn't be.

Speaking for my own preferences, I would never have visited a prostitute, even before I got married, 'cause you can't pay someone to like you.

> you can't pay someone to like you.

Try me.

I think the Cathouse income can be misleading, because I gather that most of those women only work a few weeks out of the year (because banging strange men routinely probably takes a heavy toll) and so the earnings are middle-class, but it's not like the 'courtesans' are all earning six figures.

Yah, it would be less exploitative if it were LEGAL/SAFER, fer chrissake. NB: I said "less", not "not".

the constant "I LOVE SEX, I HAVE AN ORGASM WITH EVERY SHRIMP-DICKED DRUNK JOE WHO COMES IN" refrain is probably the most tiresome part of that show, next to the douchebag owner

Agreed.

Like I said upthread, I don't have too many hang-ups about sex. I never bought into a lot of the puritan bullshit they feed you in this country about sex between consenting adults. And if there's money involved, so be it. Who cares?

you can't pay someone to like you.

Try me

What else comes with this package, Oily?

My belief is that prostitution ought be legal and that prostitutes ought have rights encoded in law to protect them from at least some forms of exploitation. And I don't deny that prostitution is exploitative, but then, so are most jobs, although perhaps to a lesser degree, depending on yr viewpoint. The best argument I've heard against this is that if prostitution is legal, then for example, welfare-to-work programs would have to count prostitution as an acceptable form of employment transition, coercing women into prostitution who otherwise wouldn't have gone there.

Okay that is appallingly stupid reasoning. Legalizing prostitution would open sex workers up to a ream of legal protextions and a slew of legal recourses that they could fall back on if their place of employment broke basic labor laws.

Also, and more importanlty, legalizing prostitution does not magically make all other jobs go away!

"legal protextions" is when you Bluetooth someone a restraining order

I'm not quite sure I can parse that counter-argument, HI DERE. Am I missing some sarcasm?

This is the first I've heard of "Cathouse" but it sure sounds depressing.

Hookers of da future. xxxp

THERE'S SOME HOES
IN THIS HOUSE

THERE'S SOME HOES
IN THIS HOUSE

you can't pay someone to like you

but you can pay some one to put things in your butt.

personally speaking, I'm fairly certain I would feel utterly empty and skeeved out if I were to visit a prostitute. Hell, I felt that way the time I got a lap dance at strip club during a particularly drunken, debauched (for me, anyway) bachelor party. CAn't speak for others though.

I just can't imagine having sex with someone who didn't, on some level, have genuine affection for me.

xpost

Do you think pornography should be illegal? If not, why is it acceptable for someone to paid for a sex act if cameras are present, but illegal in the absence of cameras?

but you can pay some one to put things in your her butt.

*be paid

You can't Pay Someone To Like You
but you can pay some one to put things in your butt.

AMEN

This is the first I've heard of "Cathouse" but it sure sounds depressing.

It is. Partly because it's such half-assed porn. "Let's make a show that's nearly porn, but pretends like it's some deep sociological documentary!" Frustrating and pretentious BOTH.

porn with people who are slightly less attractive than the average Real Sex couple/group/orgy

Agreed.

Like I said upthread, I don't have too many hang-ups about sex. I never bought into a lot of the puritan bullshit they feed you in this country about sex between consenting adults. And if there's money involved, so be it. Who cares?

-- Bill Magill, Tuesday, September 4, 2007 2:37 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

uh

oh never mind i misread that
not quite as bad as i thought

I'm not quite sure I can parse that counter-argument, HI DERE. Am I missing some sarcasm?

1. If prostitution were legal, it would exist in a form different from how it exists today, ergo condemning it as a viable legal work alternative based on how it works as an illegal enterprise is intellectually dishonest.

2. Creating opportunity in sector X does not remove jobs from sector Y. Opening up a paper factory in a town that contains a thriving law practice does not, as a consequence, decrease the number of available law jobs in town. By similar reasoning, legalizing prostitution does not reduce the number of available waitstaff positions in nearby restaurants.

porn with people who are slightly less attractive than the average Real Sex couple/group/orgy

Ugh, this is so true. Ugh.

1. If prostitution were legal, it would exist in a form different from how it exists today, ergo condemning it as a viable legal work alternative based on how it works as an illegal enterprise is intellectually dishonest.

I wasn't actually condemning prostitution as "viable legal work", as you might have observed from the sentence above that argument. I was merely saying it was a good argument, not that it carried the force of science.

2. Creating opportunity in sector X does not remove jobs from sector Y. Opening up a paper factory in a town that contains a thriving law practice does not, as a consequence, decrease the number of available law jobs in town. By similar reasoning, legalizing prostitution does not reduce the number of available waitstaff positions in nearby restaurants.

I'm not sure I said anything at all about removing jobs from sector Y. I don't subscribe to the fixed-employment-resource theory of economics.