No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority. – Joseph Addison
We’re halfway through the year already! Here’s a new item followed by eight updates and four metaupdates.
Feeding On Their Own
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott (one of the goons behind the toothless threats against Backpage and a major promoter of the “gypsy whores” myth) has accused Google (which gave $11 million to anti-whore groups) of failing to enable Abbot’s snooping. I’m not really concerned with the conflict itself; I’m just glad to see two supporters of trafficking hysteria at each other’s throats. Maybe Abbott will be too busy fighting Google to persecute as many consenting adults as usual, and if this costs Google a lot of money they’ll have less to give to prohibitionists this year. Let’s hope this becomes a trend; perhaps Martha Coakley will sue CNN next.
Updates
Reading Between the Lines (November 11th, 2010)
The last time the FBI diverted federal funds to conduct local prostitution busts under the guise of “fighting sex trafficking” I had a full report to dissect, but this time they’re playing coy; though press releases for “Operation Cross-Country 6” crow about the “rescue” of 79 “children” and the arrest of 104 “pimps”, no mention is made of the hundreds of adult women who were no doubt arrested as well (over 800 of them if the proportions are similar to those of the last raid). As for those “children”: most underage whores are about 17 so the majority of these probably are as well, though we’re only told they were “as young as” 13 (which would be true if only one was). Statistically, 66 of these “child sex slaves” have never even met a pimp, so where did 104 “pimps” come from? The answer is that most of them are probably male or transgender prostitutes, cast as “pimps” to fit the narrative. I’ll write more on this when more complete data becomes available, but in the meantime here’s an analysis of local reports compiled by the ever-thorough Emi Koyama.
Hooters, Japanese Style (December 15th, 2010)
Japanese cops are adopting American-style prudishness and repression:
…police…arrested five employees affiliated with a restaurant chain that features female staff members in revealing clothing. Nikkan Gendai…sees the bust as another example of the demise of another popular form of salaryman entertainment…Attired in bikinis that expose their midriffs, the girls perform dance routines…and shake their hips as they take food orders…“After these girls get off work, they’ll attract stalkers,” says lawyer Toshi Okabayashi…“Since this type of employment could also develop into a hotbed for prostitution, the police cannot overlook these places.” The lawyer adds that these recent arrests are intended to set an example…
I’m not sure why the police should be concerned with “hotbeds of prostitution” when the trade is essentially legal in Japan; that “set an example” bit is chilling.
Check Your Premises (March 10th, 2011)
Another man convicted of “child pornography” for taking photos of a woman with whom he was legally having sex:
…Marshall Hollins had a 17-year-old girlfriend…perfectly legal in Illinois, where the age of consent for sex is 17. Yet because Hollins took pictures…he was convicted of three child pornography offenses and sentenced to eight years in prison…the Illinois Supreme Court rejected Hollins’…arguments…While 17 might be old enough to have sex, the court said, allowing the event to be photographed entails additional risks that arguably require another year’s worth of maturity and wisdom…dissenting Justice Anne M. Burke noted…that…”all five photographs…are extreme closeups of the couples’ genitals,” including neither faces nor “visible identifying marks such as scars or tattoos”…
So in the American mind, the “risk” of creating an unidentifiable “dirty” picture outweighs that of creating a human life.
Surplus Women (September 27th, 2011)
This rather bizarre item from The Sun presents a sympathetic view of an accused serial killer, but dismisses the three Winnipeg sex workers he may have murdered in a single phrase. Well, at least it doesn’t dwell in lurid and loving detail on the women’s profession as an equivalent American article would.
Bell, Hook and Kettle (December 6th, 2011)
Though the Salvation Army claims that whores are all “victims” who need rescue, it apparently feels differently about homosexuals:
…In talking to…Serena Ryan and Pete Dillon on their Salt and Pepper radio show [audio here]…Major Andrew Craibe, a media relations director for one of the [Salvation Army’s] Australian branches, had this exchange with the hosts:
Ryan: According to the Salvation Army, [gay people] deserve death. How do you respond to that, as part of your doctrine?
Craibe: Well, that’s a part of our belief system.
Ryan: So we should die.
Craibe: You know, we have an alignment to the Scriptures, but that’s our belief.The doctrine they’re referring to is…the Salvation Story: Salvationist Handbook of Doctrine, which borrows heavily from Romans 1:18-32…the Salvation Army has officially distanced itself from Craibe’s remarks…
The Course of a Disease (February 16th, 2012)
The Norwegian body politic may yet fight the Swedish cancer into remission:
Norway should rip up a law that criminalizes sex buyers, Oslo’s social affairs chief believes, as a new report shows a marked rise in violence against prostitutes…Anniken Hauglie [said]…”The reality is that the law has made it more difficult for women…It’s our political responsibility to take this feedback seriously”…the Pro Sentret report indicates that the law has…made prostitutes much more susceptible to violence at the hands of their clients as the sex trade moves further underground…Many of the women also said the new law had scared off many of their more reliable customers, while troublesome and violent clients were relatively undeterred…
The fact that the ban hasn’t decreased prostitution may also help: “In 2011, the number of prostitutes…rose by 28 percent compared to the previous year, according to…Pro Sentret, the country’s official help centre for prostitutes…”
…Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, the [French] women’s rights minister…said in an interview that she would be organising a conference of experts on how to contain the sex-trade and human-trafficking… “Since the 19th century and…Josephine Butler, Britain and France have been the core countries in the international mobilisation against prostitution. I really hope that these common roots are still alive”…
I hope so, too; though Josephine Butler was against prostitution personally and promoted the idea of whores as “victims”, she also opposed the idea of using laws to control or “abolish” it.
Yellow Fever (June 18th, 2012)
If you thought 20 clients a night was a bit hard to believe, and 35 a night wholly absurd, how do you feel about 50?
Tamara Vandermoon…ran away when she was 12, the same age she turned her first trick…before she knew it she was prostituting herself up to 50 times a night, the money going to her pimp or to feed [her] drug habit…When it comes to child and adolescent sex-trafficking in the United States, the FBI ranks Minneapolis-St. Paul among the top 13…With its tangle of highways…its year-round sporting events and frequent conventions, millions pass through on any given day…many teens who wind up in the sex trade are runaways targeted by men who coerce or threaten them through physical or psychological abuse…
It would be hard to imagine a more ludicrous collection of myths and fallacies in one short article. Besides the turgid client count there’s the ridiculous belief that a large number of highways constitutes evidence that a city is a “sex trafficking” hub, the myth that sporting events attract whores and the lie that most teen whores are recruited by “pimps”, and that’s just in the first six bite-sized paragraphs (before it descends into badge-licking, “trafficking” platitudes and “end demand” rhetoric). I almost feel I should stand up and applaud.
My Favorite TV Dramas (June 27th, 2012)
William Shatner gets it, even if the former mayor of Ilfracombe doesn’t:
Star Trek actor William Shatner…[appeared on] the BBC show Have I Got News for You…When he mispronounced the town’s name, guest panellist Charlie Brooker said he had made it sound “deeply sexual” and Shatner replied: “The place is laced with prostitution.” [Paul Crabb, Former Mayor of Ilfracombe] emailed Shatner’s agents: “As Captain James T Kirk, Mr Shatner has been to places where no man has gone before, however, [this]…clearly shows he has never been [here]. If he came, we could show him that there is no prostitution in Ilfracombe”…In an email…Shatner replied that prostitution “commonly means sex for something of value…I would be hard pressed to believe that sex was not being had in Ilfracombe for something of value, perhaps a lengthy marriage, children or a valuable career. In any event, my apologies for having singled out Ilfracombe as a potential haven for prostitution…”
N.B: With 10,840 people, Ilfracombe might have as many as 15 whores.
Metaupdates
Counterfeit Comfort in TW3 (#8) (February 26th, 2012)
Louisiana just won’t give up trying to destroy people’s lives:
A new Louisiana law requires sex offenders…to state their criminal status on their Facebook or other social networking page…[it] builds upon existing sex offender registration laws, in which the offender must notify immediate neighbors and a school district of his or her residency near them…The law states that…[a registrant] “shall include in his profile…an indication that he is a sex offender or child predator and shall include notice of the crime for which he was convicted, the jurisdiction of conviction, a description of his physical characteristics… and his residential address”…
In other words, he’s “required” to provide lunatics with detailed instructions to make it easier to murder him. No doubt other states will follow Louisiana’s lead, despite the fact that onerous sex offender notification requirements are known to increase the risk of re-offense by socially isolating the registrant.
Coming and Going in TW3 (#17) (April 28th, 2012)
…A Manhattan judge signed…Anna Gristina’s $250,000 bond package, clearing the way for her to be released with an ankle bracelet…Gristina, 44, is a mother of four who tends to rescued pigs…but prosecutors say she also was the madam of an upscale sex service for 15 years…Gristina has said she was merely starting a matchmaking service, not peddling prostitutes…
Tracy Quan published an interesting article on Gristina’s defense which points out, as I have before, that the line between matchmaking and “pandering” is a purely arbitrary one.
Bad Fantasy, Good Reality in TW3 (#20) (May 19th, 2012)
Dr. Kimberly Hoang was not satisfied with merely publishing the truth about Vietnamese sex workers in her dissertation; she also gave an interview to Vietnamese media:
…Dr Kimberly Kay Hoang…[said] “Most people assume that women engaging in the sex industry do so because they are kidnapped, forced, or coerced into sex work…However, few studies have been able to furnish empirical evidence to support these claims…Legalizing this work would provide women with the same legal rights as other working people”…
What a Week! in TW3 (#22) (June 3rd, 2012)
As part of the process of licensing what will be Australia’s largest brothel, Urbis think tank did a study on the effects of brothels on neighborhoods. Its findings?
There is not a definitive relationship between the opening and expansion of…brothels and any increase in crime.
There is no proven correlation between decreases in property value and the location of sex premises in an area.
There is no evidence that anti-social behaviour in inner city areas can be attributed to the clients or staff of sex premises.
So, sex industry premises, much like other contentious uses such as funeral parlours, can cause a level of discomfort for some members of the community. At the same time, the sex industry has a role to play in the social and economic vibrancy of cities and sex premises are a legal and legitimate land use.
One Year Ago Today
“June Q & A” defines my own terms “archeofeminism” and “neofeminism”, discusses the Indonesian “Obedient Wives Club” and offers assistance to a man who has difficulty achieving orgasm with a partner.
in relation to ”the sun” article,i always found it disgusting that there is a ”jack the ripper”wax figure in madame tussauds chamber of horrors.jack the ripper was not just a psycho looking for easy victims,he commited a hate crime against a very marginilized group of people,as his letters show.yet,he is glorified and people find it amusing to play games based on him.when the same museum decided to display a hitler wax figure,the outrage was enormous.in jack the rippers case there were not enouph protests,not even from feminist groups,who are more occupied with protesting outside strip clubs and burning penthouse magazines.also,about the convicted”child pornographer”,your statutory rape laws always striked me as ridiculous.if a girl is 15 or 16 she can initiate sex with an older guy,perhaps without the man knowing how old she is.the fact is there are many girls this age,who are attracted to older guys in their twenties,i had many friends in high school who had relationships with them.that law is based on misogynistic views that dictates that young women are mindless potential victims that need be chaperoned and the fact that ”feminist” groups and politicians encourage such laws shows how corrupt they are.
I totally agree, and it’s worse than that: statutory rape laws are “strict liability” laws, which means the need to prove mens rea is discarded. Even if the accused can prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that he honestly believed the girl was above the age of consent; even if she had a really good fake ID as Traci Lords did; even if everyone in court agrees she looks like a 24-year-old; even if she seduced him: none of these matter, he will be convicted because the state teaches the absurd mystical, magical belief that she is still a sexless “child” and his having sex with her “ruined” her, something like negligent homicide but with much higher penalties (once again demonstrating the asinine Victorian belief that rape is worse than death). This is not secular law; it is a religious inquisition, in which heretics must be punished by torture and humiliation.
i remember that pornstar case youre talking about.every ”feminist” using her as an example of how how evil and corrupt the porn industry is,taking advantage of an underaged girl,who had been sexually abused in the past and those government procecutors who claimed she was coerced and drugged.of course,it wasnt rocket science to understand that Lords was the one who exploited the accused pornographers.i also remember the underage call girl,Zahlia Dehar,who bacame a model for Karl Lagerferld.some soccer players,including my absolute favourite Frank Ribery are accused of sleeping with her,although both them and the girl herself say that they didnt know she was underage.on a side note,Maggie id like to ask sth that always striked me as strange.there have been cases, where escorts have outed famous men that were clients of theirs.i understand that for a girl like Zahlia who wants to break into the show business,every publicity is good publicity.but then i remember the case where a few escorts,who were employed by Christiano Ronaldo and two of his teammates in ”manchester united” and were asked for top secrecy by them,sold the story to the newspapers.didnt they risk getting fired by the agency,be unable to find clients again and if they wished to do another job in the future be unable to do so,because their names are out there as the whores of a world famous soccer player?
An unethical whore who “outs” her clients is definitely burning her bridges; she’d better be pretty certain of her advance, because she isn’t allowing for any possibility of retreat.
As for the Lords case, most people only heard one side of it. There was more to it than that.
I had a very good fake ID when I was 16. It’s how I got to work serving liquor. The only people who spotted me as under 18 were the strippers who worked in the gentleman’s club, upstairs. It still pisses me off that they were able to.
Everybody took me for “about 25” from the time I was 16 until I was in my early 30s; the first time I was ever carded was after the “crackdowns” on underage drinking started when I was 28.
Maggie,
“statutory rape laws”.
Sigh…I have tried to educate you but you remain quite stubbornly ignorant.
How can “statutory rape laws” be “laws”…is it not obvious, even to you, that “statutory rape laws” must indeed be STATUTES? After all “statutory” implies OF STATUTES.
There is no such thing as “statute laws”…that are only “Statute statutes”. That lawyers call them laws does NOT make them laws any more than calling a politician honest makes him or her honest.
Really. Is there not a single woman on this planet willing to actually learn the difference between statues and LAWS?
You are the smartest female writer I know. How come you can not see through the lie that statutes are laws? It was very easy for me to see through the lie.
No man can make a law that any other man can be subject to without consent because we are BORN EQUAL.
Therefore no GROUP of men can make a law that any other man can be subject to without consent.
There is really only one LAW….that is “do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. That is the basis of all natural law.
For those who can not “get it” you might add
“do not cause injury, harm or loss to others”
“do not use fraud in your contracts”
The reason that “ignorance of the law is no excuse” is because these three things are all you really need to know.
This is hair-splitting. The words “statutes” and “laws” are synonymous in all common use, except in cases where the word has a modifier attached (e.g. “laws of science”). You seem to be trying to draw a distinction between malum prohibitum and malum in se, which is certainly a useful and valid distinction. However, to insist that people are not allowed to use the term “law” to describe an unconstitutional or unjust malum prohibitum statute is just spitting into the wind.
I always find the sovereign citizen stuff fascinating, although I’ve never quite understood how it became the basis of a political movement.
Fascinating like reading up on scientology. The insistence on absurd nitpickery, and the bizarre doublethink that this legal distinction is simultaneously widely unknown, hidden from nearly all except the enlightened few… and yet will actually hold up in court.
I mean, if you want to say the government shouldn’t do X, you don’t need a convoluted legalistic framework to say that. Just say it. But don’t expect them to stop doing X just because you say so.
I think you’re being a bit too hard on Madamme Tussaud.
In the “Chamber of Horrors” – Jack the Ripper is completely appropriate. JTP is two people, laida – the first is the psychotic from history you describe and the second is the sensationalized caricature of him portrayed in fictitious books, movies, and popular culture.
Lizzy Borden is likewise a dualistic figure who’s treated the same as JTR in pop culture. Charles Manson is quickly joining them.
Madamme Toussaud’s exploits aren’t for the weak of heart. She started that collection of wax figures herself during the French Revolution and her wiki states …
There’s no doubt that her early works in wax came from actual castings of people who were executed – many of those castings are still there.
The object of MT’s collection is to terrify – and it does that quite well.
i just really dislike the fact that people who have brought so much suffering upon humans become a subject of play and amusement.
Nothing wrong with this ‘play and amusement’ if it serves to educate us.
“So in the American mind, the “risk” of creating an unidentifiable “dirty” picture outweighs that of creating a human life.”
Hardly the only stupidity in this country when it comes to age limits. At 18 you have the wisdom to join the military and learn to use weaponry that would shock and awe soldiers in Wordl War II, marry without your parents consent, select the leaders of the most powerful nation in the world, in fact make all the decisions about your life, except of course you’re too immature to buy a beer. I don’t care if the age of adulthood is 18 or 21 (I prefer 18), but just pick one and be consistent, and I say that as the father of 23 and 19 year old sons.
You got that wrong – you can join the military at age 17 – SEVENTEEN with your parent’s consent.
I don’t have a problem with the rights of adulthood being gained gradually, at different ages. For instance, you can get a driver’s license at sixteen, join the military with your parents’ permission at seventeen, and join without their permission and vote at eighteen. You’re old enough to run for city council or school board at eighteen, to run for the US House of Representatives at twenty-five, for the US Senate at thirty, and for President of the United States at thirty-five.
I don’t really have a problem with that.
I do, however, think that we’ve made some dumbass choices about what at what age. I mean, if you are “old enough” at sixteen to drive a one thousand pound hunk of metal, plastic, and glass filled with many gallons of highly flammable fuel at sixty miles per hour on a concrete highway full of other people driving explosive half-ton mile-a-minute death machines, how can you NOT be “old enough” to take your OWN BODY out for a spin with one other person on a soft mattress?
If you are old enough to kill and die for your country, how are you not old enough to drink a beer? And if you aren’t old enough to drink a beer for three more years, how to you suddenly go from “too young to handle beer” to “old enough to handle whiskey?”
If we’re going to restrict stuff by age for people who are adults or mostly adults or even just a little bit adults, can we at least try to be a little sensible about it?
Yeah, I did know as my nephew joined the Marines at 17, though he didn’t actually start boot camp until he was 18. I was focusing on all of the things we say 18 year olds can do on their own. Here in Texas a “minor” can drink publicly if it’s purchased by their parent or legal guardian (for a 20 year old, geez) and is consumed in their presence. TABC doesn’t like the law, so they take a strict interpretation of in the parent’s presence. If I buy my 19 year old a beer and then go to the restroom, TABC says he’s no longer in my presence, so that’s a violation. That’s why most bars and restaurants won’t serve any one under age despite the law. They’re too worried about getting violated.
Looking at your old article, I’m struck by the similarities between Archeofeminists and Radical Feminists of the type that believe men are inherently evil. A lot of the more aggressive types do think gender is not a social construction and do hate transexuals because of that.
The views I’ve expressed aren’t a lot of your more interesting articles, which do speak of a dark side to male behavior.
And both believe the government is the primary means of their oppression.
The only difference Archeofeminists seem to believe that femininity gives women the power to be safe from men by being womanly and stuff, while Radicals Feminists just plot to murder all males.
And, I’m just saying that terrorists do seem to get their way more often than whores. That may just be because I’ve read more about terrorists than sex workers.
None of that made ANY sense to me.
The problem is – can you name a single radical feminist who “plots” to murder males? Archeofeminism somehow allows women to be safe from males by being womanly?
I don’t get any of that.
I guess Valerie Solanas would be the classic example, although neofeminism does not encourage individual violence and instead seeks to use proxies against their intended victims.
Yes, agree. Neofeminists do not often dirty their hands; they prefer to use criminal accusations as weapons.
That came out wrong, Sorry.
I was reading the Agent Orange Files, a bunch of stuff from a radical feminist forum.
For a wordpress example try this:
http://bevjoradicallesbian.wordpress.com/
Classic lesbian separatism.
If you want more I could totally track down more radical feminist stuff.
I wrote that post really quickly so I fell back on a lot more hostile language then is usually the case.
the kind of Radical Feminists I was talking about to believe that gender is natural, but masculinity is evil, while femininity is good. So they imagine a world without males would work best and like thinking about that kind of world.
When I said plotting to kill, I really meant more like trying to find ways to oppress men while thinking about how much better life would be if there was no males in it.
To clarify, Maggie seems to be be in agreement with the neofeminist idea that “male behavior is therefore pathological” she just really cool about men being predators because of yin and yang. So she’s kinda of a neofeminist who believes in the “civilizing power of whores”.
It’s a lot like how libertarians and socialists have very similar ideal worlds.
Not remotely. How can male behavior be pathological when it’s natural? The two are antonyms, not synonyms.
I did not know those two words were antonyms, but none of the thesaurus I looked at say that they are direct antonyms either.
You regard male behavior as natural, and think that the negative effects can be moderated with sex work. Neofeminists think it is pathological and should and can be cured. However, the behavior itself is described by both you and neofeminists in terms that are very close to each other.
**krulac shakes head …
She’s never regarded male behavior as “negative” – that’s the key point you’re missing here. Neofeminists are the ones who claim that male behavior is “negative” and undesirable. Maggie recognizes that male behavior is a result of evolution and it’s that very behavior that ensures the survival of the species. Neofeminists don’t like male behavior and see no scientific reason for it to exist – so why not get rid of it?
If I say that Jews are generally frugal with their money and David Duke agrees with me – does that then buy me into the entire universe of antisemitism that David Duke represents? It should not – because I regard frugality as a positive trait.
I need to address something else you keep posting …
First – and I hate to DEFEND Socialists – but what “socialist” nation makes no compromise in it’s ideology? Now, it’s very easy to cherry-pick certain Socialist authors and certainly some activists and say … “See there! He’s an idealist!!” … but can’t you do that with ANY ideology?
The U.S. is a “Capitalist” nation – yet we make many compromises in that ideology – among them a LOT of government regulation in business.
And – what exactly is it about Libertarianism that is idealistic? Yeah, there are some radical Libertarians out there but I can’t name any in the main stream who believe that government should be eliminated. That’s really never been a source of debate – we just want to limit the things that government puts it’s dick skinners into.
There are negative male behaviors, one of her main points is that men need sexual contact to avoid some of these negative male behaviors.
I keep comparing socialism and libertarianism because the two are very similar.
Socialism is just as hostile to government power as libertarianism, because they believe that it is a tool for the elite to control the proletariat.
The utopian societies that the two envision look very similar.
Socialist want to create a worker’s paradise that’s the libertarian paradise but where the employees of a company have controlling interest in that company.
That’s what owning the means of production is. It’s stock options.
She’s never said that. There are men who go through life with no other companionship than Ms. Rosey Palm and her five sisters who have never committed rape or violence of any kind. I don’t think she’s ever denied that Tibetan monks do okay – or Hindu gurus – or even some Catholic Priests. If you want to consider masturbation as sexual contact – well, okay – but then it’s being “modulated” by the individual using the tools he has at hand (no pun intended).
So the instance of rape does go down when men have sexual options to resort to such as whores? Imagine that – I would also suppose that in a world where food is plentiful and available to all – then the instance of stealing food might go down also. I don’t think anyone here would advocate for decriminalization of prostitution if male satisfaction were the only result of it – however, it is also beneficial for the ladies involved.
And what is a “negative trait”? Is the fact that my libido runs at 150 mph negative? Or is the fact that my wife’s libido runs at 20 mph negative? I submit that neither is negative – and they are simply “imbalances”. So prostitution is not “modulating” a negative trait as much as it is “absorbing” an imbalance.
Negative Male traits – well, our self-destructive habits such as my addiction to danger is a “negative” trait – but I’m pretty sexually satisfied at the moment and don’t think any more sex will cure or modulate that.
Maggie has never called the whole of the male species a bunch of rapists. It’s very difficult to be a hard-core neofeminist without viewing all men as rapists – where is the similarity there?
Similar? Okay – if you say so. However, can you tell me of a single Libertarian who uses terms like “proletariat”? At the base of things – Socialism is about forced “socialization” of everything while Libertarianism is about voluntary associations. In a Libertarian society – there would be no punitive tax on success while in Socialist ones there most certainly are. And – incidentally – what Socialists advocate no government? Socialism is all about government. Maybe in some alternate universe – there a socialist system in place where the Bill Gates’ of that world just pony up all their hard earned money to the rest of society voluntarily – but I assure you, in this universe – Socialism requires a government to collect from Bill Gates.
Both libertarianism and Marxism (I won’t say socialism in general) assume that once you get rid of the boogieman, people will just naturally help those in need. You won’t need to tax Bill Gates or anybody else, in Libertaria OR in Marxia, because without oppressive government taxes and regulations/capitalist greed and oppression, Gates and everybody else’s good nature will assure that all are taken care of. Hey, without the boogieman around, people probably won’t even need to be taken care of!
Socialists in general and Marxists in particular say “proletariat” and libertarians say “thugs with guns;” Marxists disparage “the market” while libertarians praise “the Market;” but the two end-utopia do look an awful lot alike.
Libertarianism has been called “the Marxism of the Right.” That it’s been called that doesn’t make it so, but I can understand how the term came to be.
Except that I don’t know any actual libertarians who believe that; libertarians hold that government’s purpose it to keep the strong from preying on the weak, unlike collectivists (of all political types) who believe government is a means by which some group is enabled to impose its own “righteous” will on everyone else.
For some reason soi-disant liberals are so unable to comprehend that a free mind is useless without a free body, they keep applying the label “right” or “conservative” to people who are to their left on many issues of personal autonomy.
Maggie, you are the only libertarian I’ve encountered online like this. Even Penn Gillette, who I was relieved to hear dismiss Market Fundamentalism, then started saying that we don’t need government programs because people are nice.
I feel like I’m talking to Laura about Christian Fundamentalists. As in: maybe you’re the exception. Maybe you’re the one who doesn’t fit in with them. Maybe the group you’re claiming membership with has been overrun with people not like you, and whatever the word used to mean, maybe it doesn’t mean that anymore. Maybe it’s been corrupted.
The only problem with that theory is that it doesn’t describe 75% of the libertarians whose articles I read online.
There’s obviously some split in the libertarian community. I’m encountering one branch, and you’re encountering the other. I run into mine at space advocacy message boards. I had to leave one because we almost never talked about space, only about how taxes are theft and the government in general and Bill Clinton in particular (this was in 2003) are ruining the world.
Now that I’ve looking at basic income and negative income tax and such, I’m running into references to “left libertarianism.” I haven’t met anyone online calling himself a left libertarian, but it sounds like they’d have to be different from the ones I’m used to.
I sometimes remind Laura (not that she really forgets, of course, but she does get heated) that I already know that many Christians, in fact most Christians, in fact many or most Evangelical Christians, are NOT like Fred Phelps or Pat Robertson. But since people like that make the most noise, they are the Christians most of the public knows the most about. So a lot of the general public hears “Christian” and thinks, “Oh yeah, the ‘God hates fags’ and ‘America deserved 9/11’ guys.”
So maybe I’ve only been encountering the Pat Robertsons and the Fred Phelpses of the libertarian world. But Maggie, there are a LOT of them out there, and they are determining what the public thinks of the whole thing. I don’t know what your brand of libertarianism can do about it, other than to denounce it loudly and often.
I suggest you follow the guest bloggers at The Agitator (including myself) for the next few months; it may open your eyes about what real libertarianism is.
I’m not making any promises about months and don’t know that I need to (I granted some time ago that your brand of libertarianism exist), but I will look at it this week. I’ve read something there before (I recognized the kid with the megaphone), so it won’t be my first time. That’s usually nervous, the first time.
BTW, congratulations on becoming a guest blogger there. That I DID read, tonight.
First off – I’ve been to Hooters in a couple of different places in Asia and use of that name is FALSE advertising. They should call them “Perkys” … which is cool in itself cuz I like “perky” girls as much as “hootery” girls.
Maggie,
in case you missed it…the new womens rights minister in france is trying to violate womens rights.
It is like the joke in the english comedy yes minister….always name the department or the job to be the exact opposite of what it is really doing so that you can deny what you are really doing by pointing to the title.
http://www.france24.com/en/20120624-france-women-rights-minister-najat-vallaud-belkacem-ban-prostitution-sex-trade-trafficking?no-cache=1
“In case you missed it…”? Did you read “The Course of a Disease” above?
I once saw a Japanese Cartoon called, “My Fair Masseuse” about a woman who worked in a Soapland. She was a very cheerful and hardworking prostitute, but she had to deal with various dilemma’s during the cartoon. One of these was being stalked by a man who was convinced that she must have been forced into prostitution because her father owed money to the Yakuza (a scenario he invented entirely in his own mind, incidentally) and he was determined to rescue her. In the cartoon he is treated as a somewhat dangerous pest and something of a bumbling Inspector Clouseau type figure (though he is not a cop).
The cartoon was on the side of Moko-chan and her clients, and treated the stalker who wanted to “rescue” her as a deranged joke.
Also police and prosecutors are treated in fairly low regard in Japan compared to the United States, where Martha Coakley’s horrible record as a prosecutor ( “Innocent people are still rotting in prison as a consequence of Coakley’s misuse of her office.” — http://www.counterpunch.org/2010/01/20/coakley-loses-and-a-good-job-too/ ) was considered a good basis for her to run against Scott Brown.
So, this kind of thing is not unknown in Japan. Japan is simply better than the United States and horrible, horrible countries like Sweden, not perfect.
Can you remember the name of the anime? I’d like to see it.
If you can’t remember the name, was it sexually explicit, or more R-rated than X? I could ask on Amazon if I have enough details.
Here it is; might not have made it to DVD though.
Ok, it’s available on DVD in the Best of Kitty Media collection, volume 3, but it appears to be out of print.
I swear when I posted the above link it was just the link not a full Amazon AD, and 19.95 seems exorbitant for an old VHS tape.
Thanks. At least I know what to ask about or keep an eye open for. Maybe I’ll find it for half price somewhere.
>Tamara Vandermoon…ran away when she was 12, the same age she turned her first trick…before she knew it she was prostituting herself up to 50 times a night,
Ok, let’s change a word here…
ran away when she was 12, the same age she became a hairdresser…before she knew it she was giving up to 50 haircuts a day,
Anyone buy that? Anyone do the math and see how absurd this claim is? Or is it that somehow we whores defy time and physics?
The only person who could claim that, or publish that with a straight face, is someone with no idea of how whoring actually works.
And while having sex more than 50 times a day is possible, (I’ve done it, more than once) let me tell you it’s simply not going to happen outside of some specially arranged event. It’s not going to happen during the course of normal business, not even for the street walker with the very best corner. Certainly not any other way. The hooker would some how have to magically teleport between customer locations, or if doing incall, the men would all have to show up on time, dicks out, and no time for meet and greet or clean up.
Even if we consider a “night” as 12 hours, that means 15 minutes per trick, start to finish. And you’d have to somehow manage to book that many customers.
I want to know where she advertised!
Even the whores of WW II era Honolulu brothels only did 100 a day and that was with an entire shipload of horny sailors literally lined up down the street, and allowing only 3 minutes per customer. And I must also point out that few girls could stand more than 6 months of that pace.
3 minutes per customer? What’s the point? I mean for the customers.
I would have given it a try. I was a very durable whore.
But that’s the point. The only way you can do that is to line the guys up, it’s got to be more of a organized logistical thing and it’s not going to be normal business. Anyone writing such a thing, seriously, is poorly informed or delusional.
I wouldn’t even let them get away with “poorly informed”; anyone with third-grade math skills could see the very idea is ludicrous.
It’s like when I bought my first set of dumbbells: they sat on the floor for weeks before I finally said to myself, “Look, BUYING dumbbells won’t give me muscles; USING dumbbells will give me muscles.”
It isn’t enough to HAVE third-grade math skills; the intrepid journalist has to USE those third-grade math skills.
Oh, you and your “math” and your “science.”
Next thing you’ll tell me is that testing witches by throwing them into lakes to see if they drown (and if they don’t drown, then burning them at the stake) is an unfair test!
I’m impressed that you have the stamina to have sex more than 50 times in a day, even if only rarely. You must be very fit.
Once, upon a time I was very fit. Now I’m older, and have some physical issues, and I’m not, and I miss it. People tell me I still have a good body for being over 50.
The amount of stamina required depends on what one is doing. I once did a thing where I gave 52 blowjobs, one after another. That was grueling. My jaw, neck and upper back hurt something awful after. On the other hand, I’ve had vaginal sex more times in a day than that, and was just fine and all good to go after.
You know – the stories you tell are fascinating. When I’m with my “gang” of co-workers and we’re in “hurry up and wait” mode … they always ask me to tell them stories about my life to
I think if you were in our little “gang” – I’d have to shut the hell up and listen to YOUR stories!!
I hope you keep up with the posting here … many moons ago I thought you might be a “poser” and some of your stories weren’t so true. However, you’ve just got way too much minute detail in them to be “made up”.
And, it’s refreshing too – to have another voice added to Maggie’s who’s done all of the things you have and can firmly attest that you did it by choice and are happy with your decisions – because a lot of critics think Maggie is an “anomaly” and not really representative of most sex workers.
So Thanks! 🙂
Well, thanks. Actually, it’s a relief to post here. See, most places in this world, if I posted any of what I’ve seen and done, I’d be considered such a freak. Here, which has a sex workers slant, I’m not.
But really, my stories? I haven’t done anything all that great with my life. I haven’t discovered anything, created any great work of art. I am not as smart and cannot write as well as Maggie.
I’m not feeling sorry for myself, it is what it is. We all can’t be all things.
And yes, I did it by choice, but I may not have had I different choices. Still, of the choices I had, sex work was the best of the lot, and I got very comfortable in that world, and was very sorry to finally have to leave it. It feels like home here. So as long as Maggie puts up with me, I’m going to keep adding my two pence.
I think that being a successful sex worker is like being successful in any other skilled trade, so there’s no reason not to be proud of it. Occupational Therapists don’t create any great works of art as part of their jobs either, but they help a lot of people.
Yes, I’m older nowadays too.
It’s amazing how much money one spends trying to get back to 18, of course when I was 18, all I wanted was the money so I could really enjoy being 18!
RE: My Favorite TV Dramas
Although statistics can certainly be useful for some things, when you’re only dealing with one sample(in this case a single town) they don’t mean much. For example I live in a town with a population of around 23,000 and I’ve been unable to find any whores here, hell I have to go to a much bigger city to find some! So it’s possible that there aren’t any professional whores in the town of Ilfracombe, or there could be a mess of them, who knows?
You’re exactly right; that’s why I said “as many as”. Small towns do indeed have whores, but they tend to be extremely careful (because they have to be). I grew up in a town of about 4000 and everyone knew who the town whore was, but I guarantee you she never advertised or walked the street.
A quick search didn’t find any prostitutes advertising in Ilfracombe. There might be one or two, but I imagine people looking to either buy or sell sexual services take a 40 mile trip to Exeter, where there are several escort agencies and numerous independent escorts. Of course that’s just what’s easily found online, and in my experience that’s often the tip of the iceberg.
I’m surprised to hear that there’s no prostitution at all in a town with more than twice Ilfracombe’s population.
I live in a town of around 25000 people and there’s a small brothel, a massage parlour on the outskirts of town, and around a dozen escorts offering outcalls to the area. Most of them are just advertising in the local free paper, with only a few visible online.
I’ll admit I haven’t done an exhaustive search here. The big city I’m referring to is only about 60 miles away and there are numerous online escorts, a number of agencies, and a number of different online sites to find them. It’s possible to get some escorts to do outcalls here as well. I haven’t really checked out any local papers or ventured into any massage/spa places here to check them out.
So like Maggie pointed out it still possible there are some here but that they don’t advertise online.
When it comes to child and adolescent sex-trafficking in the United States, the FBI ranks Minneapolis-St. Paul among the top 13…With its tangle of highways…its year-round sporting events and frequent conventions, millions pass through on any given day…
Mmmkay. I don’t have any math to back up what I’m about to say, but mere observations from my two years of living in Minneapolis-St. Paul and my frequent visits to the Twin Cities, including one last weekend, one planned for the end of July, and another for Halloween. But basically I have to say an emphatic…
NO. Roving bands of teenagers are highly policed in the Twin Cities. I’ve never seen any in groups smaller than five and they’re usually same-sex, so large bands of girls and large bands of boys. Downtown Minneapolis, they’d been a bit of a plague to the point of Target, TCF Bank, and Macy’s threatening to leave downtown if police didn’t crack down on these teenagers/young adults harassing their employees and customers. These bands are very visible and so I can’t believe that, for the number that the FBI probably wants to claim, that there would be a high enough number of them trafficked to make the Twin Cities #13 as far as trafficking. Their behavior, to me, doesn’t seem as though they are operating under anyone’s yolk, not even their parents’, which can be part of the problem.
I don’t spend a lot of time in “downtown” St. Paul as there is pretty much jack and shit to do there. The other place where tourists and these apparently exploited teens would intersect would be at the Mall of America. Again, NO. MoA is even more strictly policed than downtown Minneapolis, to the point where my best friend (who is older than me by 1.5 years but looks like a teenager at the age of 29 when the following incident occurred) was carded by mall police. You see, anyone under 16, after a certain time of day, can only be in the mall with an adult guardian like a parent or older sibling. We separated while shopping and when we met again for lunch she told me what happened.
In the trafficking narrative, since the most “at risk” younglings are usually poor, in Minneapolis/St. Paul, this would mean most of the trafficked victims would be ethnic minorities. In case you’ve never been to Minnesota, it’s really fucking white there. Anything darker than light beige sticks out like a sore thumb. Again, using the trafficking narrative, most of the “abusers” are white men. These pairings would, again, stick out like a sore thumb even with the rather common sight of interracial pairings. The Twin Cities are extremely segregated with regard to race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status. So when someone who doesn’t “look” like they belong is in the wrong area, again, it sticks out like a sore thumb.
That said, I would not be surprised if quite a few of those teenagers are turning the occasional trick. But a huge number trafficked or pimped in the stereotypical narrative? No. Among the people I know in Minneapolis/St. Paul are bail bondsmen, limo drivers, musicians, and others who live the nightlife in the Twin Cities. I even know one somewhat annoying (but mostly just sad and pathetic) cop. I’ve heard plenty of crazeballs stories but not one jot about trafficking.
While there may well be some of this activity occurring, it is not going to be in the high number quoted by the FBI, especially not for sex trafficking. Domestic work, yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if there are a ton of Edina and Eagan housewives with illegal helpers cleaning their houses, tending their children, and trimming the hedges in their gated communities.
It bothers me that Japan is emulating us in this way. I assume that they’re emulating us; maybe I just don’t want to believe they came up with something this dumb on their own.
I’ve been watching Olympic trials. I think I saw some Nomadic Whores in the background. You could tell because they were dressed alike and sitting together and…
Oh. That’s the gymnast’s family, there to cheer him on? My bad.
Well, the thing is that their moral system isn’t emulating ours. When Japan or Thailand start punishing prostitutes, it’s usually a matter of face saving, particularly in the International Press.
Probably, these types of places were becoming too popular and too profitable. (Or else it could be that the nice local tattooed men weren’t getting the piece of the action they require. If they were getting it, I expect that the police would have been looking elsewhere to make arrests.)
I think that this means that there’s hope.
The best thing to think of is mosaic and black bars. Go back in history a while to “The Dream of the Fishermans Wife”. No mosaic, no black bars. Then you have the American occupation, and mosaic and black bars become de rigeur. This is not because mosaic/black barred films, anime and manga is particularly less pornographic than if that stuff were missing, it’s in place primarily as a face saving measure.
Prostitution is also more complex. For example, a common type of brothel in Japan was originally called a Turkish bath but due to objections from the Turks are now called Soaplands. Prostitution is, again, technically illegal in Japan. So, a you can’t just go to a brothel. You can, however pay a woman for sex in a Soapland (much as you can in Florida body rub places, lingerie modeling shops and some of the looser strip clubs). The main difference, as far as I can tell (my sex tour of Japan is still in the realm of theory, though I did the preliminary research) is that there is just about zero enforcement of these laws in Japan, whereas in Florida you do have to worry about raids, stings and all that other fun stuff that goes along with chasing sexual variety in these United States. (In Florida, of course, much of the government is simply paid to look the other way, which they do most of the time.. until you get a religious type in or someone who wants to run for higher office on “cleaning up the filth.” In some ways it’s not so different than Japan, but the strain of Puritan zealotry is strong enough in the US that you occasionally get serious crackdowns. )
Now, a lot of these East Asian countries where prostitution is illegal are currently under the thumb of the United States, so they have to play nice. If the United States ever loses it’s position as world enforcer of public morals, I expect you’ll see prostitution go back to being legal in a lot of these places.
Yes and no. Prostitution is indeed illegal in Japan thanks to postwar American pressure…but it’s defined specifically as penis-in-vagina for money. Blow jobs, anal, etc for money are all 100% legal.
Thanks for the clarification Maggie, It’s interesting to find out the details, though that would have been much, much more exciting and useful information for me about 15 years ago (I miss being single sometimes, sigh…).
When I was researching it, I was mostly concerned about whether foreigners would be allowed in the Soaplands rather than the status of the laws. (I was thinking about going on a trip over there, but it got derailed because I fell in love.)
I do have good firsthand knowledge of what goes on in Florida, but even my information about here is probably out of date nowadays.
The link to the interview with Dr. Kimberly Hoang is dead. Would you have a copy or cached version? Thank you.
I’m afraid not. I’ve noticed a distressing tendency among smaller news media companies to purge older items from their sites; some do it within months. There’s probably a way to access the cache, but I usually rely on more technically-competent people to do that for me.
Thanks, Maggie. I’ll try to find it. If I do, I’ll send you a copy.