Why are feminists so afraid of sex? – Gopinath Arunima
Take a good, hard look at the prohibitionist company the US prefers to keep:
…fundamentalist Islamists, though…shut out of power in countries like Tunisia, Egypt and Morocco, nonetheless manage to promote their…agendas — often taking the law into their own hands, and in this case threatening…prostitutes and their customers and driving away the only industry in [the town of Ain Leuh]. “The economy is in free fall here,” said Ali Adnane…“The girls rented. They had cash. They bought things”…Exactly what happened…is in dispute. [Campaign leader Mohammed] Aberbach says the Islamists never did anything illegal. The campaign, he said, largely involved demonstrations in the main square. No one threatened anybody or used violence or stood at the entrances to the village demanding identification from men who wanted to enter…But others, including Haddou Zaydi, a member of the town council, say all those things, and more, took place. Sometimes, he said, the Islamists used padlocks to imprison the prostitutes in their houses after a customer had gone in. Then, they called the police…Mourad Boufala…said he was not in favor of prostitution…but…was offended by the Islamists’ methods. “The way they did it was really rough,” he said. “They hit girls…scared them…and…offered them no alternatives”…
From the big booming metropolis of Muscatine, Iowa:
Sixteen agencies worked together on a human trafficking and prostitution investigation that led to 27 people being arrested…County Attorney Alan Ostergren said…that agencies across Iowa have participated in these stings lately. He claims that agencies chose Muscatine…because the law enforcement there wanted to investigate the prostitution problem. Investigators took two months to set up the sting…The prostitution charge is an aggravated misdemeanor…[but] Robert Kennedy, 56, of Peoria, Illinois was charged with felony human trafficking…
Even if you believe that prostitution is a “crime” worth persecuting people for, do you really think tying up 16 different organizations for two months – literally thousands of man-hours and many tens of thousands of dollars – is really worth it for 27 misdemeanor arrests, many of which won’t even bring in a fine?
Here’s a short Guardian article on the history of the Contagious Disease Acts, including a rather odd epilogue: Cambridge University continued its own version of the national laws – complete with arrest powers – for ten years after the latter were repealed!
The fact that people think there is something remarkable about this brothel’s location is a sign of the deep Western weirdness about sex:
Two women were arrested on suspicion of prostitution after seven rooms were found in a [Moscow] building close to Sretensky Monastery where sexual services were offered from 1,750 roubles (£35) per hour. Father Tikhon, the abbot of the monastery, is said to be a religious counsellor to Mr Putin…There were conflicting reports over the ownership of the brothel, found in one of a chain of mini-hotels called Podushkin…
Wow, déjà vu! “Two women from the Dominican Republic [said] that…New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez paid them for sex earlier this year…they claimed Menendez agreed to pay them $500…but in the end they each received only $100…” When will reporters learn? A government official paying for sex is not even news; the scandal here is that he cheated two women out of money he agreed to pay.
The Last Thirteen for Fourteen
If you’ve been looking for a meaningful opportunity to speak up for sex worker rights, now’s your chance:
Rhoda Grant MSP believes that “prostitution…is a form of sexual violence against women…[which] is inherently harmful and dehumanizing” and that “the majority of those who are involved in prostitution are unwilling participants.” She is proposing to make it illegal to purchase sex in Scotland…The public consultation on Rhoda Grant’s proposals for a new law to criminalise the purchase of sex is open until 14th December. This is an open consultation – you do not have to be a resident of Scotland or the UK to respond…
That bears repeating: YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE A RESIDENT OF SCOTLAND to reply; responses from sex workers, clients, allies or just those who care about liberty are all welcome. You don’t even need to “out” yourself”:
…the consultation document asks specifically for answers to 8 questions – but you can also just write in with your opinion if you prefer. Your letter will be much more powerful if you can add your own views and experiences, although at Scot-PEP we have prepared some template letters here which you can use as a guideline…or simply print the letters off and sign them. You don’t need to use your real name, for example you can use your work name or an alias to send in your opinion…email your letter to: Rhoda.Grant.msp@scottish.parliament.uk…
Yet another generally-balanced profile of several sex workers, including Audacia Ray of the Red Umbrella Project. Nobody could accuse it of “glamorizing” sex work because it’s a bit too enchanted with the lurid, but it does clearly present the position that “it is patronizing to view all sex workers as victims” and “choosing to become a sex worker is self-determination in its own right.”
Some politicians just can’t resist cutting off their noses to spite their faces:
…Experts from 11 countries [who] have converged on Sydney…expressed dismay at the NSW government’s proposal to remove decriminalisation of sex work…The Sex Worker Outreach Project (SWOP) has apologised to the international visitors, who have come to Australia looking to pick up tips on best practice…
In Taiwan, traditional funeral processions and festivals for the dead include strippers; this is a short trailer for Dancing for the Dead: Funeral Strippers in Taiwan, a documentary made last year by anthropologist Marc L. Moskowitz.
Metaupdates
The Leading Players in the Field, Not in TW3 (#14)
Indian women’s studies professor Gopinath Arunima responds to Gloria Steinem’s April 2nd lecture at Jawaharlal Nehru University:
…witnessing the saviour Gloria [lecturing about]…rescuing hapless victims of ‘prostitution’ trafficked, abject and forever victimized…set me thinking…of what it is about sex work that makes…feminists so deeply uncomfortable…the anti-trafficking lobby maintains that prostitution is violence against women, tantamount to rape and coercion, and requires abolition…in [her] impassioned plea…Ms. Steinem spoke…of her…crusade to rid the world of that heinous crime prostitution, akin to yet far worse than slavery…After all what could be worse than the bodily abuse that is prostitution (“they are inflicted with multiple penetrations, daily”) except possibly only the vicious stranglehold by traffickers…significantly the areas that sex workers identify as most damaging to them like societal opprobrium and police violence did not find any mention in Ms. Steinem’s talk…By compulsorily desexualising the prostitute and rendering her as perpetual victim, the feminist anti-trafficker can then validate her own position as saviour…
Wholesale Hypocrisy in TW3 (#25)
While US courts have repeatedly blocked governmental attempts to interfere with escort advertising, China has no such mechanism in place and Apple was happy to lick its boots for the almighty dollar:
…When a Mandarin speaking Siri first arrived in China this summer, she generally responded to the question “Where can I find hookers” by pointing people to a nearby location — usually a bar or a club…but a customer service rep for the company told China Daily that the company has…cut off Siri’s ability to help people find prostitutes, escorts and brothels…
Legal Is As Legal Does in TW3 (#32)
What’s a politician to do when a court ruling protects the civil rights of someone he’s bigoted against? Make a new law overruling the decision, of course!
Hotel and motel owners across [Queensland] will have the right to evict guests they believe are sex workers under new legislation put forward today by Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie. The amendments to the Anti-Discrimination Act will be debated next year and will likely be passed by the LNP-majority Parliament…Queensland Council for Civil Liberties spokesman Terry O’Gorman slammed the move, saying it…targeted a “particular class of people” and enabled arbitrary discrimination on the grounds of personal prejudice, the likes of which was seen during the 70s when some motel owners refused accommodation to indigenous Australians…
Something Rotten in Sweden in TW3 (#36)
We keep explaining that, despite prohibitionist claims, “end demand” campaigns actually hurt sex workers. However, it usually isn’t quite this direct:
…Illinois prostitution law…is among the harshest in the country…any repeat prostitution misdemeanor is eligible to be upgraded to a felony—one of two states allowing such upgrade after a single charge. On paper, sex workers are still not as likely to face felony charges as their patrons, who can be charged with a felony on their first offense…But…analysis of the…data shows that prostitution-related felonies are being levied almost exclusively against sex workers. During the past four years, they made up 97 percent of the 1,266 prostitution-related felony convictions in Cook County. And the number is growing: Felony convictions among sex workers increased by 68 percent between 2008 and 2011…
Follow Your Bliss
in TW3 (#37)
“…a TSA agent [named Paul Magnuson] has been arrested for the rape of a boy he was mentoring…the TSA attracts pedophiles. Several that we’ve documented. The TSA attracts criminals and those with personality disorders that exaggerate control and sociopathic tendencies…”
The winning bid for Catarina Migliorini’s virginity was $780,000 US, offered by a Japanese man identified only as “Natsu”. However, busybody control freaks just can’t resist trying to interfere with other people’s mutually-agreeable business deals:
Justin Sisely, the director who helped [Migliorini]…may face sex trafficking charges…Brazil’s attorney general, Joao Pedro de Saboia Bandeira de Mello Filho, ordered an “urgent investigation,” to look into the auction, which he equated to “people trafficking”…He also said Migliorini, who currently lives in Australia, should have her passport revoked and she should be returned to Brazil for “the exercise of prostitution”…
Backwards into the Future in TW3 (#41)
Pakachere Institute of Health and Development Communication (PIHDC) will launch a national wide Alliance of sex workers in Malawi on November 7, 2012…[to provide] a platform [for] sex workers [to] discuss issues affecting their…lives…Executive Director Simon Sikwese said the alliance is targeting all sex workers across the country and that it is one of the forums aimed at ensuring that sex workers rights are protected…
Shift in the Wind in TW3 (#43)
The reaction of the world’s most prestigious medical journal, The Lancet, to the UN’s call for decriminalization could be summed up in two words: “We agree”.
…Law can be used to protect and promote the human rights of sex workers…and…Legal empowerment of sex worker communities has been shown to be an effective approach in HIV prevention. However, law is often used to criminalise and penalise sex workers, resulting in their exposure to violence and discrimination from society in general, and law enforcement officers and health-care providers in particular. This situation limits access by sex workers to health and social services they need, and increases the risk of HIV for them and their clients…It is imperative to review and reform the current laws, ensuring that sex workers and sex worker organisations are fully and centrally engaged in improving legal environments to safeguard their human rights.
This Week in 2010 and 2011
Besides my two previous Halloween columns, All Hallows weeks have featured columns on both porn and horror movies, the War of the Worlds panic and another H.G. Wells comparison, deadbeats and death goddesses, Amsterdam, Election Day and Roman prostitutes. They also saw short articles on a Spanish city’s harassment of streetwalkers, Charlie Sheen’s meltdown, the FBI raid on Escorts.com, labioplasty, sexual satisfaction in marriage, a yogurt-tainting creep, “end demand” programs, an app for arrestees, Detroit’s persecution of parties and Florida’s criminalization of questions.
This:
>Brink’s past involvement in the sex industry has held negative consequences, following her in other pursuits. “Everything that’s on the internet stays [there] forever,” she said. “If you really don’t care, and you have no future, and you don’t want to work in an office one day and be some big CEO, then that’s fine.”
Is so sadly true. Even pre-internet stuff has been digitized, I’ve found, to my surprise, and occasional disadvantage.
The bit about strippers, hookers, porn actors and drugs- It’s a very demanding, have to be “on” type career, much like professional sports. If you’re stripping, you might be on your feet, dancing or working the room ten to twelve hours a night. You always have to project charisma, and confidence. That’s difficult to do, and the drugs can help.
This is sooooo great! Thanks for saying it like it is in such accessible ways. This is all such a travesty! Having been a whore from 1973 until 1993 I can tell you its a lot worse for prostitutes today than it was then. Surveillance, prison industrial complex full of whores. I thought by now we’d have decriminalization. But no, its gone backwards. More criminalization than ever. glad you are on the case.
I’m honored to know you’re reading, Annie; thank you so much for the kind words! 🙂
I despise the Swedish model even when it is “used as directed”, but in the US context, “End Demand” is even bigger hypocrisy. For all their rhetoric about prostitutes as victims, not once have they gotten behind any law to lessen the penalty for simply selling sex. In Rhode Island a few years back when legislation to recriminalize prostitution was imminent, Donna Hughes and the rest of the “abolitionist” movement made an active and ultimately successful effort to torpedo a version of the law that they felt had insufficiently stiff penalties for selling sex. And now we see the outcome of the much-touted “end demand” policies in Illinois. These policies fail not only from a sex-worker rights point of view, they fail according to their own stated rhetoric.
Morocco – a couple months back I had an opportunity to “play” with a girl from Morocco. She’s the only Muslim I’ve ever been with – she’s a beautiful girl and very in touch with her native country. We talked a lot about Morocco and US / Moroccan relations. She relayed to me that Moroccans VERY MUCH like Americans and most of them are proud of their association with the US as a major non-NATO ally.
Now, I have been all over the middle east and I am about to go back this month. I’ve been doing this since the War on Terror began. I’ll explain what we’re doing – but it’s not going to make a lot of people here happy who secretly view radical Islam in their hearts as a welcome tool to bring down Christianity and the West …
But here goes …
Radical Islam is on the rise in the middle east. We are attempting to “control” and “manage” it’s rise and spread. The Monarchs and Dictators of the Arab world are working desperately to find a way to hold on. This should not be viewed negatively by us (for the most part) since a lot of these leaders have made positive strides to “moderate” Islam and bring their people through the “Age of Reason”. They can only do so much though. Witness the Shah of Iran – a man I highly respect. He had NO PROBLEM with the Islamists in Iran until he began his “White Revolution” – which empowered women. It was his moderate stance on women and his attempts to get his countryment to view women as human beings that brought about his downfall with the Mullahs and there is no doubt of that.
So it’s a tricky game these guys are playing. There’s NO WAY they’re going to put out the fires of radical Islam – they’re simply “managing” the problem and biding time – and sometimes “biding time” can solve a problem. For instance – it’s now widely believed that, in Iran, the “regime change” clock may run out before the “nuclear” clock – and this would be a welcome development. It’s also part of the reason the U.S. and Israel haven’t struck Iran and their centrafuges.
WE – the US – are also playing this strategic “management” game. The alternatives? Abandon these leaders – such as the King of Morocco – and see their nations fall into the hands of radical Islam. Or we can just go in with US forces and kick the asses of these medieval bastards – which I’m ALL FOR – but I don’t think most of YOU are.
I would be all for us wiping out the nasty states of “radical Islam” if it were as cheap to do as it was in past colonial eras. But it’s not, because weapons technology is no longer confined to a small number of good-guy countries.
So it’s not worth doing. I will be surprised if that changes in my lifetime.
We can disagree on that point but my point is … to Maggie, what else would you have the U.S. do in Morocco? Yes, we’re standing by an ally here who’s allowing radical Islamists to bully prostitutes – but prostitutes aren’t the only people that these radical islamists are bullying.
Sure – we can leave the Moroccan’s to their own devices – but that’s NOT going to improve the lot of the sex workers there, in fact, it will make things much worse for them.
After talking to this Moroccan girl – I really hope that we can help bring Morocco around. I’ve never been there, but it’s on my bucket list of things to do. We have a free trade agreement with them – since 2006 or so and the people there are benefiting from a relationship with us. The radical Islam, where it appears there – is simply a by-product of the “Arab Spring”. I don’t think the majority of Moroccan’s want to go down that radical islamic road – and I don’t think we need to invade the place really. We just need some time with them.
I don’t think the US has the right or need to “do” anything to Morocco or anyone else. The way to help other countries advance in human rights is to present a good example, and we stopped doing that several decades ago.
Agreed. America has never been perfect but it at least used to aspire to respecting human rights. Today it confuses handouts with rights….
Without commenting on the rights or wrongs of US policy just consider the following hypothetical situation:
Tomorrow morning Great Britain and the EU declare that due to his policies, they are solidly in favour of (just as an example – any President from either party would do) Obama remaining the President.
But more than merely verbal support, they announce that they would fund Obama’s election campaign by what ever means necessary (legal and covert) for whatever amount he needed, plus they would run supporting campaigns in all British and EU media channels, as well as apply political pressure on all British and EU allies to back Obama.
Furthermore, they declare that should anyone else win, there would be economic sanctions against the US, and they would provide funding and military hardware to all US enemies, plus they (Britain and the EU) would fund any “freedom fighters” in the US who requested help.
On the US side, Obama publicly thanks Britain and the EU for their support and pledges undying freindship and a continuation of “friendly” policies.
Now, the question is not whether Britain and the EU truly have the power to help or hurt the US, but rather how such a situation would affect US public opinion regarding this hypothetical Obama and his policies. Would it make him more or less popular with the American people?
Remember, it is not about the “real” Obama or his party. It could equally be Romney.
Give that man a cigar. Treating other countries as we do is as paternalistic as treating some people as unable to make proper decisions for themselves, and just as wrong. When it’s done to countries we call it “imperialism” or “colonialism” instead of “paternalism”, but it’s the same thing.
Our screwing around in Iran, propping up the shah, lead directly to the Iran Hostage Crisis, which showed the Islamists that the US could be defied. This, in turn, lead to the popularity of terrorism as a tactic against a country (us) they could never stand up to on any traditional battlefield.
The CIA missed the fall of the Soviet Union, and they missed the Arab Spring. What the hell are we paying these guys for? Well, they are awfully good at overthrowing governments and installing friendly dictators, and we’ve seen where that leads (see above paragraph).
Most libertarians of my acquaintance are basically pacifists, if not outright cowards. However, I’m with you here; the proper response to external threats is to so thoroughly destroy those threats that no one with any sanity would again consider being a threat. What we should have done in Afghanistan was 1) Destroy the Taliban as a governing force (we did that, amazing!) and 2) Leave but warn the Afghanis that if they let the Taliban or anyone like them back in power we’d level the country. But, no, we couldn’t respect the Afghanis enough to let them run their own country; we had to try and do it for them. And we’ve seen just how well that works!
Re: Bob Menendez, some wit asked if he stiffed the prostitutes before or after he voted for the Lilly Ledbetter Law.
I never see this mentioned in discussions about the Swedish model, but how many Swedish men actually jump on the ferry to Latvia to have their “demand” satisfied there?
Or Denmark. It happens quite often, so of course some Swedish neofeminists want to use the law to prosecute Swedish men who buy sex anywhere in the world, assuming they can catch them; it’s already like that in Norway.
Yes, I can see that is something they would want to do, although practically impossible to do. Speaking to Swedish colleagues, not about this subject, they did lament about going from being Vikings to being ruled by neofeminists.
Before I send an e-mail off to Rhoda Grant, I want to test this draft here:
“Dear Ms. Grant:
I sincerely doubt that this letter will change your mind about prostitution, even if you were to receive over ten million. If I were a woman, you would claim that I was in cahoots with or brainwashed by “the human trafficking industry”, regardless of whether I worked as a sex worker or not. Since I am a man, you will dismiss my concerns as the wishes of a selfish pervert or philanderer, even though I have never used the services of a sex worker. But the truth demands to be told, even if you are unwilling to see it.
Nearly eighty years ago, my country abandoned its goal to prohibit the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages. Prohibition was a miserable failure, but in fairness to the advocates of temperance, in theory it should have worked. Anyone who has never touched a drop of alcohol in their lives can walk through a beer or liquor store and feel no innate conmpulsion to drink a single drop. Likewise, anyone who has never taken a recreational drug will feel the need to try cocaine or heroin without someone else’s persuasion. Sex is not like that at all, and to attempt to dissuade man from giving in to his carnal desires is as futile as stopping the River Tay from entering the North Sea.”
[TO BE CONTINUED]
I think that you may have left the word “not” out of this sentence. Otherwise, I just read it poorly, which is certainly possible.
Thank you, Sailor! Corrected this now reads:
“Dear Ms. Grant:
I sincerely doubt that this letter will change your mind about prostitution, even if you were to receive over ten million. If I were a woman, you would claim that I was in cahoots with or brainwashed by “the human trafficking industry”, regardless of whether I worked as a sex worker or not. Since I am a man, you will dismiss my concerns as the wishes of a selfish pervert or philanderer, even though I have never used the services of a sex worker. But the truth demands to be told, even if you are unwilling to see it.
Nearly eighty years ago, my country abandoned its goal to prohibit the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages. Prohibition was a miserable failure, but in fairness to the advocates of temperance, in theory it should have worked. Anyone who has never touched a drop of alcohol in their lives can walk through a beer or liquor store and feel no innate compulsion to drink a single drop. Likewise, anyone who has never taken a recreational drug will not feel the need to try cocaine or heroin without someone else’s persuasion. Sex is not like that at all, and to attempt to dissuade man from giving in to his carnal desires is as futile as stopping the River Tay from entering the North Sea.
The same powerful hormones that drive men to court women and make them their lovers, wives, and the mothers of their children also makes them masturbate to pornography, take mistresses, and hire prostitutes. Like the Tay, it’s possible to channel or divert the male sex drive, but it cannot be suppressed. In 1948, Alfred Kinsey estimated that as many as 69% of men have paid for sex at least once in their lives.”
This is embarrassing, but where on this site does Maggie say that perhaps as many as 67% of men have extramarital sex?
[TO BE CONTINUED]
No problem. Glad I could help.
Check “Handy Figures” in the reference box in the right column.
I re-read the “Handy Figures” column and it gives the Kinsey survey which I quoted. But theoretically, the 69% of men whom Kinsey quoted could have been men who hire a prostitute before they got married and then are perfectly faithful to their wives. I’m looking for the figure that says around 67% of married men engage in extramarital sex at least once. I think I remember in the column where you cite it you say that wives would be better off knowing that if their husbands HAD to cheat, they were seeing a professional whore rather than an amateur who would try to break up their marriage.
If I can find that figure, I can use it in the letter. Thanks!
I can’t remember a specific source for that; it was a very typical figure I heard and read a number of times in the 1980s, before sociologists started artificially massaging the figures to decrease the incidence of male infidelity and increase those of females so they’d be essentially similar, so as to disguise the participation on prostitutes (yes, they misguidedly think lying is OK if it “sends the right message”). The Potterat study talks about the problem at length.
Because there is so much controversy about it, I’d rewrite the sentence to say “many more men than women” or some such (that will appeal to her feminism anyway).
Dear Ms. Grant:
I sincerely doubt that this letter will change your mind about prostitution, even if you were to receive over ten million. If I were a woman, you would claim that I was in cahoots with or brainwashed by “the human trafficking industry”, regardless of whether I worked as a sex worker or not. Since I am a man, you will dismiss my concerns as the wishes of a selfish pervert or philanderer, even though I have never used the services of a sex worker. But the truth demands to be told, even if you are unwilling to see it.
Nearly eighty years ago, my country abandoned its goal to prohibit the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages. Prohibition was a miserable failure, but in fairness to the advocates of temperance, in theory it should have worked. Anyone who has never touched a drop of alcohol in their lives can walk through a beer or liquor store and feel no innate compulsion to drink a single drop. Likewise, anyone who has never taken a recreational drug will not feel the need to try cocaine or heroin without someone else’s persuasion. Sex is not like that at all, and to attempt to dissuade man from giving in to his carnal desires is as futile as stopping the River Tay from entering the North Sea.
The same powerful hormones that drive men to court women and make them their lovers, wives, and the mothers of their children also makes them masturbate to pornography, take mistresses, and hire prostitutes. Like the Tay, it’s possible to channel or divert the male sex drive, but it cannot be suppressed. In 1948, Alfred Kinsey estimated that as many as 69% of men have paid for sex at least once in their lives. Some studies have suggested that as many as two-thirds of men have had extramarital sex. If that seems rather too high, the answer may be that not all of those men are having affairs, but rather brief one-night stands with either “friends with benefits” or prostitutes. These men are trying to satisfy both their sexual needs and urge for variety without leaving their wives. Human beings are not naturally monogamous, and I would recommend reading Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jetha.
What happens if men still feel the driving urge for sex but going to a prostitute is no longer an option? That’s where things get ugly. I mentioned earlier that the male sex drive was responsible for several behaviour patterns that women like yourself may find distateful, but I left one out—rape. Every man who has gone through puberty knows that the notion that rape has nothing to do with rape is pure bollocks. Fortunately, most women do not live in a rape culture, but an ANTI-rape culture. Most men are taught to respect women and if they cannot find an outlet for their sex drive, will either masturbate to pornography or hire a prostitute to avoid the temptation of rape. A survey by the Independent Institute has shown that in EVERY instance where prostitution has been legalized, the incidence of rape has dropped dramatically. Similar studies have shown that rape has gone down when pornography is more readily available. If you are truly concerned about the welfare of Scottish women, you would help make it easier rather than harder for Scotsmen to safely release pent-up sexual tension.
[TO BE CONTINUED]
In this sentence I think you meant to write “…the notion that sex has nothing to do with rape…”
Other than that I think you’re doing fine.
As usual, there is a mix of good news and bad news. Every win for freedom, be it cannabis or gay marriage or whatever, is a win for other freedoms, even those currently unpopular. When the move to decriminalize prostitution is met with the inevitable charge that to do would destroy society, it will be nice to be able to say, “Yeah, yeah, that’s what you said about marijuana.”
OTOH, a defeat for freedom, even small losses, helps none of us.
My computer is in the shop and I’m trying to keep posts brief while using anybody else’s machine.
[…] sex slave rescues” end up with the arrest and conviction of huge numbers of women; for example, 97% of prostitution-related felony convictions in Chicago are of women, and 93% of women arrested in the FBI’s “Innocence Lost” initiatives areconsensual adult […]
[…] I doubt many of those sharing the above infographic without comment (or even worse, with supportive comment) would have done so had they realized that it was naked “end demand” propaganda, a blatant push toward Swedish-style systems that aim to “eliminate prostitution” by eliminating prostitutes through slow starvation. The filth about “victims”, “commodification” and “cultural perceptions” belched forth by Katie Buxbaum would’ve been quite enough, and even the name of Michael Shively would’ve rewarded a quick Google search with the revelation that he makes a very good living producing bogus studies for Swanee Hunt, a morally-warped multi-billionaire with a personal vendetta against whores who actually bankrolls pogroms against us. These “operations” go under the name “National Day of Johns Arrests”, but just because a politician calls something the “Free Kitten Act” doesn’t mean it’s actually devoted to giving out free kittens; in fact, it may be the exact opposite. The center of Hunt’s private anti-sex jihad is Cook County, Illinois, where Chicago is located; its sheriff, Tom Dart, vomits out “end demand” poison every time he opens his filthy mouth on the subject. So one would expect his county to be a model of “john arrests” in order to uphold his advertising and please his obscenely-wealthy patron, wouldn’t one? Well, not quite: […]