Words that are saturated with lies or atrocity, do not easily resume life. – George Steiner
Busybodies simply adore dysphemisms; they’re one of the moralists’ chief weapons in transforming a fact of life into a “menace”, a statement into a “shocking revelation”, a thing they dislike into something “seedy” or discussion of a taboo subject into a “conspiracy”. The ignorant, naïve or spineless are actually influenced by these words, while the better-informed and more reasonable may simply dismiss them as empty rhetoric. But when one takes the time to actually look, one begins to see that they’re not simply insulting and manipulative, but ludicrous and self-evidently wrong. Here’s an illustrative example on the South Korean sex industry, which is extremely typical for articles of its kind:
South Korea, a wealthy, powerful Asian…technology hub and stalwart U.S. ally, has a deep, dark secret. Prostitution…[flourishes] in South Korea just under the country’s shiny surface. Despite its illegality…the sex trade is so huge that the government once admitted it accounts for as much as 4 percent of…Gross Domestic Product — about the size of the fishing and agriculture industries combined. Indeed, paid sex is available all over South Korea – in coffee shops, motels, hotels, shopping malls, the barber shop, as well as the so-called juicy bars frequented by American soldiers and the red-light districts which operate openly. Internet chat rooms and cell phones have opened up whole new streams of business for ambitious prostitutes and pimps.
The self-contradiction begins from the very first line: If the sex trade is so all-pervasive, how can it also be said to be a “deep, dark secret”? The fact is that it’s not a secret at all, and never has been; it’s just that the phrase “deep, dark secret” is actually code for another, more obviously subjective word: “shameful”. A secret is something which is hidden, which the South Korean sex industry isn’t; “dark” implies something unpleasant or harmful, which almost nobody in South Korea really believes despite the extensive lip service paid to the notion in Korean culture. Prostitution was only criminalized in 1961 (at the urging of the United States, naturally), and police, whores and clients alike virtually ignored the law for more than 40 years, carrying on just as they always had. But American cultural imperialism refused to be denied, and in 2004 harsh new Swedish-flavored laws were implemented in response to US demands that Seoul “do something” about the nearly-nonexistent “problem” of “sex trafficking”. The fixation with the word “pimp” probably dates to this period; I see it used more often in stories about South Korea than in any other articles (discounting pure prohibitionist hatespew).
The…Ministry for Gender Equality estimates that about 500,000 women work in the national sex industry, though, according to the Korean Feminist Association, the actual number may exceed 1 million. This means that 1 out of every 25 women in the country might be selling their bodies for sex — despite the passage of tough anti-sex-trafficking legislation in recent years. (For women between the ages of 15 and 29, up to one-fifth have worked in the sex industry at one time or another, according to estimates)…
The phrase “selling their bodies for sex” is such a clichéd inanity I almost hesitate to call attention to it, but I find it almost incomprehensible that it’s still being passed around. It’s almost as though some people actually believe that after one transaction whores become spiritual beings (after all, when one “sells” something the buyer generally takes it with him when he leaves) who then, presumably, reincarnate like the Dalai Lama and return to the brothel to “sell” their instantly-grown, identical new bodies again. One wonders what happens to all the old bodies, however; I reckon once the men are done with them, they flush them down the loo like unwanted goldfish or “child sex slaves”. For comparison: if it’s true that 4% of South Korean women work in the sex trade, that’s roughly comparable to 19th-century Europe and America, which given the comparable levels of industrialization and similar social hypocrisy about sex is wholly unsurprising.
Indeed, the sex industry…is so open that prostitutes periodically stage public protest demonstrations to express their anger over anti-prostitution laws. Bizarrely, like Tibetan monks protesting China’s brutal rule of their homeland, some Korean prostitutes even set themselves on fire to promote their cause.
A reporter who lives in New York (where prostitutes periodically stage public protest demonstrations despite criminalization) considers it “bizarre” that people strongly resist tyrannical attempts to destroy their businesses and virtually enslave them. I wonder how he would react to the police violently smashing their way into his office, arresting everyone, forcing him into “rehabilitation”, then consigning him to work he hated at 5-10% of his former salary? Besides, since he apparently believes Korean harlots have the power of voluntary metempsychosis, it seems as though he would consider their behaving like Buddhist monks to be entirely predictable.
…According to the government-run Korean Institute of Criminology, one-fifth of men in their 20s buy sex at least four times a month, creating an endless customer base for prostitutes…
One-fifth of American men buy sex “occasionally” (i.e. closer to four times a year rather than a month) and only 6% “frequently”. If the Korean figure is correct, it makes the claim that the sex industry is a “secret” even more absurd.
From here, the article rapidly proceeds into the typical “child sex slavery” garbage, liberally sprinkled with phrases like “descending into the business of sex” and “illicit trade”; young women are intentionally conflated with “children” in the American style, so that the well-known Asian preference for youth is equated with pedophilia. Furthermore, the age of consent in South Korea is 13, while the age of legal majority is 19 by Western reckoning (20 by the Korean calendar). So when “Yun Hee-jun, a Seoul-based anti-sex trafficker, told the Times: ‘On online community websites, you can easily find information about prices for sex with minors and the best places to go’,” he was being extremely duplicitous; up until 2011 it was completely legal for a South Korean man to have sex with a “minor”, presuming she was at least 13 (which as we know, the vast, vast majority are). But beginning with the 2008 “Trafficking in Persons Report”, the US began to pressure the government to “crack down” on what American law defines as “sex trafficking” (whether it actually is or not), and early in 2011 Seoul decided to “out-Herod Herod” by raising the age of consent to that of legal majority…possibly the highest in the world. It is unclear whether the new law applies to all sex, or only that in which the older person is somehow “superior” to the younger (wealthier, in a position of authority, etc); try googling “age of consent South Korea” and you’ll see that nobody in or out of the country is entirely sure. And that makes moralizing about “underage prostitution” disingenuous at best, and at worst flagrantly dishonest.
Moving on, we find author Palash Ghosh either drinking deeply of the Kool-aid or expecting his readers to. He says that “women from…The Philippines, flock to South Korea to work as prostitutes and ‘bar girls’ (lured by the promises of legitimate work as waitresses or entertainers)”; Dr. Rhacel Parrenas demonstrated that parenthetical comment to be an outright lie. We are also told that “The prevalence of prostitution in contemporary South Korea provides an ironic counterpoint to the passionate political activism of elderly Korean women who relentlessly criticize Japan for their servitude as prostitutes and comfort women during Tokyo’s brutal occupation of their country”, but only a moral imbecile could find irony in the idea that people who choose to do something for good pay under pleasant conditions have very different attitudes about it than those who were forced at gunpoint to do it without any pay under horrific conditions.
The fact that Korea has had a thriving and legal sex industry since at least the Middle Ages is pushed down nearly to the bottom of the story, as is the fact that Park Chung-hee “actually encouraged the sex trade in order to generate much-needed revenue…[from] thousands of U.S. troops stationed in the country.” Ghosh then quickly changes the subject to North Korean refugees who work to pay off “people-smugglers”, and refuses to recognize that the poor conditions under which these unfortunates work are made possible by criminalization. He even seems surprised that Korean sex workers have challenged the 2004 law, the injustice and tyranny of which is easily recognized by anyone whose mind is not enveloped in a fog of dysphemisms and burdened by the misapprehension that they represent something even remotely akin to reality.
An extremely interesting article, thank you.
Great article, always spot on with the hypocrisy
It’s not the kind of revenue transfer that turns around economies – but it is organic, and it contributes to lifting the South Korean economy up.
Another thing is … we have an incredible number of young, single military guys stationed overseas in nations like South Korea. Since Sailors and Marines stationed in SK are under the 7th Fleet AOR – they are following highly restrictive rules of conduct which include informing their commanders of every movement they make off post. They are required to follow a buddy rule, which means they have to have a buddy with them all the time off post. This makes interfacing with local women “one on one” virtually impossible. However, it’s easy to take a buddy to a brothel and spend a whole evening.
The military doesn’t want it’s personnel having contact with native “civilians” because there’s been too many problems – too many allegations of attacks and rapes by U.S. military guys. One of the Marine Commander’s on Okinawa (about 20 years ago) had to deal with a rape scandal by some of his Marines. He later lamented … “They should have just gone out and got hookers”. That’s a reasonable statement.
He was fired for making it.
That’s because South Korea( and maybe Japan too, but I’m not sure) are more sane, ethical and humane than the USA concerning prostitution. He should have never been fired. It was the same way for Soldiers and Airmen in South Korea regarding the military people needing a battle buddy to leave installation when I was there.
Maggie
I offer my compliments on a truthful article with attention to facts and detail, well analyzed as well as well written. This is especially true because to the best of my knowledge, you’ve never been there. Everyone should read this article is they want to know more about the real deal concerning prostitution in Korea.
The long disappeared commenter Gorbachev, the ever present commenter Krulac and I have. .You must have done some really good research. I hope my previous comments and others regarding prostitution in Korea helped and hope that they should do so in the future. South Korea struck me as more sane, ethical and humane in how it treated prostitution than the USA, don’t you think?.
Maggie wrote, “but only a moral imbecile could find irony in the idea that people who choose to do something for good pay under pleasant conditions have very different attitudes about it than those who were forced at gunpoint to do it without any pay under horrific conditions.”
Certainly true. Look at the press reaction to the trespass on their phones committed by the “Justice” Dept and then marvel at their clueless ignorance of govt coercion of sex workers or, in their vernacular, dirty whores aka trafficked victims.
I love the fact that the author you quote is surprised that the workers are protesting for their rights; shows how deep the perception of victim-hood runs.
“consigning him to work he hated at 5-10% of his former salary?”
From Bangkok Tattoo, by John Burdett
–quote–
As an experiment the other day, I sent a missionary over to her. (We get them from time to time: white shirt, black tie with tiny knot, the sad courtesy of the professional sin-buster, Bible in quick-release shoulder holster-I’m afraid they all look the same to me, the men and the women.)
Missionary to Su: “Whatever you earn, I’ll pay you the same for cleaning my condominium every morning.”
Su (threatened, conflicted, and distressed): “Couldn’t we just fuck?”
–end quote–
Maggie,
Please understand that it’s not my intention to be rude, but I believe that you misunderstand what neo-feminists mean when they say a whore sells her body. Moreover, I believe it’s important that their meaning is properly understood, because it shows exactly why their position on prostitution is flawed.
When neo-feminists say that a whore sells her body, I don’t believe they’re implying that a spiritual exchange occurred. They also make statements like “In prostitution, men buy women.” Such statements lead me to believe that neo-feminists seriously conceive of prostitution as a temporary slave contract. It would also explain Melissa Farley’s bizarre comparisons between the sex industry and a slave plantation, and with escorts and “house slaves.”
Of course, whores do not enter temporary slave contracts. It would be more correct to say that whores rent out access to their bodies. Looking at prostitution this way, a whore never gives up the right to make decisions about what is to happen to her own body, and her clients have a moral obligation to respect those wishes.
Even though neo-feminists are wrong on this point, I think they have correctly pointed out a prevailing prejudice that legitimizes the worst atrocities against whores. If a person who owns something, then they are allowed to use it however they wish. So if a client owns the body of his whore, then he has a right to use her body in whatever way he wishes. By this logic, a whore can not be raped, battered, or worse.
At the same time, the way neo-feminists conceive of prostitution shows exactly what is wrong with their position. Neo-feminists aren’t saying that prostitution is slavery most of the time. They don’t think there is such a thing as a voluntary prostitute. They are saying that prostitution is necessarily slavery, is necessarily battery, and is necessarily rape. Which is exactly their problem. Their heads are so trapped inside their ideology, they do not realize the obvious: prostitution and (slavery, battery and/or rape) are contingent.
Neofeminists only promote that position in public because they know that their true position – that (female) sex workers are “gender traitors” – is less effective with government and masses.
Whores don’t “rent access to our bodies” either; that would imply we simply lie there. That description would be more accurately applied to the most menial and repetitive kind of factory work; certainly not sex work, which even at the lowest levels uses a great deal of skill and mental interaction. The idea that sex work only uses a woman’s body is the idiocy at the heart of a lot of opposition to it, and deserves to be mercilessly ridiculed as I did in this essay.
This reminds me of the whole “robotic sex worker” obsession, where people occasionally print up the idea that one day soon all the sex workers will be out of a job because men will have sex with robots.
Of course, in order for that to happen the robots would have to be like the Cylons on the new version of Battlestar Galactica, indistinguishable from real, sexy human women in every way.
(As a guy with a BS in computer science, I can tell you the problems of creating robots which pass a Turing Test are non-trivial… Oh, and as an aside Tracy Quan sometimes acts as a control in Turing Tests.)
Perhaps these people just have a higher appreciation of human science than I do, though, rather than what I perceive as a very low opinion of sex workers….
I, for one, welcome our sexy robot overlords.
pws wrote,
“Oh, and as an aside Tracy Quan sometimes acts as a control in Turing Tests.”
That’s almost an LOL. But it’s close enough to a possibility that I have to ask if she really does? You’re not just implying a certain robotic aspect to her interactions?
Oh, it’s true, she even mentions it in her bio here:
http://www.edge.org/memberbio/tracy_quan
Cool!
You’re right, and I think it’s best to call it a service. For sure, “using a woman’s body” is inaccurate as well. However, I don’t think it’s what is at the heart of their position.
In my opinion, it seems more likely that they are using the dysphemism to trick the public in to thinking that whores are somehow slaves who trade away their bodily autonomy. I think that makes more sense because people don’t generally say “he/she is being used” unless there is a connection with exploitation.
The myth they want to prevail is one that says all women involved in prostitution are forced into it. Once in it … they slave away working grueling hours seeing countless numbers of customers per day … and they are beholden to provide sex to any man regardless of his personal hygiene or physical appearance – or regardless of his personal conduct. And of course – they want you to believe that the girls have no other choice but to obey a client’s every command – no matter what it is.
THAT – would be slavery.
In truth – escorts have almost all the control. They set the rates. They do the screening and decide to see whoever they feel comfortable with. They set the physical limits for the sexual activity.
It’s the clients who are more akin to “slaves”. I know for a fact that a lot of escorts use initial contact as a major point in their screening. If you contact an escort with a profane email, text, or phone call – she’ll ignore you or turn you down flat. When I contact one – I have no clue if she’ll see me or not – so I’m as polite as possible (well this is normally me anyway). When I had the first meeting with my ATF – I didn’t know her real name … she, on the other hand – knew my real name and almost everything about me. Later, she shared her real name with me but there are other escorts I’ve seen only a time or two and they never have (yet again – most of them know MY name). Before I meet with a girl – I read her website and reviews so that I know what her limits are. I don’t want to ask for anything during the session that she refuses to provide. Actually – I usually don’t ask for anything because I’m pretty good at reading female body language and can usually tell when then they’re going to have a problem with something before it even happens.
When I walk out of a call … my wallet is A LOT lighter (her purse is heavier).
In fact, I am a big tough guy but I have never felt like I had the upper hand with an escort. With a “free” girl – oh sure – I’m Conan the Barbarian. I can sweep a “free” girl off her feet. My charm and romance will work on her. I can plausibly assume in my head that I’ll be the best lover she’s ever had.
You can’t do those things or assume those things with an escort!
Burdett’s Bangkok novels are highly recommended.
Yeah, I really like them too.
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I sure hope the Koreans figure out what their age of consent is. Not knowing that could be… embarrassing.
Ah yes, the deep dark secret that everybody knows. The universally known deep dark secret. The thing that is done so openly and flagrantly, that’s what the secret is! I’ve seen some really cute Korean women, and that’s no secret.
Yes, the difference between a willing prostitute who’s doing it because she prefers the job over other jobs is a LOT different from a comfort woman, forced into it for no pay. It’s like comparing a bunch of kids “playing army” to actual child soldiers.