This essay first appeared in Cliterati on July 7th; I have modified it slightly for time references and to fit the format of this blog.
As I recently pointed out, people rarely recognize that allowing the rights of one group to be violated opens the door for everyone’s to be; they are wholly oblivious to the power of legal precedents, refuse to recognize that slippery slopes exist, and happily support any abrogation of the rights of people they don’t like, blissfully unaware that the noose they’re gleefully tying will fit their own necks as well as anyone else’s. Individuals of this type are unable to recognize any danger residing comfortably in the Neverland of tomorrow; however, the danger posed to non-sex-working women by anti-prostitution laws is not in the future, but in the present.
The more common and less severe form of the danger lies in the simple fact that there is no such thing as an identifiable “hooker type”; women who will take money for sex are indistinguishable from those who won’t up until the moment the deal is made. So it’s inevitable that aggressive campaigns of persecution against the former will ensnare some of the latter. When prostitution is criminalized to any degree, women who carry condoms, answer personal ads, wear sexy lingerie, go without lingerie, fail forced “virginity tests”, ask a cop if he’s a cop, “act sexy”, go out after dark without a male chaperone, or even just “look like a prostitute” are regularly arrested and charged with having sex for a reason some people don’t like.
And then there’s the less common, but more severe form:
The husband of murdered rape victim Jill Meagher has hit out at the sentence handed down to her killer Adrian Bayley, saying his wife would still be alive if the justice system had taken the serial sex offender off the streets…The 41-year-old, who has a long history of violent attacks on women, was sentenced to life for the murder, and 15 years for what the judge described as “a savage, violent rape of the worst kind”…Tom Meagher [said]…”Given what this man has done in the past, I think that 15 years is a disgrace, considering the maximum penalty for rape is 25…I don’t know what the maximum penalty is for if it’s not for that man?”…In September 2000 he was jailed for…eight years for the rape of five prostitutes over a six-month period. Mr. Meagher says he is concerned the justice system treated the attacks on the sex workers differently than the attack on his wife. “I’m aware his previous victims in previous cases before Jill were sex workers, and I’ll never be convinced that doesn’t have something to do with the lenience of his sentence,” he said. “Put it like this: if he’d raped five people like Jill that many times in that brutal a fashion, I don’t think he would have served eight years in prison…What it says to women is if we don’t like what you do, you won’t get justice…And what it says to people like Bayley is not ‘don’t rape’, but ‘be careful who you rape'”…
All too often, the “justice” system minimizes, ignores or excuses the rape or even murder of sex workers, who are classed as somehow less than other women because some people don’t like the reasons we choose to have sex. Defining some women as “unrapeable” endangers and demeans all women, not merely because it helps to enable the crimes of men like Adrian Bayley, but also because it sets a precedent that a woman’s value as a human being is entirely dependent upon how she chooses to use her genitalia.
I’d wager that increasing numbers of men looking for an unpaid hook up or merely “window shopping” are getting swept up by police sting operations as well.
Or even ones who just happen to be driving by or sitting on their own porches.
But let’s make no mistake—a man falsely arrested for soliciting a prostitute is a victim of injustice, but nowhere near the same type of injustice as a woman raped or murdered by a man who should have been put behind bars were it not for the fact that he had previously targeted prostitutes. How many women might still be living in Long Island if the police had put as much attention to solving the serial murder of sex workers as they do the abduction of children?
I learn something here almost everyday. Today it was the chautauqua movement.
The “stigma” against hookers is an unwritten part of the (current) strategy to police them. Knowing that you can be raped and killed in a violent manner and no one is going to give a fuck about it – is a key component in our attempts to eliminate the behavior.
But it is also the endorsement of TERROR by a “civilized” people.
We also use the strategy on sex offenders – with “registering” them and publishing their names and addresses. We’re expecting the public to pick up some of the “harassment” and “terror” work that the police “legally” aren’t allowed to carry out. Someone victimizes a sex offender – I really doubt that the judge is going to go very harshly on that person – it’s part of the plan – anyone who victimizes a sex offender is actually doing society’s “good work” – the part of it that the justice system cannot legally do.
Now, I don’t agree with the tactic being used against sex offenders – even though I detest legitimate sex offenders – some of whom have victimized kids or women in disgusting ways. It’s much more HONEST to just execute these fools rather than use a campaign of societal terror to harass them for life.
But when the tactic is applied to women … and as you say – there’s no difference (visibly) between a prostitute and a “straight” woman until the actual deal is made … when it’s used against women – it makes my blood boil.
And this all because a woman makes a decision to have “compensated” sex.
My “ATF” closes on her first house today (leaving the “trailer life” – and hopefully forever) – and I am so happy for her! She’s a single mother and last night she emailed me a picture she took at her son’s football game. No one can tell what she does sitting there in the bleachers. Visibly – she is simply a HOT Mom supporting her son – like so many other Moms there.
When I’m at the bar working … I see all the good looking girls there and I wonder how many, and which ones of them live outside the protections of civilized society simply because they choose to have sex for reasons that society frowns upon. What fucking dangerous women they must be – that we should expend so much energy tormenting them.
It’s just wrong.
It’s a form of extra-judicial punishment. It’s kind of along the lines of using an IRS audit to police groups you don’t like. Supposedly and IRS audit is just an information gathering exercise, but the reality is it’s a frightening experience to know that a few honest mistakes in your accounting could land you in jail.
Maggie, your arguments are sound and logical, your conclusions morally just. But I suspect that if we are ever to end the persecution of sex workers, we will have to work on the deeply irrational beliefs that are the real cause of it. I often have suspected that the drive to censor sexual imagery is an unrecognized sexual paraphilia, and I suspect that something equally deep and twisted lies buried beneath the persecution of sex workers … in combination with the usual greed and fear of the “other” that drives much persecution.
It’s worth noting here, if you’ve not already noted it in another post, that National Review published an article
Legalize Prostitution, by Charles C. W. Cooke about the same time as your original article.
Way ahead of you. 😉
Mr. Meagher is absolutely correct. That bastard Bayley should have been serving five consecutive sentences for the rape of the prostitutes in the year 2000–125 years if the maximum sentence had been handed down, and it was the same in 2000 as Mr. Meagher alluded to in the article. Figuring a time served of 42 years (with good behavior) the then 28 year-old Bayley would have been 70 when he got. And no longer a threat to Mrs. Meagher.
My preference for Mr. Bayley’s fate, I borrow from the Sioux: tie him over one end of an occupied badger hole, and light a smoky fire at the other. You can imagine the rest. 😉
No actually, he completely wrong and it’s grossly irresponsible for the media to report his incorrect assertions without putting them in legal context. Firstly, Bayley committed over 20 prior rapes and attempted rapes, five of them were prostitutes, and in that case the sentence was proportionate.
Forget all this bullshit about the judge handing down 125 years because that only happens in America, which has the most draconian CJS in the world. Australia has a first-world CJS in which there are very limited circumstances in which sentences can run concurrently. Bayley was given a non-parole period of eight years for the rapes of the prostitutes which was not unsubstantial because he pleaded guilty (therefore had to be given time off), he was charged with a primary offence of rape and asked for the rest to be taken into account, so they all run currently.
He used the statutory reductions to sentence to his advantage. The parole boards decision may seem stupid in light of his behaviour but the minimum non-parole period was set by the judge and well founded in law. The current 35 year non-parole period is the longest ever given for a single murder (only one other prisoner has the same tariff for a single murder but he committed two attempted murders) and Bayley is appealing the harshness of the sentence. He could quite possibly get it reduced because the average is 25 years and he pleaded guilty.
Islam on Cows, Horses, Camels and Women
One of the few positive developments following the rise of the Islamists during the “Arab Spring” is that today many average and/or nominal Muslims are seeing the true face of Islam and its teachings. And many—as evinced by the June 30 Revolution of Egypt, which saw the ousting of the Muslim Brotherhood—don’t want to deal with it.
For example, during a recent episode of “With Dr. Islam Buhira” on Al Qahira Wa Al Nass TV station, Buhira explained how he had attended “a conference in Morocco on the status of women in society post Arab Spring,” and how at the conference, the following interpretation of the Koran by renowned Islamic exegete, al-Qurtubi (d.1273), was read:
“Women are like cows, horses, and camels, for all are ridden.”
“Women are like cows, horses, and camels, for all are ridden.”
But women can give blowjobs too.
I’m sorry Stefi, you are probably right. I unfortunately wrote that immediately after an argument on Facebook who seems to love to do nothing but attack me and my writing.
But I have had too many friends raped, including my step-brother in prison, that it is very much a hot button issue with me.These jerks who rape women (and men) make me see a deeper red than the color of the shirt I’m wearing today.
My worry is this: is Mr. Bayley going to get out and try again? Or maybe killing Jill brought him a new level of pleasure, and he’ll decide to graduate to serial killer status.
Captain Kirk on Star Trek once said that the difference between the civilized man and the barbarian is that the civilized man wakes up in the morning and says to himself, “I am not going to kill anyone today.”
But my Native American ancestry still feels the badger hole is a good solution.
freegirard
“My worry is this: is Mr. Bayley going to get out and try again? Or maybe killing Jill brought him a new level of pleasure, and he’ll decide to graduate to serial killer status.”
Judging on his previous pattern of behaviour, and assuming he survives gaol, that is exactly what he will do when released in 35 years (or sooner if the non-parole period is reduced). He clearly makes a cost benefit analysis of the crimes he will commit and the gaol time he serves. Hence he makes no attempt to avoid going to gaol, he just confesses and cooperates after he commits his crimes to reduce his time.
My attorney friends here in Colorado call that playing the system. I am generally against the death penalty, because it is overused, and poorly enforced in this country, i.e., there are too many innocents on death row. The only time I even think about supporting it (and I swing back and forth on this) are those who meet the requirements of what I call the Hannibal Lecter test: those people who represent such a danger to society that we cannot risk them getting out of prison even by an act of God, such as an earthquake. Mr. Bayley seems to fit my criteria on that test, and I know where there are a couple of badger holes in use up near a cousin’s house.
He’s manipulating the system to some degree, although I would call it a persistent pattern of offending. Bayley is the sort of sex offender who is likely to apply for chemical castration to obtain early release so he can re-offend.
Like you I’m opposed to the death penalty on the grounds that there are far too many unsafe convictions, not because I have any moral objection to the execution of men like Bayley. That said, I think he should serve 25-30 years and be monitored on release.
The great problem is the cost of monitoring, and that it does not stop him from committing one more heinous act before being re-incarcerated.
Electronic monitoring costs a quarter of what it costs to keep a prisoner in gaol.
I understand and agree. I just do not want him to commit another vile act on some other innocent person in 25 or 35 years.
The UK’s “whole life tariffs” sentences (life without the possibility of parole) were ruled illegal by the ECtHR last month because it constitutes inhuman and degrading treatment. There are also pragmatic reasons against life sentences without the possibility of parole. If a prisoner confesses and pleads guilty it reduces the costs of the criminal investigation and court case, as well as guaranteeing a conviction. If there is no reduction in sentence for doing so, they will take their chances in court and a lot of them will be acquitted.
Also a prisoner isn’t automatically released having served his tariff, he has to satisfy the parole board that he meets conditions to be released on licence. Whereas without the possibility of parole he would have no incentive not to murder and rape in gaol.
The other reason for parole is rehabilitation, gaols are not just supposed to be punitive or a deterrent. Although I very much doubt, going on past record, that Bayley can be rehabilitated. Hopefully he will die before he completes his tariff but if he doesn’t by the time he gets out electronic monitoring will be pretty damn advanced. Hopefully it will limit his opportunities for re-offending.
Yeah, unfortunately, according to statistics, I have a better chance of willing the Powerball jackpot of $142 million tomorrow night, than he has of being rehabilitated. Nothing seems to fix these individuals, their mental wiring is so screwed up. but we can always hope.
Stefi, the USA has “the most draconian CJS in the world”?
There are several thousand Cubans who would vigorously disagree with you, if they were free to speak.
Cuba definitely has a draconian CJS but it doesn’t even come close to the USA.This isn’t a subjective argument; it’s an objective fact. The United States incarcerates more of it population per capita (it has quarter of the world’s prison population) and has more prisoners serving life sentences per capita than any other nation in the world.
The US is also is fifth in the world for the use of the death penalty behind China Iran, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Whereas Cuba has a de facto moratorium on the death penalty and hasn’t executed anyone for 10 years.
So American citizens have more chance of going to gaol, being sentenced to life or than citizens of any other country in the world. They don’t have the highest execution rate but if you add prisoners serving life without parole and death inmates together the US leads is way ahead of any other nation.
By the by- to paraphrase Mikhail Bukhanin: “No one can be free unless everyone is free.”
Hi Maggie,
Why don’t you write about Rape Jihad in Europe! Hundreds of Europeans are being gang raped by Muslims & the “Free Press” is afraid to report it!
What about you?
I’m afraid I know very little about it, and since it doesn’t involve sex workers it’s probably something better left to a European writer with better access to primary materials in several languages.
Yep. I say it all the time: the difference between a “good girl” and a “whore” is simply one of opinion. You excuse or justify violence against sex workers, you’re doing the same for violence against women in general.
Its like men who think that because they’re straight, they’ll never be gay bashes. It’s all just opinion, bucko. Nothing more.
Sex Worker Rights just maybe the biggest equal rights fight ever. Women in the industry have cival rights, too. I hadn’t thought to what extent until you mentioned it. To rob a woman of her freedom of choice is dehumanization in and of itself; a crime against humanity.
But Lorelei, women–let alone sex workers are not guaranteed anything close to equal rights in the United States. My quote from Bukhanin above is true for all of us, and until we get a constitutional guarantee of equal rights for all–regardless of sex, sexual orientation, race, creed, color, economic class, or how we make our living, we will never see true Sex Worker Rights. What I hate about the neofeminists most is that they have dropped any attempt to reintroduce and pass the Equal Rights Amendment in the United States. For this reason, I consider them traitors to their sex.
I agree with you about a constitutional guarantee of equal rights true for all. That may never be. On the bottom of that list is SW’s, unfortunately, many people that fall into each category feel “entitled” to a perfect world. Which, in my opinion, is to say they aren’t true feminists.
No one is entitled to a perfect world–whatever perfect is. Everyone is entitled to a world where–in the words of FDR–they have freedom from fear. Where an African-American doesn’t have to fear a lynch mob, a Jew doesn’t have to fear a concentration camp, a gay man doesn’t have to fear getting beat to death by frat boys, and a professional sex provider doesn’t have to give a free blow job to a cop to avoid being taken to jail.
The intelligent sex workers I know avoid dressing “like hookers” out on the street. Now, this is not to say they don’t carry fetish clothes with them if they are on their way to a booking, but it won’t be their street wear.
The case of Jill is noticeable because she was a popular ABC journalist. There have been numerous rape/murder cases before – the one that sadden me greatly was the Irwin sisters who were raped and murdered by a paroled violent offender who was brought in from interstate and placed next door to them (without their knowledge) by the Victorian Govt led by Steve Bracks. When initially questioned about it he argued that the system was fine – these sort of things just happened. Somehow the sheer horror that two innocent women going about their normal everyday business, and in the sanctity of their own home can be murdered by a thug that their own Govt placed next door to them – did not seem to touch the consciousness of the public or the media. Australia has a very lax attitude towards the rape and murder of its own citizens – esp when they are of a minority ethnicity – check out the cases of Carmen Chan, Dr Cao a Victorian University lecturer and the 2011 abduction of Bung a Thai school girl in Knox.
There are a lot of injustices in the justice system. If I committed a crime, any crime, and told the judge I should go free because “we need to look forward and not backward,” what do you think would happen? I mean, what would happen when the judge was done laughing at me?
Yes, this unequal application of justice does send the message “be careful who you you rape,” just like it sends the messages “be careful who you defraud” and “be careful who you murder.”
Reblogged this on Pycraftsworld’s Weblog.