Mark Bennett is a criminal defense lawyer in Houston who, as he says in the text below, is unafraid to defend sex workers. I first linked his blog just over a year ago in “The Truth About ‘The Truth About…’“, then more recently in “The Spiral of Absurdity“. But in December he wrote a series of “tweets” which impressed me so much, I asked him to turn them into a guest post; this column is the result.
An adult’s body belongs fully to that adult. It does not belong to his parents, to her husband, or to the government. If something—including your body—belongs to you, you can do what you want with it, as long as what you do doesn’t hurt (or create an unjustifiable risk of hurting) other people. If you cannot do what you want with it (without interfering with others’ rights), a thing does not belong to you. You have at best a limited license.
It is true that the law and society treat us as having a limited license to our bodies. In most American states you can’t legally smoke marijuana, you can’t hire someone to help you end your own life, and you can’t have sex with someone for money. It has not always been the case that a woman’s body belongs to her, even aside from the claims upon it by government; historically, women’s bodies have effectively belonged to their male kin, who were honor-bound to protect their purity until they married, and to their husbands thereafter. There are still segments of society in which this is the case. Witness, for example, “purity balls” at which adolescent girls pledge that they will preserve their virginity until married and fathers pledge that they will protect their daughters’ purity. I do not claim to be a feminist, yet it strikes me as creepy that a father should take such a proprietary interest in what his grown daughter does with her vagina.
To the avowed feminist, the claim of male ownership (transferred from the father to the husband, with no intermediate ownership) of female sexuality must be the height of patriarchy. Yet there’s a wide gap between rejection of male ownership of female sexuality, and acceptance that everyone’s own sexuality belongs to him or her, to do with what he or she will as long as it doesn’t hurt (or create an unjustifiable risk of hurting) other people. This gap is illustrated by the feminist position (not universal, but much broader than just the PIV-is-rape crowd) that sex work should be criminalized. Sex work is the explicit exchange of sexual services for value (as opposed to the implicit exchange of sexual services for value, which we just call “sex”). Criminalization is the use of violence (including the threat of violence) to compel people to refrain from doing something. This is what libertarians call “the gun in the room”: without violence, government would be powerless to compel anything, so those who support criminalization are using violence (through proxies) to force women not to engage in explicit sexual commerce. The argument against decriminalizing sex work depends on people possessing a thing that they cannot be permitted to sell. But if a person possesses something that she could not (assuming a willing buyer) sell, she doesn’t own it. By criminalizing sex work we teach people that their sexuality is not their own, but subject to society’s—government’s—license. If male ownership of women’s sexuality was bad, government (male-created and mostly male-run) ownership of women’s sexuality is worse.
I write as a criminal-defense lawyer who represents sex workers, as a libertarian, and most importantly as the father of a girl. “Would you have sex for money, Mark? Would you be happy about it if your daughter chose to?” I reckon not. But each of us experiences life’s many facets differently; I know women who derive satisfaction from sex work, and I’m not prepared to force my own tastes on other people at gunpoint. Outlawing sex work makes women’s sexuality (most sex workers are women) the property of the community. There would be a certain internal logic in this if you were a PIV-is-always-rape feminist: you would see in the sex worker a woman who thinks she is honestly exchanging sexual services for money, but who a) suffers from false consciousness; and b) is harming your cause by promoting a culture of penetrative sex, and therefore rape. (You would also have written off this post, on seeing my name, as mansplaining.) By the same token, if you were a religious fundamentalist you might think that sex workers were calling the judgment of God down upon society, and feel that using violence to stop sex work was justified to prevent a greater harm.
But I suspect that most people fall somewhere between these two extremes. If they view sex work as harmful, most people see it as harmful to the sex workers, harmful to individual relationships, or a symptom of a more severe disease. When sex work is harmful to sex workers, the harm is often due to criminalization, which drives the criminalized behavior underground, where it’s easier for violent people (including police) to harm those engaging in it. Even absent criminalization, sex workers would sometimes put themselves into danger, but the risk of harm to sex workers cannot justify using violence to stop them. When sex work is harmful to individual relationships, that’s the fault of the people in the relationships, and not of sex work; using violence to stop sex work because some relationships are troubled is an irrational overreaction. And though I do think that society is sick, sex work (which has always existed in all societies) is not a symptom. Even if sex work were a symptom of a societal disease, applying violence to sex workers would not cure it; on the contrary, it would just drive the symptom underground.
I think that most people have a visceral moral reaction against sex work, which they rationalize and don’t worry about a lot about because they don’t consider the downside of criminalization. I’d like to ask those people: could we try treating a woman’s sexuality as her own property, to keep, give, rent, or sell as she will? Let’s try, just for a generation or two, teaching our daughters that they are sovereign over their own bodies.
I think that the reason that sex work drives elements of both Left and Right crazy is that it is the intersection of personal freedom with economic freedom; the Right opposes the first and the Left opposes the second – often in terms reminiscent of the false consciousness of the PIV rad-fems.
Thus, support for sexual commerce is an excellent litmus test for one’s belief in liberty; one that majorities of both Left and Right fail abysmally.
The statist variants of both left and right oppose those, anyway.
Mark hit the nail on the head with: If you cannot do what you want with it (without interfering with others’ rights), a thing does not belong to you.
I’ve been saying for years that the extent that a third party (be it the government or some individual) determines what you can do with your property equals the extent to which that third party is claiming to own your property (which includes your body and your life). The most eloquent explanation I’ve seen of this is here: http://www.jonathangullible.com/mmedia/PhilosophyOfLiberty-english_music.swf
Look at the “Resources” box in the right-hand column. 😉
Freedom requires that we distinguish between adults and children. Parents are required to supervise children because otherwise the consequences of sexual activity fall squarely on the taxpayer. And the psychological damage to the child has created this Group Think that passes for culture in this country.
Mark comments above on the explicit cost of sex (prostitution) versus the implicit cost imposed by normal women. That’s an adult perspective. Children don’t get that when sex is free, reproduction is worthless. There’s plenty more sperm where that came from. The girls and the taxpayer pay the price of free sex.
Birth control, because it was seized by children, detached the price of sex from the cost of reproduction. Only whores can take sex back and restore the rationale for male development. Family formation requires the passage from child to adult. Expensive sex, whether implicit or explicit, gets the boy across that bridge to own his own needs, and pay accordingly.
You may know that there’s been some interesting research (the Rind Report) suppressed on the psychological damage caused to children by sex.
I’m not sure I completely understand your second and third paragraphs, but I think you’re making a compelling argument against freebies.
I just so happen to have a copy of that study handy.
I say thank God for freebies. Without them the poor would be even more sexually frustrated. There should be sexual options for ALL (except real rapists and pedophiles) and no one way of getting sex should be pushed as the only good option, including freebies. People shouldn’t be put into safe little category boxes in the sexual area.
I’m a person that’s given sex away for years and haven’t once missed a birth control pill. People who give sex away for free can be completely honest also about how they do things, etc., up front. I’ve done it for years. There’s never been any “costs” that came up later that were a surprise to anyone. Everything was decided on up front. Hopefully you’ll admit that there’s single mothers who don’t use taxpayer help. Is it fair to call reproduction that’s done a certain way “worthless”? Are the kids that are born from free sex of less value than those who aren’t? I guess the women who have been single mothers without any taxpayer help that are great citizens have kids that are as “damaged” as them…LOL.
Above two posts were to Mark Bennett and elimatthew2013.
Thank you Laura, I think you get me. No one can sell what some one else is giving away. I have a saying; Women love men for how they are unique, but Men love women for how they are the same. This is why the World Trade Organization has rules against dumping. Free food just drives the local farmer into bankruptcy. Whether you like it or not, your services are contributing to the terms of trade for young mothers. Do I sound like your great grand-daddy? I mean to. Our ancestors were right, there is a difference between a boy and a man, and free love will and has retarded his development. Single mothers are a tragedy unless they are wealthy. Just ask them. They need all the help we can give them, including especially the truth. Boys aren’t damaged by free sex until the woman costs him, then she’s a whore. Whore hating is the damage.
Concerning the contractual discussions above: Keep It Simple. I make a proposition, he responds, I say “Show Me The Money.” After that, if I at any time, for any reason, want to “void” the contract, I say “Keep your money, you’ll have to find another girl”. Then leave.
The difference between a free born though impoverished worker and a slave is that the slave can’t quit. A whore can quit at any time for any reason. In fact it is the free-for-love who is enmeshed in assumed and opaque obligations, excepting Laura.
I’m an evangelist for JesusBornToSaveWhores.com. AKA GodSaveWhores.com
Birth control has been seized by children? News to me. Or perhaps you mean teenagers? And exactly what does “when sex is free, reproduction is worthless” mean?
The stance that “free sex is bad for society!” is no more freedom-loving than the stance that “paid sex is bad for society!” Note Mark’s second-to-last sentence:
“I’d like to ask those people: could we try treating a woman’s sexuality as her own property, to keep, give, rent, or sell as she will?”
Just to clarify re: “feminists” – the group that supports criminalization at all costs are abolitionists and, while they call themselves feminists, are not representative of the views of all feminists. Some of us, for example, are feminists who fully and completely believe in the right of anyone to choose to engage in consensual sex-for-pay. The one thing that I believe we can all agree on is that no one should be coerced into engaging in prostitution against their will or forced into a position where they *must* engage in sex for pay because they have no other options (i.e., they lack education or other supports that would enable them to secure other employment or access resources).
One of the biggest issues with prostitution is that the problems that push people into it when they have no desire to do it remain unresolved: poverty, lack of education, lack of resources, lack of access to resources and/or support programs. So these are issues that need to be dealt with along the way to supporting the right for anyone to engage in selling sex. Until then, all we’ve done is ensure that people privileged enough to choose to sell sex can still do so, while those who are forced into it remain at the bottom of the heap, exploited and unnoticed.
I’m not entirely certain about this statement of principle. Many people are forced into positions where they must engage in one sort of work or another because they have no other options; while it’s always better for people to have more options than fewer, I don’t see any good reason that sex work should be considered differently than, say, maquiladora work.
“If something—including your body—belongs to you, you can do what you want with it, as long as what you do doesn’t hurt (or create an unjustifiable risk of hurting) other people.”
Not sure how this would work out in practice. If your body belongs only to you, can you sell yourself into slavery? Can you agree in a loan contract that if you don’t repay the loan you can be sold into slavery?
This isn’t a far fetched hypothetical, as debt bondage has been widely practiced in history (and is still going on today in some countries). And I can think of plenty of other rights that people should not be allowed to waive, on public policy grounds.
“Not allowed” to waive? If you mean that the contracts should be legally unenforceable, I would agree; that, however, is not the same thing as criminalization of a consensual act. What do you suggest should be the penalty for the “crime” of selling yourself into bondage? Infliction of a worse and more brutal bondage to the state, followed by a lifetime of stigma?
I think that’s right—there’s a difference between a voidable contract and an illegal contract. A child, for example, can enter into a contract, but the contract isn’t enforceable against the child. So the adult contracting with a child does so at the risk that the child will repudiate the contract.
There is no need to make any contract illegal. Just put limits on what human beings can agree to contractually before the contract becomes voidable. The same limits could be applied to maximum restitution for voiding a contract.
So, say if a child enters into a contract, voidability limit is $0. If it is a juvenile, say $10. For a competent adult, unlimited.
Then add that some things like slavery, sexual services, etc. make the contract voidable by the party offering the service at any time, but anything paid must be given back in full, or if partial services have been rendered, in part.
In addition, any contract not understandable in full to the parties involved is automatically voidable, and if malicious intent or gross negligence is present on one side, the restitution duties of the other side become zilch.
Sure, this would cause some implementation issues, but none that are worse to what is used today. In fact, this would probably work far better. Sure, some people would do exceedingly stupid things, but they are doing those anyways. And for people that get themselves into irrational debt time and again, it may be an option to have them get out of dept at the price of reduced competency level. These people cannot really be regarded as fully competent adults, so why pretend? It is however important that the decision to go with reduced competency must be their own.
Consensual acts should, under certain circumstances, be criminalized. Take blackmail, for example. Suppose I agree not to disclose information about Krulac (which I learned in a perfectly legal way), and he agrees to pay me $1,000 a month. I have the legal right to publish the information, so why shouldn’t I be able to suggest an “arrangement” to him. And if he decides it is in his interest to pay me, well isn’t that his right?
Nonetheless, I think that the state has every right to criminalize this sort of thing.
But I do think you are missing my larger point, which is that trying to govern ourselves by first principles, (such as that people own themselves and should be able to do anything that doesn’t hurt someone else) sometimes ignores some very hard lessons we learned as a society.
Bullshit. “Do this or I will hurt you” is not the basis of a consensual transaction.
In this instance the blackmailee’s conduct would not be criminal. His contract—to pay the blackmailer—would not be illegal, but would be voidable (as against public policy).
The blackmailer’s conduct—extracting money by threatening harm—would rightly be criminal.
Nice one. If common sense supported by clear view of the facts would be enough to convince people, the whole discussion would be finished at this time.
The real problem seem to be that most people are by far not mature enough to think rational when sex or any form of domination-oriented system like religion or “the law” is involved. This is nicely supported by the research of Bob Altemeyer. His “The Authoritarians” (free on the web) is stunningly, if depressingly, enlightening on the subject.
I can recommend The Authoritarians quite cheerfully, with a clear conscience. Though I’m sure that there are those who would argue that, since it’s free, it must be worthless.
One thought that has occurred to me on this subject: there is no small irony in the fact that the world politically was much more amenable to Maggie and her whorish sisters prior to passage of the 19th Amendment. In that, one might even be tempted to read the ensuing events as an expansion of female sexual competition by other means.
An awful lot of the fuss and stink in ‘murica seems to stem from the idea that “children are innocent UNTIL acted on from the outside”.
Let me be clear about this : once puberty starts, they’ll do a dandy job of discovering sexuality all by themselves without any outside intervention.
I should know. *meaningful look over top of glasses* So should you.
The “grown ups” need to do some growing up of their own.
What’s needed is not cottonwoolwrapping over the subject of human sexuality, but a fullsome and frank discussion between parents and kids : that’s part of your responsibility as a parent; not just informing them about the bad stuff, but how the good stuff should look too.
In this one aspect of human endeavour, we’re NOT “standing on the shoulders of giants”. Each generation gets to learn about this aspect of human existence from a near-zero standpoint, every time.
Is it any wonder that this aspect of human behaviour is a near-trainwreck?
Nowhere else do we voluntarily chuck out the concept of collective transmission of experience to the new generation “because its too ikky”.
To be honest, if I’m not killing you, maiming you, or doing you damage, what I do with me and/or other consenting adults is none of your business.
The rot sets in when I do something you don’t like, and you take the right to offense, and turn it into the right to force me to stop.
The snag is, you’ve no right, but we also (as social animals) desire to get along with as little fuss as possible (most of us). Now we’re walking through the foggy bit.
Ultimately, though, you have no right to force your morals, mores, values, choices or behaviours onto anyone else. This includes your kids, neighbors, village, etc etc etc.
And people, being homo sapiens sapiens the self-centred lying fornicating killing machines that their instincs tell them they are, don’t always get the “do unto others” thing, or choose the civilized path of getting stuff done that works in the non-instinctive “citified” world.