A lot of people under 18…are only considered “trafficked” because the law says so. – Raani Begum
Some people can’t seem to understand that while sex workers can help men to manage their sexual frustration, there is nothing we can do once they grow to believe they’re entitled to free sex and go down the twisted “incel” rabbit hole. I think Dan Savage does a good job of explaining that difference here:
…Sexual deprivation can make a person miserable, even suicidal…and, as a society, we seem fine with that. People who can’t get sex are often told that…no one has ever dropped dead as a result of being deprived of sex. (Loneliness, however, can hasten death; it may be a greater risk factor for early death than smoking or obesity)…sexually deprived people…who…identify as incels…[don’t] feel…depressed or blam[e] themselves…[they] are filled with rage and blame…women…And when an incel with social or mental health issues—issues that doubtless contributed to his being an “involuntarily celibate” in the first place—violently attacks women (men are often killed too), the online incel breaks into cheers…I don’t think throwing sex workers at violent, deranged incels will solve the violent, deranged incel problem. Our culture has to change in enormous ways to solve this problem…men have to stop being socialized to believe they’re entitled to women’s bodies…adults who do sex work of their own free will shouldn’t be stigmatized (or treated like criminals) and adults who hire adults doing sex work of their own free will shouldn’t be stigmatized (or treated like criminals). The former cultural transformation will solve the “incel” problem; the latter will solve the problem of sexual deprivation, i.e. involuntary celibacy…
Once again: coalitions of fundamentalist anti-sex groups are in no way “surprising”:
If you had told radical feminist and [writer for SWERF/TERF rag Feminist Current] Natasha Chart five years ago that she would be fired from her advocacy job for objecting to the prostitution of minors, she wouldn’t have believed…She opted to speak with The Christian Post…”because…there is a significant and influential portion of…mainstream human rights activist community that…believes…youth sex work[ers]…should [not be raped and caged by cops]”…Chart is a former Jehovah’s Witness…no one is served when trusted civil society institutions utilize their clout…to quietly further a “pimping agenda“…If this goes unaddressed it is only a matter of time before the sex industry is considered “respectable” enough to emerge from the shadows and begin openly sponsoring a political caucus, as is the case in the Netherlands and Australia…
Yes, this is a Christian publication masturbating at very great length about the “pimp lobby” and approvingly quoting Meghan Murphy.
Can we please stop pretending that Dart’s actions are anything other than a power & money grab?
Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart wants [to profit from]…a recent plea deal [by Backpage CEO Carl Ferrer]…Dart filed a motion…asking [a]…Judge…to require Backpage.com LLC and its attorneys to pay the county for its legal fees in connection with a legal battle that dates back to 2015, when the Dallas-based online classified advertising site obtained a preliminary injunction blocking the sheriff’s office from [threatening] credit card companies [to force them to stop] processing payments for the site…
Prohibitionists just can’t stop beating this dead horse:
Three local groups are hosting an outreach event to warn the community about the dangers and reality of human trafficking during the Kentucky Derby…If you spot [any of these] red flag[s, report the person to the cops]…Hotel guests with little luggage…”Do Not Disturb” sign used constantly on a hotel room door…Housekeeping services refused for many days…Adults with…cell phones…A person is vague about his/her profession…
Can you imagine these phone calls? “Hi, Officer Porky, I’d like to report a man with a cell phone who told me to mind my own business…”
US prisons are hotbeds of rape in every form:
Jeannette Reynoso dreaded visiting her husband at…Rikers Island…She knew she would wait hours to be processed, go through several metal detectors and be subjected to a search by dogs sniffing for drugs and weapons. But she never thought she would be…naked and in tears before two [screws raping her using the excuse of searching] …her body cavities for contraband…When she [resisted the supposed search]…the [screws] threatened to cancel her visits for 45 days…[among other violations] the [screw]…violently inserted two fingers into her anus…she was menstruating at the time…The search Ms. Reynoso described is prohibited in city jails. In state and federal prisons, strip searches of visitors are permitted with consent, but not cavity checks…Elias Husamudeen, the president of the [Porcine Propaganda Perpetrators]…[mocked] the [reports made] by the women in the lawsuits and [claimed that]…“People are coming in with weapons in their vaginas, up their anus and in baby bottles”…
Because every woman I know can fit a 0.44 magnum in her pussy and a knife up her arse, at the same time.
Surveillance beyond the wildest dreams of the Stasi:
In cities across the country, Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations agents can mine local police reports using COPLINK, a data program little known outside law enforcement circles…The software ingests local police databases, allowing users to map out people’s social networks and browse data that could include their countries of origin, license plate numbers, home addresses, alleged gang membership records, and more…[“authorities” pretend] these databases and analytic tools helps ICE…tackle serious crimes, like child pornography and [the catchall] money laundering. But…ICE…agents are also involved in questionable immigration enforcement actions nationwide…
…the true targets of the [so-called] war on trafficking have been the marginalized, low income consensual sex workers whose livelihoods and ability to stay safe have long been dependent on the resources being scrubbed from the internet in the name of ending trafficking…It’s likely that these [“sex trafficking”] laws will be challenged in court and eventually overturned…Even the Department of Justice has said [FOSTA] could…be found to be unconstitutional…But while overturning these bills in court would be a good first step, it’s not enough. As long as consensual sex work is treated as functionally indistinct from abusive, forced or coercive situations, our laws will continue to punish some of the vulnerable people we claim to want to protect. Criminalizing and aggressively cracking down on all sex work pushes consensual sex workers underground and into unsafe environments…and…does little to discourage or combat people who profit from coercing others…In contrast, decriminalization…allows…sex workers to more openly and thus safely conduct business…A wide range of groups including Amnesty International, Freedom Network USA, Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women, Human Rights Watch, UNAIDS, World Health Organization, International Women’s Health Coalition and numerous sex worker advocacy and support groups have thrown their support behind…decriminalization…
Negative Secondary Effects (#817)
Normally, the pretended “secondary effects” are concrete things, not silly nebulosities:
[Prohibitionists] have been granted a judicial review against Sheffield’s strip club licensing policy in a move that could…have significant implications for other councils considering strip club licences. It could force them to take into account the [imaginary] impact on women and gender equality, rather than just the wellbeing of [actual people like the dancers who these prohibitionists want unemployed]…
Funny how nobody is crusading against businesses that employ mostly men on grounds of “gender equality”. Don’t men have an equal “right” to be forced out of high-paying work to appease prudish lunatics?
“What the new law does is it allows the FBI and law enforcement and individuals to sue platforms of any kind online for third-party hosts and content,” Barb Brents, a professor of sociology at UNLV, told KNPR…She explained that platforms like Craigslist and Backpage…are simply platforms for information and couldn’t be held responsible for what people posted on that format. But under the new law, people can sue them for what other people post…Brents said there is no real evidence that real traffickers are using those sites, but the sites are used by consensual sex workers. With them shut down or otherwise threatened…sex workers are losing an important screening mechanism…
And here’s a good introduction to FOSTA and its related tyrannies:
…Hillary Clinton would have signed it, too. It…has had an overwhelming bipartisan majority…FOSTA-SESTA does nothing but places liability on online platforms by asking them to tackle an enormous “real world”/not online problem…FOSTA-SESTA spooks online platforms into pre-emptively censoring free speech for fear of criminal liability, which has all sorts of horrible consequences for free speech…You can no longer share “explicit and vulgar content” on any Microsoft product, which means that no longer allowed to do anything sexual with anyone on their platforms, regardless…if…paid or unpaid…Here is an incomplete list of products and institutions that discriminate or ban sex work or adult products…
Ridiculous. It wouldn’t surprise me if these guys expect women to have a low number of lifetime sexual partners, but also want them to be good and willing to experiment in bed. Nice trick, too – the way that conventionally attractive women, who are likelier to have a high number of men they’ve slept with, would be the same as, or below, conventionally unattractive women. Another thing, by a single woman’s mid thirties, their number could very easily be low just based on relationships from high school up to that point, even a marriage or two! Prior to escorting, I’d have 6 points knocked off, and only one of those was outside of a relationship.
Law enforcement officers can be pretty violating with their searches! This is pretty mild, especially in comparison to that woman’s experience, but I once had my breasts fondled as part of a “search” by a male Highway Patrol officer while the other searched my purse. That’s supposed to be illegal if not done by a female officer. This was before all of those body cameras, and conveniently done off to the side of the car.
Dan Savage is utterly wrong and is only going to make things worse. This article is exactly like an article written about sex workers without talking to any; it’s all alarmism based on myth with punching down as a result.
First, “incel” is not a social or political philosophy, it is the state of not being able to find someone to have sex with. All those people who he says don’t “identify” as incels still are incels. It’s like not “identifying” as poor; yes if poverty is a big part of your self-image you are probably more likely to be prone to bad and violent ideas like redistribution of wealth. But not identifying as poor doesn’t make you not poor.
Second, and more important, incels do not believe they are entitled to women’s bodies. The guys who believe they are become not incels but Chads, because it is easy to approach women for sex if you feel entitled, and one’s success rate will be much higher as well; confidence is the most attractive trait of all and I can’t tell you how many ugly assholes with mental problems I’ve seen that get sex. The absolute last thing guys who are depressed and miserable and down on themselves and angry because they are lonely need is yet more people screaming at them for a sin they aren’t even committing. When has shame and hate ever improved a situation of rage and depression?
This isn’t to say that “throwing sex workers at” incels who have already become furious at the world is the solution. It’s easy for someone who can’t give sex away even when packaged with gifts and services to resent someone who’s paid for sex, and the shaming and criminalization of sex work feeds the resentment and removes much of the worker’s recourse if the resentment is expressed as anger.
What incels need is not more shame, but compassion, and the recognition that they can be valuable members of society without any women wanting to have sex with them. Sex work could indeed help greatly though, if it came earlier, before the rage, in the day when people are no longer vilified for treating touch and social contact as a legitimate need that can be legitimately addressed with a monetary transaction.
I agree with this and would like to add something. From what I see, the violence directed toward women seems to mostly come from men who get a lot of sex, not too little. This includes abusive husbands cheating on their wives, popular athletes (professional and non-professional), and self-styled gangstas. Find a guy who has a “soft harem” and odds are you’ll find him smacking women around, or worse.
When I worked as a reporter (back when the media was a lot more reasonable), I saw who was committing violence against women. Mostly it was men who had long track records of criminal activity, not the guy at the library afraid to say hello.
Yes, there are exceptions (like Elliott Rodger, etc.). But exceptions do not prove the rule. They stand out because they’re exceptions.
With this subject, I think the media is trying to create a “trend story” based only on news anecdotes. “Incels” is now a buzzword…sort of like “trafficking.” In fact, this whole thing reminds me of how cops will arrest one or two people for trafficking and all of a sudden the media is breathlessly reporting “OMG! It’s a crisis! A MAJOR crisis! OMG!”
If your experience with clients proves otherwise, I rescind my words. But if frustrated guys not getting sex led to violence, most every 15-year-old boy ’round the world would have an arrest record.
Don’t know if it’s a watershed or not, but I noticed this is the lede article in the dead tree edition of the ultra-left Berserkely paper Slingshot, Issue #127, 2018:
Online edition URL: http://slingshot.tao.ca/?p=116615
I read this blog to see how stupid our elected officials are, but when I got to the story of the involuntary celibacy I had to bite my tongue to see if I was dreaming or had slipped into the Twilight Zone.
Totally at a loss for words about this.
“I don’t think throwing sex workers at violent, deranged incels will solve the violent, deranged incel problem. Our culture has to change in enormous ways to solve this problem…men have to stop being socialized to believe they’re entitled to women’s bodies”
Why on earth does Dan Savage believe that permitting men access to safe and legal prostitution will not mostly end “incel rage”? Doesn’t every statistic indicate that legal prostitution reduces the incidence of every kind of sex crime? The numbers are not on his side.
As to supposing that incel rage is a result of men thinking that they have an “entitlement to women’s bodies” – words fail. First, surely a prostitute would know better than this – skin hunger is a real thing. You might as well condemn rioters in time of famine for believing that they are somehow entitled to food.
Second, it’s just not about entitlement. Quite the reverse, it’s people knowing perfectly well that they are locked out of fulfilling a human need. It’s young men understanding deeply that they are not entitled, not worthy, not fully carded members of the human race, discarded and unwanted.
Why the incomprehension that young men rejected by society should reject that society in reply? It’s basic stuff.
Every sane society has ensured that men have some sort of access to sexual contact. Either by the enforcement of monogamy, or in nonmonogamous societies by legal prostitution. The exceptions are Islam, and the modern west with its unsustainable mix of puritanism for some and licentiousness for others.
I’m kinda mystified at the number of guys on here who can’t tell the difference between “BEFORE they become violent & entitled” and “AFTER they become violent & entitled”. Would you have as much trouble with a concept like “BEFORE they develop cancer” and “AFTER they develop cancer”?
Prophylactic measures are just that: prophylactic. Not curative.