fishsticksandpudding:

that-yellow-bird:

lookoutsideyourself:

brokenhallelujahacme:

Sex Workers Need HUMAN RIGHTS, Not Legal Wrongs

*TURN OFF THE BLUE LIGHT, IRELAND POSTER CAMPAIGN*

Always reblog.

This is wonderful.

I really, really, really want to support the sex industry, because I do think that people should have the right to use their body as they please.

The issue is that I know far too well how it affects families when married men decide to go to prostitutes. I hate the sex industry because of what it does to families. Most days, I don’t think I could ever look a sex worker in the eye and say I’m perfectly fine with what they do.

I feel like that’s shifting responsibility to the wrong place.  Do you have trouble telling casino workers you’re “fine with what they do,” because some people spend money they shouldn’t (and this can ruin families)?   Do you have trouble looking the alcohol store manager and clerk in the eye, knowing that he sometimes sells alcohol to alcoholics (and this can ruin families)?   The gas station attendant because he will sell the man who’s already had lung cancer, another pack of cigarettes?  Etc., etc.   

Only when it’s sex work does it suddenly become, in many minds, the worker’s fault that the customer wanted something they sell every day to all sorts of people.  When someone makes a choice to do the wrong thing (and cheating is wrong), it is their fault and the resulting fallout is their doing.   Even if, in some cases, it is less of a choice (like alcoholism) that still doesn’t mean the blame and responsibility is necessarily on the person providing the service.   

The sex industry doesn’t do this to family when we’re talking about what married couples choose to do.  The sex industry offers a service.   Offers- not forces.   If you’re already in a position where you’re considering cheating on your spouse, then I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that your family/marriage/whatever is probably already in trouble whether or not you go through with your choice.     Sex workers aren’t messing with those families; troubled relationships and choices are messing up those families.

PS.  Just as a statistical thing, unmarried men are more likely to visit prostitutes than married men.   Which doesn’t really negate your argument or anything but I just pointing out that contrary to conventional wisdom they don’t always comprise the majority of a sex worker’s clients.