Unemployment and Homelessness

 

Autonomy is to act on your own without being controlled by any other influence. Autonomy is to have self-governance, and to have the liberty for free choice. One could classify it as a synonym for freedom. I have heard people use autonomy as an argument for why sex work shouldn’t be legal, because they can be under the control of people they work with or work for. But, in this paper I will discuss how prostitution can be made legal and regulated to the point where autonomy and sex-work can be intertwined.

The idea of autonomy is highly valued in all cultures of modern countries. The United States is founded on the ideal that every man has the right to pursue life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. When one person’s autonomy is threatened, people often react with fear or aggression. When a person’s sense of security and control are sabotaged, they feel stress, fear, and discomfort as a result. Essentially, being controlled takes away one’s sense of self. So from that, if someone is not given the opportunity to practice a skill or perform an action that is a part of them, is that not stripping people’s autonomy from them?

The profession of prostitution is unique in general. Nobody likes to talk about it. Parents hide away from it to the point where a girl who sits at my table every class told me she didn’t understand what a pimp was or what they did. The stigmas that surround prostitution are concrete and there is little room for someone to even debate. There is an overwhelmingly negative connotation to the word and the practice. It is considered dirty, scandalous, immoral, unethical, and to some more religious people even sinful. In addition to the negative connotation, prostitutes are typically very poor, sometimes leading them to be homeless or drug addicts. Those who are working to fuel an addiction or because they are in danger are not acting with autonomy, there is a force that is controlling them in a sense. If they are not controlled by drugs or by their lack of money, pimps control them. Pimps who keep the workers safe from the law and also make a business control many prostitutes by controlling them. Buying sex is viewed as shameful and dirty, so it has to be done in secret, but if it were legal then the connotation behind prostitution could change, and things could change for the better. We all hope that sex between a buyer and a seller is always consensual. The prostitute is providing a service and receiving compensation. Hopefully they are not being coerced or taken advantage of and want to do it. This is not always the case though, which can make it easy for one to argue it should be made illegal but with legal prostitution the rape and wrongdoings that happen in prostitution could be eliminated.

Many prostitutes who enter the business of selling sex are most likely doing so because they have to and not because they want to, but that does not apply to everyone. Many prostitutes, like strippers, see their job as a skill and not as something easy. Many believe that all prostitutes are handed an undesired fate and stuck to see it through for the duration of what will most likely be an arduous, sufferable, and limited existence. But, this viewpoint while true at times represents the trap that many prostitutes remain in due to their pimps. But, at the same time the jobs are arguably getting cheaper and many now witness that it is not just woman who are prostitutes now. With a legal system that can monitor what happens and make sure that nobody’s rights are attacked, there can be a new market where a man or woman’s choice to sell their skills are respected and not taken advantage of.

Another issue many have with prostitution is that prostitutes have enormously high rates of sexually transmitted diseases. It is estimated that prostitutes engage in unprotected sex about 300 times a year. While this is a very alarming statistic, this could be changed. With legalization there could also be rules and laws protecting those engaging in prostitution from this spread of disease. If a prostitute wanted their clients, meaning those seeking out their sexual labor to use protection, the police and legality of the system could protect them and make sure that their wishes were respected and not blown off. The one counterargument that I really see as fit to go against making prostitution a legal business is the fact that we have figured out a way to sell most things and the sale of sex not only devalues it, but also could eventually lead to a loss of its value entirely. The question that many have about prostitution is that if money can buy sex, will it eventually be able to buy love? I don’t see the two having to be tied together unless someone allows it to be, but many others have an old-fashioned view on the subject that I believe is due to the preconceived notions about prostitution.

While prostitution is illegal it still goes on and prostitutes face violence much more frequently than we would like to think. The illegality leads to prostitutes being extremely vulnerable and can put them in more danger. Prostitutes are arrested far more than their clients and pimps by a giant margin. While this could lead to a belief surrounding prostitution needing to be eliminated entirely, I still believe many pursue it as a career because or their skill and it is because of this that I recommend for the U.S. to adopt a model that would make the selling and purchasing of sex legal but with protections in place for all parties involved.

The arguments supporting the illegality of prostitution surround the idea of prostitution stripping men or women of their freedom because of being controlled by their pimps and other factors that they are trying to escape like unemployment and homelessness. Some argue that prostitutes never truly give consent, because their work is only given out of need, not want. But, I disagree with this statement and think that with the legalization and monitoring of prostitution that it can become an ethical and safe market where people can practice a skill without being attacked.

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