The battle against sex trafficking

[thir]

The article below compares laws in Sweden and Denmark, and results.

In 1995 Sweden made it illegal to buy sex, While in 1999 Denmark decriminalized prostitution.

"Copenhagen's red light district pulsates with neon lights. Women stand on nearly every corner - many from Africa - aggressively making their pitch to men walking by. Inside one particularly loud bar, young Thai women sit on the laps of male customers.

And Stockholm? Well, you might walk right by its equivalent and never notice. Malmskillnadsgatan is a commercial area, the address of several banks. In its heyday, dozens of girls used to ply their trade here. Now, you can find only three or four women who work the street."

In Sweden "The law was enacted as part of Sweden's push for gender equality. From a Swedish legal point of view, any woman selling sex has been forced to do so, either by circumstance or coercion. Anyone caught buying sex faces hefty fines, an embarrassingly public police notification and possible time in prison, with a maximum four-year sentence. So far no one arrested has served time."

Denmark: "We thought that these women would be trapped and kidnapped and they wanted to be saved and rescued and they wanted to go back home," says Anne Brandt-Christensen of the Danish Centre Against Human Trafficking. "But what we found out is that this is a much more complex phenomenon."

"That stark difference may explain why Sweden is being hailed as a model of how to combat sex trafficking, while Denmark has been called the "Brothel of Scandinavia."

Other countries are now debating whether to follow the Swedish model.

So, what to think of this? Is the fact that you do not see hookers on the street in Sweden a sign that they are not there? Or have they gone underground, with even less protection from the police? Are all prostitutes really forced? Will such a law stop trafficking?

http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cn...blem/?hpt=Sbin

[leo9]

A very obviously slanted article, the author's agenda is not hidden.

Is the fact that you do not see hookers on the street in Sweden a sign that they are not there?

Yeah, like you could see Prohibition was working because there were no bars.

Or have they gone underground, with even less protection from the police?

That would be my first guess. As for abolishing prostitution, I'll believe that when they abolish gravity. The most extreme police states never managed it, and with all its faults, Sweden isn't anywhere near that.

Are all prostitutes really forced?

Didn't you know, all the ones who talk to journos and write online about how they chose the life and like it, are just paid agents of the masculinist conspiracy. So says Dworkin, and who of us dare argue?

Trafficking is a tragedy, but it's a gift to the anti-sex faction. With a few simple verbal tricks they can make all prostitutes victims and all clients abusers. The fact that they don't honestly care about the victims is shown by how little attention they give to the trafficked girls' fates once they are found and deported.

Will such a law stop trafficking?

It'll certainly stop the attempts to persuade clients to blow the whistle on brothels they believe have captive girls, something that's doing some good here in the UK. As with Prohibition, making the customers criminals makes them allies of the real criminals.

[denuseri]

Whats the numbers on sex worker who like what they do and want to be in the industry as opposed to human trafficing numbers in those place that have legalized prositution compared to places that do not by comparrisson?

[leo9]

Whats the numbers on sex worker who like what they do and want to be in the industry as opposed to human trafficing numbers in those place that have legalized prositution compared to places that do not by comparrisson?

It would be wonderful if we knew that. It would be wonderful if we had any solid facts and figures from any of these countries, but we don't; there are only the vaguest guesses as to how many sex workers of any kind there are, and only anecdotal evidence for whether they are happy with their work or not. A large part of the trouble with this debate is that it is mostly built on guesses, information supplied by very unreliable sources (such as the police) and pure prejudice dressed up as fact.

For example, the anti-prostitution lobby in this country constantly repeats a figure for the number of trafficked women here: when investigated, this turns out to be based on a police guess of the number in one British city, a guess based on the number of arrests over a few days, multiplied up to the whole country. They might as well make it up and be done with it.

Anyone going round brothels with a survey clipboard would be in almost equal danger from the lawless and the law, so it's not likely to get any better.

[IAN 2411]

Prostitution is supposedly the oldest profession known to man or woman, if Sweden thinks they have got rid of prostitution through unworkable laws they are living in cloud cook-coo land. Any Country looking to follow their example is in the same misguided mind. Prostitution is big business and it works under several names, the new one that comes to mind is Male and Female Escort Agencies. They might be off of Sweden’s streets but are the police and prosecution service really that naive to think that they have left the country. If like Britain you are letting in so many people every year to stay in the country, how are you going to stop trafficking? You cannot vet every person 100%, trafficking is almost as old as the profession. As long as man and woman need sex, and are willing to pay for it, neither prostitution nor the trafficking will ever stop.

Be well IAN 2411