# Are prostitutes raped if they don't get paid? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 17, 2018, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005 "2018-02-17T16:47:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![mmmiiikkkeee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/edb3f5/32.png) [@mmmiiikkkeee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mmmiiikkkeee)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/21 "2018-02-17T20:14:52Z")
Based on how I understand the typical female service provider prostitution transaction to occur, payment happens first, and the money is usually tucked securely away before anything substantial happens (this is what the hooker is really interested in after all). Money is not just casually left on the bed side table for the guy to decide whether to leave or not, or discussed after the fact. So, most of the time the woman will eye the guy up, decide whether she’ll go through with it (= consent), then take the money - which is now hers. I’m pretty sure this isn’t a business where refunds are given, so who’s money it is after it changes hands isn’t in question. They guy doesn’t have the option to not pay; he does that up front. If after the fact he decides it wasn’t worth the money, too bad. Any attempt to get all or some of the money back is a new deal, and if it ends up being done by force is then theft/robbery/whatever you want to call it. I just don’t see where “rape” could come into play here. Some other crime possibly (with a near-0% chance of ever being prosecuted), but not rape. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/22 "2018-02-17T20:28:39Z")
> [@mmmiiikkkeee](#): > > Based on how I understand the typical female service provider prostitution transaction to occur, payment happens first, and the money is usually tucked securely away before anything substantial happens (this is what the hooker is really interested in after all). Money is not just casually left on the bed side table for the guy to decide whether to leave or not, or discussed after the fact. > > So, most of the time the woman will eye the guy up, decide whether she’ll go through with it (= consent), then take the money - which is now hers. I’m pretty sure this isn’t a business where refunds are given, so who’s money it is after it changes hands isn’t in question. > > They guy doesn’t have the option to not pay; he does that up front. If after the fact he decides it wasn’t worth the money, too bad. Any attempt to get all or some of the money back is a new deal, and if it ends up being done by force is then theft/robbery/whatever you want to call it. > > I just don’t see where “rape” could come into play here. Some other crime possibly (with a near-0% chance of ever being prosecuted), but not rape. That may be why the question a professor asked my class was, _if a prostitute later finds out she was paid in counterfeit money, has she been raped?_ ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/23 "2018-02-17T20:28:51Z")
The OP posits that the payment is supposed to be after the act. How it is done typically is irrelevant. A service was performed and payment wasn’t made. Similarly to if it were for house cleaning, it’s theft of services. One twist is that the contract is for an illegal service but let’s say it was in a place where prostitution is legal. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/24 "2018-02-17T20:45:06Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Nah, they’ve just been screwed over. I think the vernacular is “stiffed”. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/25 "2018-02-17T21:01:23Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Wait—are you saying that consent can be withdrawn after the fact? That any act of consensual sex can become a rape if either party, at any time afterward, decides to withdraw their consent? No it’s not retroactive. Sorry if I made it sound that way. > [@Corry\_El](#): > > Which would in general be the case for a john reneging on paying a prostitute or taking the money back. Seems like it would be robbery in theory if stealing the money back even in an illegal transaction. Whether just not paying would be covered by ‘defrauding an innkeeper’ laws in case of illegal services I don’t know. But I don’t see how it could be rape. It wouldn’t be rape. Robbery or theft occurs whether or not it’s was a criminal transaction to begin with. For instance yiu don’t get a pass because the guy you pulled a gun on was supposed to deal you drugs. > [@](#): > > Although OTOH (and you aren’t saying otherwise) there can be rape without explicit withholding of consent: woman unconscious, or somebody has sex with a woman in the dark under the ruse he is someone else who has consent. That doesn’t have to be realized at the time by the woman to be a rape, seems to me. But I agree with those with a hard time seeing how conditional consent (as in yes to sex in exchange for money) becomes rape if the conditions aren’t met _after_ sex is finished. In general (I can’t say for all 50 states) incapacitation is listed in the statute and not assumed to be under the umbrella of consent. Our statute specifically mentions victims that are temporarily or permanently incapacitated. I seem to remember a case in another state that separated some acts into a sodomy charge. Their rape statute mentioned incapacitation, the sodomy statute did not. Someone walked free or nearly so because of it. The legislature had to fix the law. > [@AK84](#): > > Bzzzt, sorry wrong answer. It is not rape when consent is withdrawn. It becomes rape when the accused finds out that consent has been withdrawn or should have lax > > \*Guess you knew this, but simplified it for civilians. 🙂 > \*\*Question like this were a favourite in the criminal law papers. > > In play: Is prostitution legal in jurisdiction? If so then it could be prosecuted with the local equivalent of “making off without paying”. > > For rape. If he never intended to pay, then it might be rape. As the prostitute was miles as to the nature of the act. If he decided post coitus, then no. > > Very unlikely to be prosecuted. Well counselor by withdrawn I meant in a way that made it known to the actor. Not the textbook answer bad marks for me. We actually had a case similar to the OP recently. It was initially reported more rapey than the OP in that some force was reported. I wasn’t involved in the case so I don’t know every detail. I know the suspect is a scumbag who has skated on too many charges. It didn’t go anywhere because the victim was strung out on heroin when they were investigating, she was falling asleep during the interview, she was more worried about the money than any sexual assault, she had a rap sheet a mile long. It’s pretty much impossible to prosecute when there is no physical evidence and your only witness is not credible or reliable. The defendant doesn’t have to say a word and his prior bad acts can’t be mentioned. Unfortunately that leaves room for a lot of reasonable doubt. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/26 "2018-02-17T21:41:15Z")
Well, but is her consent not contingent upon payment? If she agrees to the act assuming that she will receive money and then does not, her consent is invalidated. Maybe not legally, _per se_, but logically. “Rape” is probably not the right word, more like some kind of molestation. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2018, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/27 "2018-02-17T22:20:38Z")
Consider some other examples of “contingent consent,” involving the unisex aliases “Pat” and “Sam”: I. Pat consents to have sex with Sam because he/she believes Sam loves him/her. II. Pat consents to have sex with Sam because he/she believes Sam is planning to marry him/her. III. Pat consents to have sex with Sam because he/she believes this will be a one-time, no-strings-attached encounter. IV. Pat consents to have sex with Sam because Pat believes that Sam will be a skillful and unselfish lover, good in bed. V. Pat consents to have sex with Sam because Pat believes that Sam has no sexually transmittable diseases. In each case, assume Pat would not have consented to have sex with Sam had he/she not believed this. Each example can be broken down into Sub-example A, where Pat believes this because Sam told him/her so or otherwise led him/her to believe it, and Sub-example B, where Sam did not, and Pat only assumed or wanted to believe it was true. Sub-example A can be further broken down into Sub-sub-example A1 in which Sam also believed it but was mistaken, and Sub-sub-example A2 in which Sam did not believe it and was being deliberately deceptive in order to get sex. In some of these cases, I would consider (or at least be open to considering) what Sam did morally wrong. In some I might consider (or at least be open to considering) that what Sam did was or should be legally wrong. In none of them would I consider what Sam did to be rape. And none of them would I be comfortable labeling “nonconsensual” if Pat did, in fact, fully consent at the time, even if that consent was “under false pretenses”—though I am open to being convinced otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/28 "2018-02-18T05:50:38Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > V. Pat consents to have sex with Sam because Pat believes that Sam has no sexually transmittable diseases… Not sure if that’s rape, but it’s certainly a very serious crime, more so if Sam is the male. ---
**Author:** ![mmmiiikkkeee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/edb3f5/32.png) [@mmmiiikkkeee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mmmiiikkkeee)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/29 "2018-02-18T06:57:14Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Not sure if that’s rape, but it’s certainly a very serious crime, more so if Sam is the male. Why would their respective sexes have anything to do with how certain it was that a crime was committed? And why does one commit a serious crime if another believes something untrue about them? ---
**Author:** ![Jeff\_Lichtman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeff_lichtman/32/1531_2.png) [@Jeff\_Lichtman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jeff_Lichtman)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/30 "2018-02-18T06:59:02Z")
It doesn’t make sense to me to treat this as rape. As far as I know, there’s nothing in any rape law about consent being contingent on anything happening in the future. Consent is either given at the time of the act, or it’s not. What we have here isn’t rape, but contract violation or fraud (or both). Not paying for a service as agreed upon in advance is a contract violation. Allowing someone to perform a service for you when you don’t intend to pay for it is fraud. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/31 "2018-02-18T08:09:07Z")
> [@Jeff\_Lichtman](#): > > It doesn’t make sense to me to treat this as rape. As far as I know, there’s nothing in any rape law about consent being contingent on anything happening in the future. Consent is either given at the time of the act, or it’s not. If consent is obtained by misleading a person as to the nature of the act, then consent has been obtained by fraud and therefore its rape. Never intending to pay, would come under this category. Deciding not to pay on a lark at the conclusion of the transaction, probably not. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/32 "2018-02-18T11:01:36Z")
> [@Jeff\_Lichtman](#): > > It doesn’t make sense to me to treat this as rape. As far as I know, there’s nothing in any rape law about consent being contingent on anything happening in the future. Consent is either given at the time of the act, or it’s not. > > What we have here isn’t rape, but contract violation or fraud (or both). Not paying for a service as agreed upon in advance is a contract violation. Allowing someone to perform a service for you when you don’t intend to pay for it is fraud. Hmm. What happens if we remove the sexual component? Let’s say that Bo the Boxer is negotiating compensation for an upcoming prizefight: he won’t do it for less than X, he offers to do it for Y, he accepts the counteroffer of Z. He then steps into the ring and soon gets punched in the face until he passes out. Bo later regains consciousness and discovers that nobody intended to pay him a cent; the guy he fought was simply lying to him. And as Bo ponders the full ramifications of this, I simply walk up to Bo and start punching him in the face. I’d be guilty of, what, battery? And what would the other guy be guilty of? ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/33 "2018-02-18T11:59:02Z")
I wonder how this would play out in Texas, since our laws allow deadly force to retrieve “stolen” property. The prostitute can’t actually retrieve her side of the bargain, but I wonder if she could collect her fee at gunpoint? The reverse of this case has already happened here, where the john had paid but the prostitute refused “service”, and he shot her to get his money back (she died later). He was [acquitted](https://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/Jury-acquits-escort-shooter-4581027.php) of murder since he was retrieving stolen property. Seems to me it oughta work the other way around for the prostitutes. ---
**Author:** ![rbroome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/838e76/32.png) [@rbroome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rbroome)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/34 "2018-02-18T13:56:41Z")
> [@pullin](#): > > I wonder how this would play out in Texas, since our laws allow deadly force to retrieve “stolen” property. The prostitute can’t actually retrieve her side of the bargain, but I wonder if she could collect her fee at gunpoint? > > The reverse of this case has already happened here, where the john had paid but the prostitute refused “service”, and he shot her to get his money back (she died later). He was [acquitted](https://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/Jury-acquits-escort-shooter-4581027.php) of murder since he was retrieving stolen property. Seems to me it oughta work the other way around for the prostitutes. You left out a crucial detail-it was at night. The law that gave him the ability to legally shoot her only applies at night. Why? Texas. I imagine Texas changed the law-either to make it apply at all hours or remove the law. Not sure which. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/35 "2018-02-18T14:18:51Z")
Are plumbers enslaved when they don’t get payed? ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/36 "2018-02-18T14:36:30Z")
Just like all human beings, prostitutes are raped when they are forced or coerced to have sex they do not want to have. The OP’s question seems to suggest that he puts women into different categories of “humanness” and is yet another disturbing expression of the misogyny on this board. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/37 "2018-02-18T14:48:19Z")
> [@TimeWinder](#): > > You wouldn’t consider “I’ll have sex with you, but only if you use a condom?” to be a valid conditional consent? I would say that is the agreed upon\*\* type\*\* of sex they are having. ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/38 "2018-02-18T15:12:30Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > Just like all human beings, prostitutes are raped when they are forced or coerced to have sex they do not want to have. The OP’s question seems to suggest that he puts women into different categories of “humanness” and is yet another disturbing expression of the misogyny on this board. That has a real ‘woke’ tone to it but the first sentence just states the obvious without answering the question raised. Which is under the category, ‘what constitutes being forced or coerced?’. There’s nothing ‘misogynistic’ about considering the specific case of refusal to pay for an act of prostitution after the fact, especially since a non-negligible proportion of prostitutes aren’t female. The question is whether not being later given a promised payment for consensual sex revokes the original consent and makes it rape. Seems to me the practical answer is ‘obviously not’. A theoretical answer might toy with the idea that never having intended to pay would make it rape but I doubt that also even in theory. Fraud isn’t rape. Many prostitutes are coerced by third parties into the profession but that’s beside the point of the question. Whatever conclusions one might draw about the culpability of the customer if somebody else is coercing the prostitute to be one, that culpability wouldn’t depend on whether the customer paid or refused to pay. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/39 "2018-02-18T15:48:48Z")
Rape and other physical assault are in a different category to theft or breach of contract because most people do not consider their sexual or physical autonomy to be worth _any_ amount of money. Loss of money and loss of sexual or physical integrity are in different categories that are not fungible. However, if a person has voluntarily decided that a limited sex act is worth exchanging for a certain amount of money (a prostitute, assuming prostitution is legal) or consented to limited physical harm in exchange for money (a pro boxer) then those people have themselves freely determined that these acts are (to them) fungible with a certain amount of money. They surely cannot withdraw this “consent to fungibility” after the fact. They would have been satisfied with payment for those services. So the crime committed by someone who fails to pay them for their services is no different from someone who fails to pay a plumber. Of course, the “consent to fungibility” only applies to the specific acts that the prostitute and boxer have consented to make fungible. You can still rape a prostitute or assault a professional boxer. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2018, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005/40 "2018-02-18T16:17:15Z")
And like Corry El, I can’t see how it makes any difference whether someone intend to defraud them from the outset, since that has no impact on their free agreement to make these acts fungible with money. The only thing that’s not obvious here is what the crime should be if prostitution (or pro boxing, for that matter) is illegal. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-prostitutes-raped-if-they-dont-get-paid/809005.md?page=3)