We were able to abolish slavery without making it illegal to farm cotton. There’s no reason we couldn’t eliminate human trafficking while legalizing prostitution.
That’s the *fun *part to discuss. The *important *part is the existence, and apparently prevalence, of slavery and human trafficking in our own country.
Amen.
What floors me is why a guy like Kraft would go to such a skeevy place. Verified escorts are generally available for under $500 even after FOSTA/SESTA - chump change for a billionaire. Anyone who hasn’t been living in a cave for the last 20 years knows that massage parlors like the one Kraft was nabbed in use coerced labor. There is no excuse for his behavior.
A few things to note about the definition of human traficking. As soon as sex is involved, the perspective of the person being traficked doesn’t matter anymore. You could have the happiest outgoing person that wants to be there… who will still be considered a victim.
Also, there precious few men that get off on being with someone that is clearly not where she wants to be. Even fewer will actually go out in public and look for something like that. Regardless of the background, the vast majority of sex workers will seem to be very much looking for/wanting to work.
I really don’t know how people think this works; you think these places are a row of rooms with crying girls chained to their beds?
Off course this massage parlor could be the exception. And even if it isn’t the girls could very well have been exploited there. That doesn’t mean clients would know.
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Have I ever said anything contradicting this?
The industry that we are talking about is human trafficking. Prostitution is a tangent. The fact that I referenced the 13th Amendment should make that glaringly obvious. Nobody should try to lampshade this issue by trying to divert attention to the rights of sex workers and abolishing the criminality of prostitution. Let’s talk about the rights of women in the workplace while we’re at it.
What makes this a huge story is that this is a place that was taking vulnerable women and forcing them into servitude, and then a powerful, wealthy man who owns the NFL champion football team and is friends with the president repeatedly uses those services. That’s why it’s a scandal.
If legalizing prostitution and regulating that industry will help fight human trafficking, I’m all for it. I’m not even opposed if it doesn’t help because I don’t fully understand why it’s criminalized to begin with, aside from wanting to legislate morality. But again I consider that a side issue where this story is concerned.
You’re not going to scare guys away from using prostitutes. You’re not going to make prostitution and the associated human trafficking go away by coming down hard on the johns.
Want to use this scandal as a jumping off point to actually fixing the problem? I’m all for that. But let’s not act like he’s the cause of all this misery. If prostitution was properly regulated, Kraft would have gotten his whatever from a person who wasn’t being exploited or enslaved.
Yeah, that misdemeanor charge is really “coming down hard”. He might, gasp, get a fine.
Would you like a side of cowardly lion with that strawman?
But it’s not. So he didn’t. And thus he got his whatever from someone who was exploited and enslaved. And, as an aside, legalizing prostitution doesn’t magically get rid of trafficking.
It’s not law enforcement that he has to worry about. It’s what the NFL will do and how this destroys his public image. The biggest damage might be done by the press.
Kraft has been one of the most influential owners and serves on a number of committees. If he becomes a stain then he might have to give up some of that by trying to have a bit of a lower profile.
I’m not sure what the NFL will do. I don’t think they can or will do anything as dramatic as forcing him to sell the team or anything. And I can’t see them punishing the team itself over this, and of course that wouldn’t be fair and would backfire. But they’re going to have to do something to save face.
He might sell the team anyway. He’s 77; who needs the hassle?
Kraft loves being an NFL owner. He’s won 6 rings, he’s super high profile, he’s one of the top 3 owners in the NFL committees, etc. Any hassle he just passes on to his son Jonathan.
Yeah, he could pull a Henry Ford: sell to the son, who would have virtually no say in how to run things.
I haven’t been following this very closely, but has there been any explanation of why Kraft went to a massage parlor in Florida? As I understand it, he left just after his second visit to be at the AFC Championship game in Kansas City; surely there must be similar establishments in K.C. So did Kraft have some other reason to be in Florida or did he travel there just for the massages? If it was just for the massages, that suggests he knew of this parlor and had been there before.
We know it wasn’t a one time thing because he’s on video twice visiting two days in a row. Maybe it was the only time he ever visited but it makes him a repeat customer.
His Palm Beach mansion is about 10 minutes from that particular massage parlor, so it’s likely he was a regular there. The descriptions that kenobi 65 linked above say he and [REDACTED] hugged a few times, which strikes me as implying they knew each other at least a bit. Whereas in KC he’d be in the hands of a stranger.
Hmmm… The news and commentary, as we are seeing it, is not predominantly “Trafficking ring busted”. The news is Kraft, Kraft, Kraft, Kraft, rub-n-tug, rub-n-tug, rub-n-tug.
So it does send the message that outing wealthy patrons will bring attention to the problem.
BUT it also says, Public Opinion will care far more about how it affects the wealthy patrons.
Maybe Tom Brady deflated all of his blowup dolls?
Legalization and licensing of prostitution can be done while at the same time combating human trafficking. So a rich guy goes to a massage parlor to get his rocks off. Maybe he’s too damn cheap for a high end escort. I’m puzzled as to why I should care.
:golf clap:
Most of the talk I’m hearing (local sports networks mainly) are focusing on the trafficking and the ordeal the women had gone through. I guess it just depends on what you listen to.
Ironically, you’d think that the sports networks would be the ones focusing on Kraft, since this is only a “sports story” at all because he was involved.