No, as I said, the issue is free choice, the absence of coercion, the lack of damage to society, and the general approval of people to the legalization of gambling and the criminalization of prostitution.
How many states permit some form of gambling, from state-run lotteries to slots to casinos with table games? And how many states permit prostitution?
So if the debate is about prostitution, and you concede that you were wrong, doesn’t that mean that the debate is now over?
Wouldn’t it make more sense to start a new thread about the basis of criminal law, if you now wish to discuss that instead? It might simplify things.
Well, I concede that my reasoning may have been wrong. There were two parts to the OP:
We have convincingly established, I think, that 2 does not follow from 1. However, we may still ask if it should be illegal for other reasons, such as the simple fact that a majority of the country WANTS it illegal. I suppose we could even debate whether or not it’s immoral, but I don’t imagine there’s much utility in doing that.
No, that’s not what I’m contending. If I’d contended that, I would not have been so careful to use the first-person pronoun.
I was saying that when I make an argument, it is for the purposes of swaying folks.
However, when anyone makes an argument, I can see only three purposes to it, as relates to legality:
You may find folks doing 1 or 2; you may find folks who haven’t really thought thorugh their motives. I may have left something out, and I’m happy to hear other reasons people might share their beliefs on issues (e.g., they might be doing it because they love the sound of their melodious voice). But I was giving you my reason for it, and I believe it’s a pretty common reason.
Daniel
Why, we seek to convince each other by reference to some statistic we both presumably agree is a “bad thing” and set forth how we believe that statistic derives from the legality or otherwise of said act. I consider that the Amsterdam example demonstrates fairly comprehensively that legalised prostitution engenders less rape, disease, violent assault, arrest, oppressive pimping and diagnosed mental illness compared to that suffered by the 5% of illegal prostitutes in Amsterdam. I also consider that the sky-high firearm murder rate in the US is largely due to their ready availability from being legal outside secure locations (and a state/district where handguns are controlled so lying adjacent a state where they’re legal still makes them all too readily available).
My general point here is that modern indutrialised democracies are not pure majoritarian rule: there are overall principles, eg. those espoused by JS Mill, which modern governments acknowledge when carefully considering whether or not to take the drastic and expensive step of actually making it illegal. These overall principles regarding democratic government are teh constitution of the democracy, whether it is written or not, and there will of course be different interpretations thereof.
In fact, that’s what we are engaging in right here on this message board. We each set forth our positions, and hope that the electorate is intelligent enough to realise that I’m right. 
I hope my answer to this is clear by now; this is a more complicated answer.
First, no, it shouldn’t be illegal: in the ideal world, the Daniel Rules Everything world, prostitution wouldn’t be illegal, and that’s the world we should have.
However, y’all persist in ignoring the wisdom of my plan. As long as you’re going to ignore that wisdom, I’d rather have a democracy, since nobody else is really trustworthy enough to be absolute dictator. Since y’all are so untrustworthy and at the same time bizarrely mistrustful of my beneficence, we end up with this flawed system that’s better than all non-Daniel-is-Dictator alternatives but is still pretty crappy.
This crappy system sometimes leads to crappy results. That doesn’t mean that these crappy results are magically uncrappy; it just means that we’ve got to change folks’ opinions if we want to change the results.
No, it shouldn’t be illegal just because a majority thinks it should be illegal, but that’s the world we live in, and until y’all accept my wise rule, we should stick with a system that gives that crappy result, and work to change that crappy result by changing majority opinion.
Morality does not flow from majority opinion; hopefully it works through majority opinion.
Daniel
The question, or “debate” (if you will), is not whether or not prostitution is immoral or should/should not be made universally illegal.
The existence of prostitution is merely one of many symptoms of a universally and deliberately thwarted and warped human sexuality. Sex is our greatest and most profound source of pleasure; physically, spiritually, and in any other way one can think of. Given that we have chosen to base our societies up to this point on the exploitation of the work of the many to the extreme benefit of a few, curbing human sexuality is paramount.
After all, sexually healthy humans might not be so motivated to work for their meager existences, rather than enjoy the intensely pleasurable merging that sex provides. Then again, maybe, just maybe, a sexually healthy society of individuals would be all the more able to work as much as necessary to support themselves and the society in which they exist.
Christianity has been particularly successful at appropriating the suppression of human sexuality to extremely profitable ends, for centuries. Read Wilhelm Reich’s “The Murder of Christ“ for the most articulate account of the meaning of Jesus’s life, teachings, and his ultimate destruction. Also, one of Jesus’s best female friends was a prostitute.
Here in the United States, the hoi polloi have a level of affluence unknown before this period in history. We have accomplished this on the back of genocide, grotesque exploitation of natural resources, and brutal imperialism, among other comparably “immoral” practices, all symptomatic of sickened human sexuality. And still we have a society here in which the many support the few. It’s little different than serfs and lords/kings, but the overall level of affluence is better for the masses in this country. We’ll pay for our desperate, miserable greed and cruelty in time, and big time. We already are.
Sexually speaking, and otherwise, the very rich can do pretty much whatever the fuck they want to, and they do. Their antics, including consorting with prostitutes, transient “marriages,” and whatever perversions they can think of, are as warped and distorted expressions of human sexuality as exist among the rest. They, too, are victims of their own oppression. They really have no choice but to be like that.
Create a society in which healthy human sexuality is allowed to be expressed, and elements such as sex-for-money, among many others including, yes, homosexuality, would virtually cease to exist. The question of “morality” would not even creep in.
So, I clearly do not support your idea that “Prostitution is immoral and therefore should be outlawed.“ As I’ve already said, prostitution is a symptom of the problem, not the problem itself. I do not agree with any proclamations of Christianity, the business (as opposed to the teachings of Jesus), nor with those of any entity that exploits human fear and desperation for profit, under the guise of spiritual benefit.
However, I fully support your right to express yourself here, and you have, extensively. I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK, even if I ultimately disagree.
I have posted a thread in The Pit addressing some of the latter issues, specifically in regard to your posts.
The thing is, though, that under many (perhaps even most) circumstances it is quite easy to make the argument that, of the four criteria you present here, the only area in which there is any appreciable difference is in the final one.
Issue 1: Free Choice
Most folks who believe that prostitution is not morally wrong and should be legal (like i do) are talking exclusively about cases where there is, in fact, free choice on the part of all parties to the transactions, the prostitute/s and the customer/s. I have never heard a supporter of legalized prostitution argue that coercion should form any part of the equation.
Does coercion exist with prostitution? Sure, but this is something that we can attempt to eliminate while legalizing prostitution. If someone threatens or extorts or bribes or intimidates another person into prostituting themselves, or into having sex unwillingingly, then it seems to me that we have sufficient laws on the books already to deal with those problems, and the question then becomes one of enforcement.
Now, another possible argument is that women who have been sexually abused might take up prostitution as a result of psychological disorders resulting from their abuse. Many reports suggest that this does, in fact, happen. But again, what we need to do here is stop the abuse, rather than simly criminalize its by-product.
Issue 2: Absence of Coercion
Pretty much covered under part 1
Issue 3: Lack of Damage to Society
Well, as i argued in the other thread, in a post which i know you’ve seen: I think a very strong argument can be made that much of the “damage to society as a whole” caused by prostitution is either a product of other problems and inequities that could be addressed separately (child abuse in some cases; economic and power imbalances between the sexes), or is a direct result of prostitution’s illegality (the involvement of pimps and other unsavory characters; concern among prostitutes about seeking help from police).
As for the damage to society caused by gambling, i think a very strong arrgument can be made that it is extremely high, and considerably more damaging than much of the damage allegedly caused by prostitution. Bankruptcy, broken homes, depression, violence, etc.
Now, you might argue that stuff like this happens in only a small percentage of cases, but given the number of people who gamble heavily it still adds up to considerable hardship for large numbers of Americans. I’m not arguing that gambling should be illegal, only that it is misleading to imply that it has little fallout for the rest of society.
As long as the people engaging in either behavior—gambling or prostitution—do so of their own free will, then i think it should be legal.
Issue 4: Approval of the People.
No argument with your assertion. It is clear to me that more Americans disapprove of prostitution on moral grounds than disapprove of gambling, although i’m not sure that the number who believe that prostitution is inherently immoral is as high as you would like to believe.
I thought I answered that question earlier:
Yes, the majority view is what we’ve decided what we rely on, provided the constitution is not violated. The collective wisdom of the people-- it’s not perfect, but we prefer that to a dictatorship (however benign its intentions are).
Morality has nothing to do with it, except when it rises to the level where people are ready to take up arms against the government. And that’s a decision that has to be made at the individual level. We do not invest the SCOTUS, for example, to be the conscience of the nation, as some people here have proposed (mostly implicitly, but some explicitly).
It’s called “freedom”. Unless I’m hurting someone else, it’s none of the majority’s business.
I think Daniel has quite eloquently laid out the issues. He wants to be the one that decides things. But since you (and I) are unwilling to accept the rule of King Daniel the Wise, and you and he unwilling to accept the Protectorate of Bricker I, the Great, and he and I unwilling to accept Der Trihs the Fearsome… we must all compromise and agree on a system.
We have done so.
Now, that system has decided this issue adversely to you.
So is your edict above, that your way is the way of true freedom:
[ol]
[li]Arguing for an essentially violent revolution to overthrow our existing form of government [/li][li]Just venting [/li][li]Trying to change minds[/li][li]Something else[/li][/ol]
??
We have? Your earlier acknowledgement of this sort of glossed over the specifics of this transition point:
1: Bricker: “Prostitution is immoral, and therefore should be illegal.”
2. then a miracle occurs
3. Bricker: "OK.
Without replying individually to the several posts above that have made varying versions of this point:
It seems clear that merely asserting immorality, even if I can also show public support for the idea that the immorality exists, is insufficient to pass a criminal law. I now accept that." (emphasis mine)
Perhaps I’m mistaken, but my reading of this thread gives me the impression that other posters may suspect that your OP was not entirely transparent. Some people seem to sense that you did not actually believe your original position was defensible, and were in fact inviting responses in order to make a point entirely unrelated to the specific debate over prostitution. Again, I hasten to add that I may be entirely wrong in my interpretation.
Your sudden and unexplained concession probably won’t help to ease any such suspicions: you declare your conversion to the opposing viewpoint without providing any hint of why your mind was changed, while refusing to reply to any individual posts, or state exactly what was said that changed your mind. It might help to clarify matters if you were to point to some specific posts that helped you to realize your error. Who exactly convinced you that you were wrong in your belief, and what persuasive argument did they make that you did not consider at the beginning of the thread?
In practical terms : work to change the law, and ignore the law when I can get away with it. “An unjust law is no law at all” and all that. I have no ethical problems in breaking laws if the forbidden behavior hurts no one; it’s not the governments business to pass such laws.
The following posts and words contributed to my convincing:
“First, the fact that the governing majority in a State has traditionally viewed a particular practice as immoral is not a sufficient reason for upholding a law prohibiting the practice” - Mtgman quoting Lawrence v Texas
“If it were discovered that the majority of people were morally opposed to the statement “The government is responsible for enforcing the citizen’s moral code”, surely this should make any law against prostitution that was based on it being immoral illegal?” - connundrum offered by Driver8
“I don’t think that prositution is immoral. But, it should be illegal in our society because making it illegal is not unconstitutional for states to ciminilize it, and most people want it to be illegal. And where people do want it to be legal, it is (a few counties in NV).” – John Mace offering a much more valid sense of why prostitution should be illegal than simple claims of my morality
Does “work to change the law” map to my option #3, “Try to change peoples’ minds?”
You accuse me of making unsupport accusations and violating the rules of GD and you don’t even respond to my next post?
treis, I apologize if I missed a post of yours. As may be clear from this thread, there are more people on one side of the debate than on the other; I’ve been a little overwhelmed. If I could ask you the favor of either reposting or simply pointing me to the post I missed, I’d be happy to respond.
More or less. Or just bribe the politicians, if I had the money; that’s rather more important than public opinion in this county IMHO.
OK. To recap, you said:
I said that this was an unsupported assertion.
You sought to support it by offering the following exchange:
You declared that my morals came straight from my religion, despite the fact that I had explictly said religion was only a part of what created my morals.
Why would you take the phrase “fully informed conscience” (my actual line) to merely mean “free will and the choice to follow the Church’s teachings?”
Before I answer that question, are you now clear on what your unsupported assertion was?