Why is prostitution illegal?

Very often there’s also a matter of weighing different bad things against each other, of viewing evil as having a scale: if making prostitution illegal means that women forced into it will not dare ask for help, it’s better to legalize (or at least to make it clear that it won’t be prosecuted on the prostitute’s side). Because yeah, voluntary prostitution isn’t a good thing but it’s a much-much-much-less bad thing that slavery.

Again, it is not all about my relationship and what some other guy does. I was using that as an example. The argument has to be more than about what a single person does. Laws affect society as a whole and cannot be distilled to what an individual does.

If me and only me pollutes the air, throws my garbage out the car window, shoots twenty deer, or uses heroin, then there is no societal problem. It is the aggregation and not one individual act that matters to society.

You want to make this horseshit argument that I am some prude clutching my pearls and that my marriage is so fragile and non-sacred because some other guy is sleeping with a prostitute. That completely mischaracterizes the point and turns your argument into a personal insult.

Contrary to your thoughts, most people still believe that sex should be reserved in some way. I wouldn’t go so far as to use the term “sacred” but people in society generally believe that it is not a positive thing to have an outrageous number of sexual partners. Since the dawn of times, across all religions, societies have generally attempted to restrict and channel sex typically through marriage.

In the last fifty years, our society has become increasingly tolerant of more liberal sexuality and has repealed laws or even accepted things that prior to that would have been unseemly: things like fornication, adultery, cohabitation, etc. This has been done for a variety of reasons, none of which is an attitude that sex is now a sporting event.

Indeed the reason for liberalizing most of these laws have been variously given as the emerging idea that sex is a personal decision and it should not be the business of society what goes on behind closed doors between consenting adults. It was argued, for example, that legalizing homosexual sodomy and same sex marriage, far from making sex and marriage a skeevy affair, actually strengthened these traditional values by allowing loving couples to legally express themselves and be recognized as full members of society.

None of this applies to the commercial sale of sex. Such a thing promotes absolutely nothing positive, no underlying values of love or mutual respect: certainly no respect for women. Now, maybe we can have a State Prostitution Control Board to make sure that condoms are used, that birth control is taken, that women are paid properly, not pimped out, that advertising is kept tasteful, that they cannot be within so many feet of a school, etc., but they won’t be 100% effective and still contribute to the social problems mentioned before.

But more importantly, why should we do this? What is the redeeming social goal or value that we would be trying to promote in having legal prostitution? The argument that this empowers women seems silly to me. I’m not a good liberal, but I think it would be far more empowering to women to get them into better fields instead of having them just sell their body for money.

Thank for taking the time to respond thoughtfully. I disagree on several points, but I appreciate your expanding on what really did come across as pretty simplistic.

I’ve read a fair bit about prostitution in Victorian times. What most folks today don’t realize is that the Victorians were much more pragmatic than we give them credit for.

There were many towns in Colorado, Nevada, etc. where prostitution was simultaneously criminalized and regulated. This was achieved through a tiered system of fines. The town ordinance might say something like, “The fine is $5 for acts of prostitution south of Main Street, and $20 for acts of prostitution north of Main Street.” Thus they set up a de facto red-light district. It was also common to require prostitutes to get a thorough medical check-up on a regular basis, and there was a separate fine if they didn’t.

Also–despite the fact that the profession was illegal–it was surprisingly common for certain prostitutes to become well-known in their city. A few even went into other types of business on the side, such as real estate.

In my opinion, our ancestors have a great deal to teach us.

The determination about whether or not to outlaw prostitution is made primarily along the spectrum of those who believe the purpose of government is to promote things good for society and protect it from things viewed as bad for it vs. those who believe the purpose of government is to protect things good for individuals in society and protect them from those who would seek to infringe upon their liberty to be an individual. Ultra Vires asserts that it is irrelevant that I might practice responsible use of prostitutes, because the question is not what I do, but rather what the aggregate effect of prostitution on society as a whole will likely be, even if prostitution is “properly” regulated. The opposite view would be that government has no business infringing upon my effort to buy sex (and the desire of some woman to be paid to have it with me) simply out of fear that somehow my activity will in some relatively minimal way infringe upon their lives. Notice that’s not a Republican v Democrat dichotomy; recently deceased brothel owner Dennis Hof of Nevada was a staunch Republican, who ran for and won (posthumously, it should be noted) a Nevada Legislature seat as a Republican. Rather, it’s a Libertarian v Authoritarian (for lack of a better label) dichotomy.

In the case of prostitution, it’s been illegal in many cultures over human history, so it’s clearly not just a “Protestant” viewpoint that it should be outlawed. But, of course, in any specific culture/polity, how it should be treated is up to the people therein, which is how the US Constitution treats it (though I suppose, given an expansive enough reading, the Congress could use the Commerce Clause to regulate the business nationwide).

For what you say, I infer that the Supreme Court of the United States would decline to hear a case centered on the legality of prostitution.

When state Supreme Courts here such cases, must they not rule based on the constitution of that state? Must they not refer to precedent or the constitution itself.

Sorry - From what you say…

Interesting. I agree that prostitution does nothing to advance any positive societal values. Here a list of other things that I think fall in the same category: cigarettes, handguns, junk food. I’m interested in how these are different. To me, they all represent personal freedom, the foundational ethic of the USA.

In a way I agree with your general characterization, but in a larger and more nuanced way, I disagree with it. I am basically in agreement with the idea that government should be small and should stay out of most areas of human life; it should definitely be involved in way fewer areas than it currently is. People should be able to pursue their own happiness and live their lives as they see fit and not how I see fit for them.

But this Libertarian ideal that so long as what I am doing does not have a direct and material harmful impact on someone else, and that two consenting adults should be able to make any free choice so long as no third party is harmed has superficial appeal, but it simply does not stand up to any sort of scrutiny:

  1. As noted before, it utterly fails to consider the aggregate effects on society as a whole which we have to take into account. If you engage in a single act of prostitution, it does not harm me in the least. It does not then follow that allowing every act of prostitution (consensual by both parties) across the entire country with businesses that cater to clients will not have ill-effects on society as a whole. Libertarians always ignore that one and simply stick by their simplistic individual act.

  2. Even if we grant the individual right argument, it just moves the debate onto the next one. So prostitution is legal and regulated and as part of the regulations, a condom is required. Well doesn’t that equally infringe upon an individual’s freedom? Should I not have the right, in conjunction with a woman who is willing, to pay for sex without using a condom? I mean, we are both adults, I have no STDs, she claims she has no STDs and is using birth control. If I didn’t pay for the sex, we could do exactly that. How is outlawing this type of individual contract any better or worse than outlawing prostitution in general?

Why can I not contract with a consenting adult, after advising him of the risks, to work in an unsafe factory and pay him less than minimum wage or work him past maximum hours? That wouldn’t hurt you one whit. The argument has always been that he is in an unequal bargaining position and may not want to do that but he needs the money. The same could be said of a prostitute.

So at the end of the day, we are only debating about the level of regulation, not some grand ideal of freedom.

  1. What exactly does it mean to not cause harm to someone else? Sure, there are easy ones like murder and robbery that clearly cause harm, but where are the lines? Is it only physical harm? Economic or emotional harm? If we go so far as emotional harm, then this Libertarian ideal, far from promoting freedom, would significantly curtail things like free speech or a free press.

If we have legal prostitution and many young women in rural areas that are having trouble finding a job then turn to prostitution, does that count as a harm?

So at the end of the day I don’t think it is about freedom v. authoritarianism. It is simply about what to regulate and how much regulation is deemed appropriate.

In my mind, I think that the bigger societal issue with prostitution (and one that has already been noted in this thread) is that, even if it were to be legalized, I’m not sure that it’d be possible to eliminate the problem with sex workers who are being exploited, or forced to work as prostitutes against their will.

First, let’s throw handguns out because that will cause a hijack and a different debate. Further, as the Supreme Court has deemed that owning handguns is a constitutional right, it puts them outside the democratic debate process.

Second, there is a lot of inertia in law and there is a huge difference between legalizing something versus outlawing something that is already here.

As far as cigarettes, if we were starting from a clean slate, it would be different. If scientists grew this new crop called “tobacco” and did studies showing that it was highly addictive, caused many diseases and horrific social costs, but on the flip side a bunch of people really like it, then I think we would be almost unanimous in saying that we would not legalize “tobacco.”

But tobacco is here and has been around for about 400 years in European cultures. It would be difficult if not futile to attempt to ban it, putting the personal freedom arguments aside. However, I think as a society, we have put tobacco on its death spiral. You can’t smoke hardly anywhere, it’s taxed to death, and becoming more socially unacceptable each year. We are doing our best to “outlaw” tobacco without directly doing so.

Junk food is even less harmful than tobacco. Yes, there is a social cost, but most people can enjoy it responsibly. This is a free country and people should be allowed to have some vices.

However, just because we allow some vices does not mean that we must allow an increasing number of them. It does not follow that since we allow cigarettes we must then logically allow marijuana, prostitution, cockfights and casino gambling. People are free to say that we will go this far but not that far. Unlike grand pronouncements of a legal philosophy, not everything in society has to follow to its formal logical conclusion.

But this is a circular argument: sex workers are exploited because it is illegal.

A sex worker can’t complain to the police or the state Department of Labor about not being paid overtime, because they would be arrested. So with no society protections, they end up exploited.

Does legalized prostitution in Las Vegas stop illegal prostitution in Las Vegas?

Thing is when a man wants to do a hooker he wants to keep it a secret. Going to a legal brothel leaves a paper trail.

I am sure the ideas of Martin Luther is at the bottom the rather more restrictive Protestant attitude towards prostitution.

Wikipedia is very informative on the history of prostitution around the world and through history.

There were some quite contrasting cultural attitudes and clearly it was closely related to the position and rights of women in society. That and the risk of catching a nasty infection. :eek:

Since there is no legal prostitution in Las Vegas (it’s only legal in rural Nevada), we don’t know. In places like the Netherlands, where prostitution is legal, non-legal prostitution seems to be only a very minor problem. Many of the problems reported seem to be prostitutes operating without a license, or failing to pay taxes on their earnings.

Only if the brothel doesn’t accept cash. And I’ve never heard of one that doesn’t.

Why is prostitution illegal? Another possible answer is, “Because no one cares enough to push it toward legality.”

Take marijuana as a rough equivalent. People who enjoy pot have been pushing for decades to make it legal. For a long time there was no movement at all, but eventually, incremental state-by-state initiatives have tipped the scale. Within the next decade, we’ll probably see recreational weed legal in more states than not.

Hundreds of thousands – if not millions – of Americans enjoy paying for sex, but they’re apparently quite happy to do it outside the law. I’m not aware of any movement on the demand side to legalize it.

And it’s easy to see why. If I told Ms. Akaj I was going to a pro-pot rally, she’d say “Where is it? I’ll join you.” If I told her I was going to a pro-prostitution rally, she’d say “Stop by a divorce lawyer on your way home.”

Undoubtedly true. But, I’m not convinced that, even if it were to be made legal, there still wouldn’t be a considerable amount of exploitation going on.

To be clear: if you have consenting adults, who are all happily in agreement on what they’re doing together, and no third parties are being harmed by it, I truly don’t care what they do. For this reason, conceptually, I think that I wouldn’t be against legalized prostitution. The issue is that I’m still not sure that all prostitutes would necessarily be truly consenting adults.

Isn’t that a risk in any employment situation, though?

I suppose that it is, and I’m willing to admit that I may view sex differently than other occupations. Sex is intertwined with all sorts of strong emotions for most people, as well as opening the possibility of STDs and pregnancy, which just don’t come up with other jobs. Birth control and protection can lessen the health issues, certainly, but it’s by no means an absolute.

On the other hand, you could likely argue that it’s no different from people who choose to work in other risky occupations (like crab fishing or coal mining) because they’re desperate for money and feel like they have no other good options.

Or agriculture or domestic work, two areas that see a lot of worker exploitation.

Totally agreed that our cultural and individual views on sex deeply color the conversation, as much as I might personally prefer otherwise.

Well what do you mean when you say “make it legal”?

Ok, lets say its legal and one can advertise on some local business “provider” board like Craigslist. Will a person be able to do prostitution out of there home? Would you want a prostitute operating next door with all these strange cars always parked outside?

Would it be a business operating in a red light district like in Asia or Rotterdam with semi nude women dancing in the windows?

Would it be a “chicken ranch” style business operating outside of city limits?

I mean while I’m generally ok with making it legal I do not know specifics.