Going undercover as a sex worker • Hacker News Board

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#201

Post by DominikR » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 6:40 PM UTC

BillyParadise wrote: post #180

_nedR wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>human slavery does happen, but its not the default case. Which country are you talking about? I can imagine this being true in countries like the Netherlands, where state and police actively regulates and monitors it (instead of simple allowing it and ignoring it), but from the preponderance of media coverage and anecdotes i do indeed think that the majority of women in this industry worldwide are exploited in some…

"I read it on HN, so it must be true?" My wife did her master's thesis on sex workers in the Philippines. TL;DR - for the vast majority of female sex workers in that country, it is an economic CHOICE. The mostly single mothers felt it was their best opportunity to earn an income capable of supporting their families. Those with agendas (especially those who are after your donations) are always the ones who speak the l…

It might even be one of the best economic choice in YOUR country, considering how much money can be made with prostitution.

But I'm pretty sure that you'd have slight reservations if your wife or daughter chose this kind of job. Why? It'd make perfect economic sense.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#202

Post by jbrown » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 6:51 PM UTC

kbenson wrote: post #192

jbrown wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or perhaps if they are in a marriage that restricts a resource that isn't supplying enough of that resource, then the marriage should be reexamined. There's a lot of social pressure against this because of the stigma associated with divorce. > Marriage is a contract, if you don't like the terms you agreed to, attempt to change the contract, not to cheat it. This is pretty much what I'm saying. The problem is that p…

> specifically the portion about monogamy / sexual exclusivity It feel like you are pushing a specific aspect to the detriment of the whole. I agree that if someone doesn't desire, or can't maintain monogamy in a marriage, that they should be upfront about this and make sure their partner is aware and accepting. While that this may require a bit of social change to make it more acceptable, I don't think that's a spec…

> It feel like you are pushing a specific aspect to the detriment of the whole.

Maybe. What detriment are you thinking of?

I'm just observing that since monogamy restricts us to this 1:1 gender ratio, and since in some cases one of those 1s is taken off the table (either literally or if not literally, maybe effectively due to low quality) this drastically restricts society's ability to meet a basic human need one a wide scale. To make matters worse, situations like China's gender imbalance add to the challenges that already exist when the gender split is close to 50-50. Wouldn't you agree that these kinds of challenges might be reduced if a many-to-one structure was just as socially acceptable as a one-to-one structure? Could the pigeonhole principle have something to do with the demand for sex trafficking? If this is an unreasonable line of thought, I'd love to understand why.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#203

Post by nailer » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:03 PM UTC

scott_karana wrote: post #163

nailer wrote: post #121

> 'Going undercover as a sex worker' This article is about human trafficking, not sex work. The title makes as much sense as 'Going undercover as a construction worker' and then writing about a construction worker kept as a slave in Dubai.

And yet, that's exactly what occurred. The journalist had to pose as a prostitute to get close to other (unwilling) prostitutes who had been trafficked into the country.

Well yes. The point is the journalist tried to get close to unwilling prostitutes, not prostitutes per se.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#204

Post by dang » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:12 PM UTC

ishener wrote: post #77

rbanffy wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any evidence to support your claim?

for example: http://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?articl...

Please don't bring religious flamewars onto HN.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#205

Post by dang » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:14 PM UTC

alphapapa wrote: post #184

boothead wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, my meme-trolling was a bit childish. However I have read some of Britain First's facebook pages and the comments there are hateful, vitriolic and most of the time barely literate. I actually agree with most of what you said here. I believe that Islam does have some serious structural problems, along with many other religions. Muslim friends say that indeed the Quran is pretty transparently calling for n…

Ok, thanks for explaining that. I briefly glanced at Britain First's own web site (not their Facebook page), and while "nationalism" sounds a bit dangerous to me, the specific policies they advocate don't sound evil to me. On the contrary, they advocate things like a bill of rights to protect people, and enforcing existing laws. No doubt, people who agree with some of their goals, but for different, more hateful reas…

Religious flamewars are not welcome on Hacker News. Please stop this now and don't do it again.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#206

Post by crobertsbmw » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:15 PM UTC

pcthrowaway wrote: post #34

danparsonson wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many (most?) of the women involved in these situations don't go there out of choice or with full knowledge of what they're getting involved in; they're either lied to and subsequently trapped, sold by their families (which is where poverty is a big factor, and certainly is not a choice made by the girls themselves), or outright kidnapped. That's the difference in your man vs. woman scenario - someone working in a coa…

If their choice is to watch themselves or their families starve or die of disease, or to go to a likely death in terrible work conditions where they can at least help their families with the money they earn, it's not really much of a choice at all.

I think the issue is: can one easily come and go from their current state to any one of a set of next best alternatives? For instance, your job as a software dev, you could probably quit and and go be a teacher, or maybe you want to dig ditches, or maybe you want to be a blackjack dealer. Those things are probably all realistically attainable. Whereas, if you are sold into the sex trade and locked in a room, not able to shower for days at a time, you aren't able to swap careers as frictionlessly.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#207

Post by mmrasheed » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:16 PM UTC

vezzy-fnord wrote: post #196

mmrasheed wrote: post #195

It is not only the imbalanced lust of few men that this horrible ecosystem is built around, the whole social structure is equally responsible for its existence and growth. Lack of strong social bond, lack of respect to the existence of other humans, lack of proper education on ethics and humanity, hypocrisy in the name of freedom, idea of living in the moments, greed etc are the reasons behind the existence of prosti…

Pornography is not a "sex related abuse". Nor is the reason behind prostitution's existence the lack of a strong social bond. In fact, prostitution was relatively out in the open and brothels widespread during the medieval period, though views on it ranged variably from reluctant acceptance in the name of compromise (by the Catholic Church) to a more complete one, like in East Asia. Brothels often served as an attrac…

The origin of girls allured to both industries (prostitution and pornography) is probably the same. The recent documentary of Rashida Jones, "Hot girls wanted", sheds modest light on this issue. On the other hand, prostitution is not weaker than before, it has been outsourced far away, so the victims' voices cannot be heard. An example- prostitution business in the East and South East Asia are stronger than ever. There are several documentaries on how children and teenagers in those countries are taken by the prostitution rings to sell to pedophiles, sex abusers and addicts from all over the world. Western European addicts go to the East in groups for orgy and sex trips. And this article uses few cases in the middle East to clearly show the extremity of hypocrisy. These are few documented stories I am talking about. There maybe hundreds of different sort of incidents yet to be documented.

Sex industries have been evolving. And none of these industries treat girls as human beings, rather as sex tools. None of these industries produce respect to any human kind. Prostitution at least has physical boundaries, porn doesn't. And that makes us and our future generation more vulnerable to sex related abuses, not only the people involved in those businesses, but also sometimes out close ones as well. And I don't see why we should not stand against both.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#208

Post by dang » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:24 PM UTC

ishener wrote: post #16

The big elephant in the room that it is politically incorrect to discuss: human trafficking happens because of Muslims and because of Islam. Recognizing this fact will help fight it, for example by closing Europe to Muslims.

There were two good things about this bigoted comment and the nasty subthread it set off: one was that it fell straight to the bottom of the page, and the other was the good HN users around—who made it clear, via flagging and calm replies, that HN is not the place for this.

A third good thing is that, for such difficult and intense subject matter, the rest of the discussion on the page managed to be substantive and civil.

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#209

Post by oldmanjay » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:42 PM UTC

nostrebored wrote: post #153

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look at the efficacy of the Nordic model. The Nordic model is less efficient than decriminalisation. It drives sex workers underground, giving them less protection.

Legalization has shown an increase in human trafficking to Germany. The use of unions has also been stigmatized by the pimps -- sorry, "Brothel owners" to the point that they're completely ineffective. Surprise, surprise, vulnerable women are still exploited. How can you call that effective?

So maybe this is a stupid question, but if vulnerable women are "still" exploited then how was keeping it illegal helping anything?

Re: Going undercover as a sex worker

#210

Post by nostrebored » Mon, Jun 22, 2015, 7:54 PM UTC

oldmanjay wrote: post #209

nostrebored wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Legalization has shown an increase in human trafficking to Germany. The use of unions has also been stigmatized by the pimps -- sorry, "Brothel owners" to the point that they're completely ineffective. Surprise, surprise, vulnerable women are still exploited. How can you call that effective?

So maybe this is a stupid question, but if vulnerable women are "still" exploited then how was keeping it illegal helping anything?

Not a stupid question. The Nordic model is another model of decriminalization that places responsibility on the individuals who buy sex. In this model, the sex-workers are not prosecuted for being prostitutes, and are given the ability to use social programs to leave prostitution if they choose to. The intent is to remove the stigmatization of women in prostitution, and giving them the means to leave the sex-work if they wish to, in stark contrast to our current system (in the US) of making prostitution illegal, typically targeting the prostitutes, which makes getting help scary/difficult. It is essentially a model that tries to help those who have resorted to prostitution out of desperation while attempting to diminish the demand that drives the industry. Also, it is notable that pimping is illegal in the Nordic model.