Think again Harriet.
Harriet Harman, the leader of the House of Commons and all round campaigner for equality for women is once again spouting off her mouth about prostitution, the government clamping down on it and how it will prevent human trafficking.
In a speech at the Labour party conference today, she made the following pop-culture infused soundbite:
“It won’t be too difficult for the Terminator to terminate punternet, if he doesn’t, I’ll be back”.
Punternet is a website where men can exchange reviews and ratings of prostitutes, and is based in California (who’s Governer is of course Arnold Schwarzenegger, star of the Terminator films).
Currently in the UK, prostitution is not illegal. But advertising (or soliciting it is). So a woman is well within her legal right to recieve money for sex, but she cannot stand on a street corner to advertise her services or put up cards etc. in phone boxes. Police along with residents of nuisance areas clamp down on repeat kerb crawlers and drive away the custom, forcing prostitutes to go to less visibile areas to ply their trade. Pimps and drugs are also major factors in the dangers of prostitution, making life even more dangerous for prostitutes.
Let us be realistic about something. There are always going to be women who will become so desperate (or perhaps even greedy, lets be realistic!) that they will sell sex for money, and there will always be men, be it business men on trips, sad lonely men in anoraks, or kinky blokes who don’t want to ask their wives to act out their fantasies, who will want to pay for sex. So no matter what prostitution ain’t going nowhere!
Here are quotes from Harriet Harman’s radio 4 interview from December 2007 when she raised the issue:
“Just because something has always gone on, doesn’t mean you just wring your hands and say, ‘Oh well there’s nothing we can do about it’.
“We do need to have a debate and unless you tackle the demand side of human trafficking which is fuelling this trade, we will not be able to protect women from it.
“That is what they’ve done in Sweden. My own personal view is that’s what we need to do as a next step.”
So making prostitution illegal will tackle the demand and eliminate human trafficking? Get real woman! Less women will become prostitutes out of their own free will and human trafficking will increase! And for those who do take the risk, they’re lives will become more dangerous!
How dangerous is prostitution? The women are in danger from punters, pimps, rival prostitues, disease, drugs. They are easy victims, they are the vulnerable – they are also easy pickings for serial killers (as rare as they are).
So what do others think of these proposals? (Taken from BBC News)
“The English Collective of Prostitutes attacked Ms Harman’s support for the Swedish system and urged her to look at New Zealand’s system of legalising brothels instead.
Spokeswoman Cari Mitchell said the Swedish system of criminalising men who buy sex had forced prostitution further underground and “made women more vulnerable to violence”.”
Okay so the Toms don’t agree with Harriet, but surely the coppers do?
“Alan Gordon, vice chairman of the Police Federation, also spoke out against further criminalisation, adding: “A move towards legalising state-run facilities would certainly be something which could be examined, as they could possibly eradicate underground prostitution and therefore have a knock-on effect on human trafficking.””
Nope, apparantly not!
So Ms. Harman – please stop fighting for everyone’s moral good, and just use some common sense.