Susan's Place Transgender Resources

The Undeclared War On African American Trans Women
by Moonflowrr
Sun Jan 04, 2009 at 10:01:26 AM PST

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/1/4/123730/3564/308/680067 (http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/1/4/123730/3564/308/680067)

It's not spoken of much, and gets an obscenely light, uncaring treatment in straight or GLBT press, much less being acknowledged by political leaders or law enforcement.  But there's a war going on out there, and black transgender women are the target.  I'm not saying that it's only black trans women facing frequent anti-trans – there are large number of latina transwomen as well – nor is it to say that trans men of color aren't facing the same threats.  But the reported killings compiled against all transgenders are showing a very notable disproportion of black trans women being the prime target of murder, especially in the U.S.

The Taysia Elzy incident in north Indianapolis' Broad Ripple neighborhood is just the latest incident in a litany of deaths in the African-American trans community these past years.  Any year is dangerous for anyone who is trans, and especially so for trans people of color.  Yet this year has been especially brutal, and in virtually every incident reported also maddeningly brushed off as "probably not a hate crime" by law enforcement.

I'm glad people more eloquent than myself are speaking up about this.  I'm not sure what to do about it, but raising awareness and conveying its unacceptability seems a good first step.

Thanks for this piece, Zythyra. I know that all too often such pieces get short-shrift becaue "that doesn't apply to me." Which, maybe is a sadder commentary on ourselves than on anything else in the world.

It becomes too easy to use the fashionable "I'd never be caught dead doing sex-work" trope when we have good jobs and some hope of getting better ones. We've never been required to "choose" such work. But every death by violence, every dismissal of our lives by ourselves when we decline to accept that many of our sisters haven't much other choice than to do what we expect transsexuls to do, transsex, if they aren't making their money, every dismissal by cops and prosecutors of their deaths, takes us just a bit further down that road of self-hatred and loathing that seems so prevalent amongst us. Don't ask for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee.

Sad the tales, but they need telling and it's high time we awaken ourselves to the fact that people do matter, all of them.

Nichole

Sadly, I think, though few of us admit or talk about it, the thought is probably more common than we think. I've certainly been forced to consider it, and I have a friend, recently kicked out by her parents, who is kind-of in that boat now, since other work is few and far between for "our kind of people" in a conservative country and an economic meltdown. I dread talking to her most nights because I just end up regurgitating the same old assurances and platitudes that mean bugger-all. :(

Mina.

Quote"I'd never be caught dead doing sex-work" trope when we have good jobs and some hope of getting better ones. We've never been required to "choose" such work.

This is not true. A white TS I know had a goal to be a porn star. She quit a high paying tech job and made over 500 porn films and made it with 2000 men as she brags. She has tried to commit suicide 4 times and been in jail 6 times. She now married a millionaire that has a house on the water and a big boat. She never said anything about love.

It is a fallacy to think or declare the only living for people is sex work. It may be what lazy people want. Many low paying jobs can be had but they are hard work under poor conditions and some just rather take drugs and ignore morals and all the problems of sex work for the easy money.

Sex work and drugs are illegal for more than religious values. They destroy the human spirit and the community. If you look at statistics you will find all black people have a average life expectancy less than others. The odds do not point to war on black TS rather they support a concept that law breakers have shorter life spans.

If everyone's life truly counts then why do we allow this behavior on the streets? Could it be that society is not willing to pay to correct the problem?

lisagurl: I have to disagree. Sure, individuals do get into porn or prostitution because they think it is easy money, but you cannot generalise that to everybody. And the old chestnut that there are plenty of jobs to be had if you're willing to work at them is not true for everybody.

As to the morality and legality of the matter, I have a question: what do you base your argument on that sex work is immoral? You are an atheist, or at least, you express atheist viewpoints on forum, so I'm assuming it's not a religious objection. What leads you to argue that prostitution destroys the human spirit and erodes the community? Certainly the degradation, exploitation and violence that seem to go hand in hand with it do those things, but everywhere I know of that prostitution has been legalised and regulated, where working girls have gained rights and protections, those negative aspects have dropped substantially.

What a woman, a man or an androgyne chooses to do with another individual is a private matter between them. Nobody else has a say in it.

One thing I will agree on is that society ISN'T willing to pay the price: They would rather keep taking the moral high ground while people are dying rather than concede that their moral values do not apply universally.

Mina.

QuoteI know of that prostitution has been legalised and regulated, where working girls have gained rights and protections, those negative aspects have dropped substantially.

Look at Amsterdam the underworld has gained a foothold and is now being cleaned up. As drugs are needed to relieve the pain . They are now cleaning it up. As the average life expectancy is lower in those areas. Along with drugs other crimes come as people have little respect for each other.

QuoteThe urge goes well beyond a mere lowering of expectations, and it has more to do with protecting self-image than with psychological conflicts rooted in early development, in the Freudian sense. Recent research has helped clarify not just who is prone to self-handicapping but also its consequences — and its possible benefits.

Here is another problem. self-handicapping allows those who are lazy to feel OK about what they do. If that does not work they turn to drugs. Being legal does stop the loss of community it just saves tax payer the cost of solving the issue. It may also reduce the spread of disease. Being legal does not stop the suicides and loss of human spirit. It also does little to reduce crime and deaths. The only crime it reduces is the prostitution crime.

I don't know if there is a "war" on transwomen of color but discrimination against the perceived norm is very much alive. Also, women are still an acceptable object of violence for a lot of men so any woman, black, white, trans or GG is a target. Brandon Teena became a target of rape and humiliation when his murderers confirmed by force he was female-bodied.
Prostitute women are in particular an easy target for killers. Like a soldier, whoever chooses such life chooses its risks too. Coming from the third world, I don't know that I can understand Americans being forced into a life of prostitution so I surmise that whoever practices prostitution understands the risks associated or has made a lot of bad choices. In the case of Tayshia (or any trans victim), the only thing we should care is that she's a sister that was killed, nothing else.

As a side note, in a society as multicultural as the US, racial discrimination is rampant. A lot of people are still tribal and work for their little cliques, so eventually the whites distrust the blacks, the blacks distrust the latins, the latins distrust the asians, etc. I wish we'd stop passing this ball of hate and not become the best oppressors our oppresors taught us to be.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 06, 2009, 09:34:31 AM
It is a fallacy to think or declare the only living for people is sex work. It may be what lazy people want.

i hope i am not trying to make a point, but i think we should approach this issue differently, rather than propagating racial or socio-economic stereotypes.

people, i think, are drawn to extreme measures often because of emotional struggles brought on by a coldly uncaring home environment, and a coldly uncaring society. it is my opinion (and who cares about opinions?) that leaders at the local, state, and national levels have long since abandoned the idea of community-building, and, indeed, actively work against it wherever it raises its hopeful head.

our society is not, and has not been for a very long time, a model of cooperation.

Ha!

rather, it is a mad, winner-take-all (screw the losers) grab for whatever political advantage and self-interest that one can get. ew! now i've spoken the truth and made myself feel unhappy.

-ell

all black people have a average life expectancy less than others. The odds do not point to war on black TS rather they support a concept that law breakers have shorter life spans.


It's poverty more than drugs, sex or race.  Poor white folks have shorter life spans than rich honkies do too.

And lots of rich people do drugs too, Rehab centers that advertise on TV, Betty Ford and all that - none of that is for po' folk.

lisagurl: Rather than get into a "statistics can prove anything" argument, I'll just relate what personal experience I have. I'll post some references at the end of my reply if you're interested.

I lived and worked in London for a couple of years, and became good friends with two working girls while there, one of whom was trans. The trans friend's story is sadly all too familiar - BA arts in music, but could not get work to stick in her eye once she went FT, and after her savings and the good graces of family and friends ran out, she was forced to do what she needed to do to survive. Her landlord got wind of this and kicked her out. Because of what she does, she is too scared to take the matter up legally, and to get a new place she has to be able to produce payslips, bank statements etc ... which she obviously doesn't have.

The other friend was an emigrant from South America who had come to the UK to study, on her parents' dime. She was doing fairly well till the money from back home dried up - she never went into details why, but from what I could gather her father ran into legal difficulties. She decided to stay and try and find a job so she could complete her studies, but because she didn't have any experience or qualifications yet, and because of really poor English, she couldn't find anything. When I met her she was trying to get back home because she had witnessed a crime and did not trust the police to protect her because of what she did for a living.

I met both when I ran into my own landlady troubles over there (kicked out when I came out to her as being trans) and ended up in the same no-questions-asked boarding house. I'm being intentionally vague on some of the specific details, but the point I'm trying to make is that neither of them chose the situation they found themselves in. That situation was a hundred times worse because what they did was illegal and they had no rights or protections whatsoever. Neither one was an addict or a wreck - they were both strong women who had simply run afoul of really bad circumstances.

Anyway, that's my take on it, do with it as you will.

Mina.

Oh, stats:

http://www.kuro5hin.org/?op=displaystory;sid=2002/12/22/185323/82 (http://www.kuro5hin.org/?op=displaystory;sid=2002/12/22/185323/82)

http://www.csun.edu/~psy453/prosti_y.htm (http://www.csun.edu/~psy453/prosti_y.htm)

http://liberator.net/articles/prostitution.html (http://liberator.net/articles/prostitution.html)

QuoteI have a question: what do you base your argument on that sex work is immoral?

There are natural physical laws that empirical science through testing, measuring, calculating and ration reasoning that give expected results.  The probability of shorting you life is much greater if you engage in activity that goes against the cultural norm. Perhaps absolute right and wrong do not exist except in religion as I do not think they have a monopoly on the better way to live, but common sense can develop a set of morals that let the human race survive to the best of its ability.

QuoteRather than get into a "statistics can prove anything" argument, I'll just relate what personal experience I have

Emotions personal experience do not lead to the probability of ones action. Personal experience is subjective and is always less accurate than objective measurement to determine if something is going to happen.

QuoteWhen I met her she was trying to get back home because she had witnessed a crime and did not trust the police to protect her because of what she did for a living.

Breaking the law leads to lawlessness. Then Murder is OK because it is OK to break the law. Not reporting a crime is also a crime. Police alone could never catch and solve crimes without the public help. So crime escalates in areas that allow small crimes because the larger crime commits know that no one will talk.

QuoteNeither one was an addict or a wreck - they were both strong women who had simply run afoul of really bad circumstances.

They simply did not run afoul. They made bad decisions, poor judgments and broke the law. They could of gone to a shelter. The could of used the state employment services. They could of taken advantage of education of English programs. My father ran a factory that 90% of the workers did not speak English they did hair dresser work on wigs. Ignorance of law is not an excuse to break it. It takes a person willing and wanting to do what is right rather than what ever emotionally is easy.

Lisa, you've known one. One. Heck even I've known 3 over the years through boards and such, who opted for sex-work. None of them seemed "lazy" and all three were "white."

And your generalization that appeared to couple "black" people and "short life spans" and "crime" seems to me more symptomatic of what Moonflower wrote about and what I was driving at in my original response.

I know you have some decided opinions on things, but Lisa, even for you this entire set of presumptions and assumptions and just out-and-out declarations of off-the-cuff "knowledge" is pretty lame, hon.

You really have a "thang" about sex work doncha? Is there any crime you feel is worse? Where does that come from. Seems like everytime s-e-x is mentioned anywhere your eyes kinda glaze over and you lose any pretense of the emotional detachment you display in so many other areas.

Whassup?

Nichole

I've known several people who work in the sex industry.  All of them by choice, some gay, some straight, some trans, some male, some female.  At one of the places I work at we share an alley with a 'gentleman's club' next door (yes, the girls next door are strippers) and I talk with some of them from time to time when they out having a smoke (its Cali, you can't smoke inside anywhere, not even in a strip joint) and they are pulling down $40-50K a year, which is not bad for a High School degree.  Some of the people I've known who have done porn movies did it more for the fun then the money.

*sigh* Kat, as always the expert on the arcana of the so-called "seamy side of life!"  :laugh: :laugh:

Man, you do your homework, doncha?  >:-)

Quote from: Nichole on January 06, 2009, 02:53:00 PM
Lisa, you've known one. One. Heck even I've known 3 over the years through boards and such, who opted for sex-work. None of them seemed "lazy" and all three were "white."

And your generalization that appeared to couple "black" people and "short life spans" and "crime" seems to me more symptomatic of what Moonflower wrote about and what I was driving at in my original response.

I know you have some decided opinions on things, but Lisa, even for you this entire set of presumptions and assumptions and just out-and-out declarations of off-the-cuff "knowledge" is pretty lame, hon.

You really have a "thang" about sex work doncha? Is there any crime you feel is worse? Where does that come from. Seems like everytime s-e-x is mentioned anywhere your eyes kinda glaze over and you lose any pretense of the emotional detachment you display in so many other areas.

Whassup?

Nichole

I'd noticed too  ::)

Nice girls are their own punishment in a way.  And SF has a huge porn industry, so its not that hard to find people who have done one or two.  Heck I know a bunch of people who were extras in the MILK film, they called it 'being gay for a day for pay."

Quote from: tekla on January 06, 2009, 03:06:17 PM
Nice girls are their own punishment in a way.

Acid rain has nothing on you, Teks :P

Quote from: soldierjane on January 06, 2009, 03:10:11 PM

Quote from: tekla on January 06, 2009, 03:06:17 PM
Nice girls are their own punishment in a way.

Acid rain has nothing on you, Teks :P

Agreed, SJ -- add salt-spray corrosion, sandstorm abrasion and rocky avalanche discombobulation!!  >:-)

QuoteYou really have a "thang" about sex work doncha? Is there any crime you feel is worse?

Yes when I was driving a Taxi in Fairbanks at night a prostitute came up to me and said she would pay me $10 for every customer I directed to her. I sent the cops in her direction. The crimes worse than sex work is those who use the sex worker. There would be no sex work if people made decisions on objective means rather than temporary emotional ones.

I  use the term "lazy" to describe people who rather skit the law rather than put the work in required to obey it. Sometimes people put a lot of effort in breaking the law they still are lazy. I have seem many con artists that if they only put in half the effort to legitimate work would have been much better off. It seems that satisfying emotions is easier than controlling the will.

QuoteAnd your generalization that appeared to couple "black" people and "short life spans" and "crime"

Statistics show that a higher percentage of black people are in jail they also show that on an average they live ten years less. That is no different than declaring war on black TS people because a few have been killed. True all the facts are not there, so someone has to point that out to the misinformed public. Leave the emotions out of reporting facts.

Humans will never be civilized as long as they let emotions run the show. Irrational acts based on feelings destroy life, liberty and happiness. The whole historic traditions based on gender have not improved the human character. Language itself is stuck with these traditions that lead to inequities and discrimination.

As long as sex is used as a tool to manipulate the human psyche the playing field will not be level.

What about in places where prostitution is legal?  Is it still as bad if it's not against the law?

Quote from: lisagurl on January 06, 2009, 03:20:39 PM

... Leave the emotions out of reporting facts.

Humans will never be civilized as long as they let emotions run the show. Irrational acts based on feelings destroy life, liberty and happiness. The whole historic traditions based on gender have not improved the human character. Language itself is stuck with these traditions that lead to inequities and discrimination.

As long as sex is used as a tool to manipulate the human psyche the playing field will not be level.

Yeah, exactly what I mean. You are generally pretty unemotional about things but the s-e-x seems to always strike nerve-pay-dirt and emotional pay-dirt with ya.

Of course, I wouldn't press for an answer you don't want to give, but what you just called for seems to be exactly what you do in conversations about these topics. See what I mean, Lisa?

Nichole

QuoteAs long as sex is used as a tool to manipulate the human psyche the playing field will not be level.

There are millions of things to comment on on the web. Personal selection of where to spend your time is a interesting subject. Is it emotional? Or is it important? Or is it a key to solving many problems? Or is it inspirational or a passion. How the mind works is dependent on many things. Goals, also have a part as people direct their will to completing them.  I could probably list many more I cared enough. But I do see a common thread on gender focused boards. That emotions are more important than objectivity especially those emotions that come from sexual feelings. Many that think that way are always shooting themselves in the foot and think the world is against them.

Quotebut what you just called for seems to be exactly what you do in conversations

Your favorite straw-man?

Quote from: lisagurl on January 06, 2009, 02:21:20 PMPersonal experience is subjective and is always less accurate than objective measurement to determine if something is going to happen.

Okay, cool. Usually when I bring stats and stuff into a discussion they get dismissed with that "you can use statistics to prove anything" argument. Sorry.

QuoteBreaking the law leads to lawlessness. Then Murder is OK because it is OK to break the law. Not reporting a crime is also a crime. Police alone could never catch and solve crimes without the public help. So crime escalates in areas that allow small crimes because the larger crime commits know that no one will talk.

Ah but she did go to the police. They wanted her to testify in open court. She feared for her life if she did so. If she had worked in a well regulated, protected industry, she would likely never have been in the position to witness such a crime, except by chance.

QuoteThey simply did not run afoul. They made bad decisions, poor judgments and broke the law. They could of gone to a shelter. The could of used the state employment services. They could of taken advantage of education of English programs. My father ran a factory that 90% of the workers did not speak English they did hair dresser work on wigs. Ignorance of law is not an excuse to break it. It takes a person willing and wanting to do what is right rather than what ever emotionally is easy.

Trans-people in the UK are still horribly marginalised. My first friend tried the avenues you describe. Nobody wanted to hire her, woman's shelters turned her away, she couldn't go to male shelters for obvious reasons. It's not so easy my dear. When you are part of an unwanted minority, by definition, people don't want you.

As for the South American friend, she was there on a student's visa, I was there on a working holiday visa. Neither of those visas allow you recourse to state funds.

Okay, on to the fact-based discussion:

I just want to make sure that we're arguing the same position, for or against, so would you agree to this being an accurate statement of why prostitution should remain illegal? Please feel free to add specific objections you have to prostitution that aren't covered here.

Quote from: http://www.csun.edu/~psy453/prosti_y.htm
Until the 1960s, attitudes toward prostitution were based on Judeo-Christian views of immorality. Researchers have recently attempted to separate moral issues from the reality of prostitution. The rationale for its continued illegal status in the U.S. rests on three assumptions: 1) prostitution is linked to organized crime; 2) prostitution is responsible for much ancillary crime; and 3) prostitution is the cause of an increase in venereal disease.

I would probably add one that I see argued fairly often: 4)prostitution should remain illegal to protect sex-workers potential or current, from trafficking, exploitation and violence.

Mina.

QuoteAs for the South American friend, she was there on a student's visa, I was there on a working holiday visa. Neither of those visas allow you recourse to state funds.

Neither of those visa's allow you to work and stay so as illegals you should have been deported. There are laws for reasons. People come to different cultures and expect them to accommodate law breakers because they are needy? Here in the U.S people are expected to learn our history and language, as  they earn there citizenship. Again skirting the law ends up in big problems which is not the way to gain sympathy or help.

As Bush and Cheney, and Clinton, and Nixon have taught us - the law is pretty much what you make it.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 07, 2009, 11:05:55 AM

QuoteAs for the South American friend, she was there on a student's visa, I was there on a working holiday visa. Neither of those visas allow you recourse to state funds.

Neither of those visa's allow you to work and stay so as illegals you should have been deported. There are laws for reasons. People come to different cultures and expect them to accommodate law breakers because they are needy? Here in the U.S people are expected to learn our history and language, as  they earn there citizenship. Again skirting the law ends up in big problems which is not the way to gain sympathy or help.

Of course. Having never felt what it's like having to emigrate to the other side of the world to be able to actually have a life escapes your First World, American upbringing so you can declamate all these tough-sounding maxims about breaking the law and waiting in queues from your comfy armchair.

Lisa, you have no idea. No idea.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 07, 2009, 11:05:55 AMNeither of those visa's allow you to work and stay so as illegals you should have been deported. There are laws for reasons. People come to different cultures and expect them to accommodate law breakers because they are needy? Here in the U.S people are expected to learn our history and language, as  they earn there citizenship. Again skirting the law ends up in big problems which is not the way to gain sympathy or help.

Actually both do. The student visa allows a part-time job of up to 20 hours, while a working holiday visa is a Work visa specifically for young Commonwealth citizens. That's beside the point though.

The point, is that for her going back home meant a life of grinding poverty and very little else. Going to the UK was an out her parents gave her, which unfortunately didn't last. And just to be clear, she still held a valid student visa, so she was in the UK legally, and the only reason she wanted to leave was because she felt she had no choice, since her life was in danger.

Don't be so quick to judge people and situations you have no experience of. When things become a matter of survival, you'd be surprised at what values and morals you are willing to suspend. The world is not nearly so black and white as you would like for it to be.

Still curious whether you're willing to take this from an emotional exchange to a fact-based discussion, so I'll ask again: Specifically, what objections do you have against prostitution? Do you agree with the four rationales against legalisation I posted?

Mina.

QuoteSpecifically, what objections do you have against prostitution?

1. It is degrading to all female gender.
2. It makes any kind of intimate love suspect.
3. It enforces cultural and gender bigotry.
4. It spreads decease.
5. It promotes gender stereotypes.
6. It attracts other illegal activities such as gambling, racketeering, drugs,slave trade etc. (Amsterdam has all those problems after it legalized prostitution.)
7. It promotes jealously in families and eventually leads to single parent situations which is not the best for children.
8. It is a short lived occupation which hastily ages the person and leaves them with no marketable skills later in life.
9. There is no hope of advancement.
10. The death rate from abuse and other health problems is much higher than any other job.
I am tired of typing as I could go on.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 07, 2009, 03:03:06 PM
7. It promotes jealously in families and eventually leads to single parent situations which is not the best for children.

lol... so my husband can have the hots for the neighbour and as long as she's not a prostitute, I shouldn't be jealous.

Quotelol... so my husband can have the hots for the neighbor and as long as she's not a prostitute, I shouldn't be jealous.

Your neighbor having sex with a married man is also degrading to all women. The idea of using sex to market products does the same thing. A study was done having men watch sexy commercials and another group watching none sexy commercials. Then the men interviewed women for an executive job. The group that saw the sexy commercials put many more degrading questions to the applicant and flirted as well as embarrassed the women and the other group of men were much more professional.

Your husband having the hots means he is missing something at home or not satisfied. Something to talk about. Perhaps the jealousy is unwarranted.

11. Not to mention it does not look good on a resume.

How puritanical.  And women were not at all degraded and subjugated in that society, were they?

1. It is degrading to all female gender.
I don't feel degraded in the least.  I'm not a prostitute, why should I feel degraded?  What they do with their lives does not affect what I do with my life.

2. It makes any kind of intimate love suspect.
No it doesn't.  You don't sleep with somebody wondering if they're a prostitute on the side or not, or whatever.  This makes no sense.

3. It enforces cultural and gender bigotry.
Not really.  You do realize there are male prostitutes, right?

4. It spreads decease.
Any unprotected sex spreads disease.  Many prostitutes now refuse to do anything without condoms involved, which basically removes this from being a valid concern.  And if you did mean 'decease,' no, it doesn't spread death, either, not any more than other dangerous jobs.

5. It promotes gender stereotypes.
Walking down the street in feminine clothing promotes gender stereotypes.  Unless everyone in the world became androgynous tomorrow, there would still be gender stereotypes.  Again, there are male prostitutes.

6. It attracts other illegal activities such as gambling, racketeering, drugs,slave trade etc. (Amsterdam has all those problems after it legalized prostitution.)
Amsterdam?  Are we talking about the same place?  I thought Amsterdam was very lawful and organized.  At any rate, all those things you listed would still be around without prostitution.  Prostitution is not a cause, it just happens to be lumped together with those things.

7. It promotes jealously in families and eventually leads to single parent situations which is not the best for children.
Lol what?!  First of all, single parent families can be just fine for children.  Second of all, prostitution only promotes 'jealousy' in families if the spouse has chosen to see one.  In which case, the couple would have had problems anyway, whether that particular outlet for it existed or not.  The existence of prostitution doesn't force people to cheat on their spouses, they either will or they won't.

8. It is a short lived occupation which hastily ages the person and leaves them with no marketable skills later in life.
It's still the woman's choice to do this if she wishes.  As I've said before, we can disagree with something, we can not understand or condone the decision, but that doesn't give us the right to judge others or tell them they 'can't' do something just because we personally find it distasteful.  Besides which, who says prostitutes don't have other jobs on the side which are giving them marketable skills?  Who says they're not educated?  You're making sweeping generalizations.

9. There is no hope of advancement.
Depends on what you mean by advancement, I suppose.  But anyway, lots of jobs have little hope of advancement, I don't see you railing against janitors and waitresses.

10. The death rate from abuse and other health problems is much higher than any other job.
Again, it's the person's choice to do this.  Hate the sin, not the sinner.  And if this is about death rate and the danger involved, you should be against mining and construction and firefighting and astronauts and all kinds of dangerous jobs.  Danger =/= bad.

11. Not to mention it does not look good on a resume.
Lol, like they really put it on their resumes?  News flash.. they don't care what you think of them.  If they cared so much about how it looked to other people, they probably wouldn't do it.

QuoteI don't feel degraded in the least.  I'm not a prostitute, why should I feel degraded?  What they do with their lives does not affect what I do with my life.

Your life is effected by what your group of peers does. Men that watch sexy commercials treat women like sex objects. They do not discriminate about individuals. Research proves it.

QuoteNo it doesn't.  You don't sleep with somebody wondering if they're a prostitute on the side or not, or whatever.  This makes no sense.

The prostitute themselves are confused between a John that is paying and a person they have should have feelings for. Hence they forget what love is.

QuoteNot really.  You do realize there are male prostitutes, right?

The aggressive male behavior is enforced in both cases.

QuoteAny unprotected sex spreads disease.

There is more disease than SIDs. TB, viruses, flues, infections etc.

QuoteWalking down the street in feminine clothing promotes gender stereotypes.

Certain type of clothing degrades and invites unwanted behavior also stamps a person for expected abuse.

Read "Dress for Success"

QuoteAmsterdam?  Are we talking about the same place?

Do your research. Even Times Square had the problem, now it much more civil with much less crime and much safer.

QuoteFirst of all, single parent families can be just fine for children.

Most research points to crime from children from single parents because they do not get the attention and disciplined they need.

QuoteThe existence of prostitution doesn't force people to cheat on their spouses,

Just like restaurants that allow smoking do not contribute to people smoking.

QuoteYou're making sweeping generalizations.

Look at the statistics you yourself said that speaking English is what prevented her from getting a job. Education!

QuoteI don't see you railing against janitors and waitresses

My father started as a janitor and became Vice President.

QuoteAgain, it's the person's choice to do this.

It has a much higher death rate than any other job. It drives up health care costs which we all pay.

QuoteLol, like they really put it on their resumes

You have to account for your deeds. Not telling the truth just invites more problems as a person could never be trustworthy our receive any security clearance again limiting any success in life.

Please note: The main report I cite: report (http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/international-approaches/index.html) was commissioned by the New Zealand Justice Department's Prostitution Law Review Committee. I mention it here so I don't have to retype the whole shebang over and over again later.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 07, 2009, 03:03:06 PM1. It is degrading to all female gender.

This is an opinion.

Quote2. It makes any kind of intimate love suspect.

Again, an opinion.

Quote3. It enforces cultural and gender bigotry.

An opinion.

Quote4. It spreads disease.

Those diseases spread because of unsafe sex, and unsafe sex occurs because of a combination of ignorance and an imbalance of power, which gets entrenched precisely because prostitution is unregulated. Prostitutes are uneducated about HIV and other STD's, and even where they are informed, they often do not feel they have the power to say no, because they know they have no recourse to the police or other institutions of protection should they find themselves in a dangerous situation.

In countries where prostitution is legal and regulated, prostitutes in fact tend to be healthier than the general population:

Quote from: B. Leopold, E. Steffan, N. Paul
GERMANY:

A study in 1992 found that only 2.5% of the tested prostitutes had a disease, a rate much lower than the one among comparable non-prostitutes.

Source: Dokumentation zur rechtlichen und sozialen Situation von Prostitutierten in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Schriftenreihe des Bundesministeriums für Frauen und Jugend, Band 15, 1993, via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Germany

Quote
SENEGAL:

Health and safety – Senegal first African country to legalise commercial sex (with routine health checks) to curb the spread of AIDs and other STIs. Senegal has one of the lowest rates of HIV/AIDs in Africa; HIV infection rate of just 2% much lower than rates in neighbouring countries. (Prostitution ProCon (2007))

Source: http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/international-approaches/chapter-3.html

Finally, where prostitutes HAVE been educated and mobilised in the fight against STD's, they have had a positive influence:

Quote from: Rwankineza R, Bandira O; International Conference on AIDS (15th : 2004 : Bangkok, Thailand).
From a study detailing an HIV education initiative amongst prostitutes in Burundi. These results from a refugee camp at Bujumbura:

Results:50 women publicly accepted to have practiced prostitution. They recognized that they were now conscient of the bad consequences of prostitution. Among the 30 prostitutes who accepted to volonteerly do the test of AIDS. 18 were HIV negative and 12 were HIV positive. Their new behaviour lead their partners to also change. Conclusions: The project allowed the improvement of the prostitutes HIV knowledge and the adoption of responsible behaviour; The income generating activities allowed those women to improve their socio-economic conditions and to be independent vis-a-vis their partners.

Please pardon poor grammar. Study coordinators not native English speakers.

Source: US National Library of Medicine: http://gateway.nlm.nih.gov/MeetingAbstracts/ma?f=102278392.html

Quote5. It promotes gender stereotypes.

How exactly? There are many male prostitutes out there too. What it does do is objectify both sexes, but then, so does porn, modelling and watersports (hmmm... surfers... ;D), all of which are legal.

Quote6. It attracts other illegal activities such as gambling, racketeering, drugs,slave trade etc. (Amsterdam has all those problems after it legalized prostitution.)

Not so. As demonstrated in the following quote, regulated prostitution actually drove organised crime out to less controlled areas:

Quote
DENMARK:

Criminal activity (trafficking and minors) – reported as having not decreased, but moved to regions with less control (Bindel & Kelly, 2004)

Source: http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/international-approaches/chapter-3.html

Where prostituation is legal and the stigma removed, prostitutes and clients can actually aid in combatting illegal activities:

Quote
TURKEY:

Trafficking – clients in Turkey helping to report trafficked women following introduction of a charge-free hotline. Turkish men are reported to have an 'old-fashioned' view of women. They don't mind using sex workers, but they want the woman to be doing this willingly. 'If she's found not to be doing it willingly ... it affects their pride' (Beattie, 2005).

Source: http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/international-approaches/chapter-3.html

Quote7. It promotes jealously in families and eventually leads to single parent situations which is not the best for children.

Again, how? Please provide evidence I can look at. If a couple is happily married, they won't be seeking things elsewhere. If they are not, they don't need to find a prostitute - the next-door-neighbour, somebody at a bar or a colleague all do perfectly well.

Quote8. It is a short lived occupation which hastily ages the person and leaves them with no marketable skills later in life.

True, but then, as Tam-Tam points out, the same is true of waitering or sweeping the streets or being a woodcutter or, or, or. All these are specialised professions that provide you with skills applicable only to that profession, except incidental soft skills you might pick up.

Quote9. There is no hope of advancement.

True and untrue. In the same way that a plumber is, well, a plumber, a prostitute is a prostitute. On the other hand, both can advance into working for themselves or even eventually owning a business.

Quote10. The death rate from abuse and other health problems is much higher than any other job.

See point six above for arguments against mortality from health problems. As for abuse, this comes about as a result of the environment created through criminalization. Where prostitution has been decriminalised, the health and safety of prostitutes has generally improved:

Quote
AUSTRALIA:

While firm conclusions are hard to draw, some evidence is emerging that health, safety and working conditions are improved in decriminalised regimes (e.g. New South Wales) and to some extent within legalised regimes (e.g. Victoria, Queensland, Netherlands, and Nevada). Improvements in the legalised regimes were limited to those businesses that were operating within the regulations and did not extend to the illegal operations.

Source: http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/international-approaches/chapter-4.html

Quote
NEVADA, USA:

Safety – legal brothels found in general to offer a safer working environment than illegal ones. Legalisation of prostitution seen to bring a level of public scrutiny, official regulation, and bureaucratisation of brothels that decreases the risk of three types of systematic violence; interpersonal violence against sex workers, violence against community order, and sexually transmitted diseases as violence (Brents & Hausbeck, (2005))

Source: http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/international-approaches/chapter-3.html

On a general note, this article does a good job of summarising all the statistics out there, a job I'm just too lazy to take on right now.

Mina.

QuoteNEVADA, USA

The business is in isolated in middle of nowhere there is not local community to destroy, just those who work and play there. It is illegal in the city be cause of the reasons given. You avoided the decease issue you only stated licensed health inspected prostitutes have less STD than none legal ones, I agree, however then still have more of the other sicknesses. Which your info avoids. Then again only where legal prostitutes get regular health inspections Neither of the killed black prostitutes did.

QuoteThis is an opinion.

So is jumping off a bridge.

Perhaps slightly back on topic, it seems to me that there is a very loudly proclaimed war on transwomen in general.  But, in the US, the war is just carrried out by diffferent means for different classes of people.  For most, excluding people to death is the weapon of choice.  The black community in the US has a different culture.  Am I allowed to say that?

Street Prostitution
Guide No.2 (2006)
by Michael S. Scott & Kelly Dedel

The Problem of Street Prostitution
What This Guide Does and Does Not Cover
This guide addresses the problem of street prostitution, focusing on female prostitutes and male clients. It begins by describing the problem and reviewing factors that contribute to it. It then identifies a series of questions to help you analyze your local problem. Finally, it reviews responses to the problem, and what is known about them from evaluative research and practice.

Street prostitution is only one of a number of sexual activity-related problems the police must address. This guide is limited to addressing the particular harms street prostitution creates. Related problems not directly addressed in this guide include

consensual, unpaid sex in public places, including meeting places for anonymous sex among homosexuals
homosexual prostitution, also known as "hustling" (young homosexual prostitution is also known as the "chicken hawk trade")
illegal immigration and forced prostitution (international trafficking in women and girls)
juvenile runaways drawn into prostitution
organized crime connections to prostitution
prostitution at truck stops or motels
prostitution through call girls, escort services, internet listings, and massage parlors, and at bars, hotels, and conventions
serial murders of prostitutes
solicitation by leaving calling cards in conspicuous public places (e.g., phone booths)
strip clubs in which strippers also engage in prostitution
transvestite prostitution.
Some of these related problems are covered in other guides in this series, all of which are listed at the end of this guide. For the most up-to-date listing of current and future guides, see www.popcenter.org (http://www.popcenter.org).

There are widely different perspectives on prostitution. Some view the prostitutes as primarily responsible for the problem; some view the clients as responsible, and the prostitutes as victims.† Others view prostitution as a private matter in which the state should not intervene. Community morals and beliefs about how the law should regulate morality will affect how any particular community addresses street prostitution. This guide does not adopt any particular moral perspective: It is intended to objectively inform you and other policymakers about the effectiveness and consequences of various approaches to controlling street prostitution. Before discussing response options, a general overview of the problem is provided.††

† For example, in Sweden, prostitution is officially considered a form of sexual violence against women. Prostitutes do not risk legal penalties. The public strongly supports this policy, with an 80 percent approval rate (Eckberg 2004).

†† The information in this section is drawn from many sources, not all of which are cited. Among the sources most heavily relied on are Benson and Matthews (1995); Cohen (1980); Matthews (1993) [Full text],[Briefing note]; May, Edmunds, and Hough (1999)[Full text],[Briefing note]; Sterk and Elifson (1990); van Gelder and Kaplan (1992); Weidner (2001); and Weitzer (2000).

Harms Caused by Street Prostitution
Street prostitution varies across the individual prostitutes involved and their commitment to prostitution, the market size, the community's tolerance levels, the degree to which prostitutes are organized, and the relationship of prostitution to drug use and trafficking. Street prostitution accounts for perhaps only 10 to 20 percent of all prostitution, but it has the most visible negative impact on the community.

The following are among the many reasons why the police should be concerned about street prostitution. [1]

Moral and Nuisance Concerns
Prostitution offends some citizens' moral standards.
Prostitution is a nuisance to passersby and to nearby residents and businesses.
Prostitutes and clients offend uninvolved people in the area when they solicit them.
Juveniles, less capable of making informed choices, may become prostitutes.
Public Health Concerns

Used condoms and syringes commonly found on the ground in street prostitution areas are unsightly and potentially hazardous. Photo: Bob Heimberger
Prostitutes and clients may spread sexually transmitted diseases such as syphilis, herpes, and AIDS.†
Used condoms, syringes, and other paraphernalia left on the ground are unsightly and potentially hazardous.
Prostitutes who do not have access to proper facilities may urinate, defecate, or bathe in public.
† Contrary to popular belief, prostitution has not been demonstrated to be a primary means of HIV transmission, at least not in the United States, largely because most street prostitution sex acts are oral rather than vaginal (oral transmission is less likely), most prostitutes insist that clients use condoms (less true of drug-dependent prostitutes), and transmission is more difficult from female to male. Of course, fear of contracting HIV has likely changed the sex practices of some prostitutes and clients. HIV transmission among prostitutes is more likely to occur from sharing needles for drug injections (Weitzer 2000).

Personal Safety Concerns
Clients may harm prostitutes.
Clients or prostitutes may be defrauded, robbed, or assaulted.
Pimps may financially and physically exploit prostitutes.
Spillover-Effect Concerns
Street prostitution and street drug markets are often linked.
Prostitution may provide the seedbed for organized crime.
Prostitutes create parking and traffic problems where they congregate.
Prostitution attracts strangers and criminals to a neighborhood.
Economic Concerns
Legitimate businesses may lose customers who avoid the area because of prostitution.
Prostitutes' presence may negatively affect the area economy, reducing property values and limiting property use.
Civil Rights Concerns
Prostitutes, as citizens, have rights that need to be protected.
Police Integrity Concerns
Policing prostitution creates special opportunities for police officers to engage in unethical conduct, such as taking payments in exchange for nonenforcement, because prostitutes, pimps, and clients are in weak positions to complain about police misconduct. [2]
Factors Contributing to Street Prostitution
Understanding the factors that are known to contribute to your problem will help you frame your own local analysis questions, determine good effectiveness measures, recognize key intervention points, and select an appropriate set of responses for your particular problem. The literature on street prostitution provides a general picture of street prostitutes, clients, pimps, sexual transactions, areas where street prostitution thrives, and links between street prostitution and drugs.

Street Prostitutes
Street prostitutes have lower status than indoor prostitutes. They are often in some state of personal decline (e.g., running away from abusive situations, becoming drug-dependent, deteriorating psychologically, and/or getting less physically attractive). [3] Most have social, economic, and health problems. Most first turn to prostitution at a young age, often before they are 18. [4]

Street prostitutes are not equally committed to prostitution: some are deeply committed for financial and lifestyle reasons; some are committed only due to drug dependency; and some are weakly committed, engaging in prostitution because it is the easiest way for them to make some money. Their inability to find adequately paying work elsewhere is the most common reason prostitutes give to explain their choice to work on the street. [5] Many prostitutes try to leave the streets, although they often return and then leave again. Most return to prostitution because their limited education and lack of skills make finding employment very difficult. Without a means to support themselves and their children, they may think staying on the streets is less risky than leaving prostitution. [6]

The typical street prostitute works six to eight hours a day, five to six days a week, and has three to five clients a night. [7] Street prostitutes' lives are organized principally around prostitution itself, and around maneuvering through the legal system. It is a cycle of engaging in prostitution, getting arrested, going to jail, paying fines, and returning to the street.

Some street prostitutes are highly mobile, traveling from one city to another, sometimes on a regular circuit, or when they think the risks are too high in one city or the money is better in another.

Although most sexual encounters do not involve violence, most street prostitutes report having been criminally assaulted at least once by clients. [8] A small percentage of clients are likely responsible for most of the violence committed against prostitutes. The pattern of violence in pimp-prostitute relationships is similar to that of domestic violence. Prostitutes do not report most assaults to the police because they either fear retaliation by pimps or believe the police will not take the matter seriously, or will charge them for soliciting. [9] Both prostitutes and those who assault them may believe prostitutes are not entitled to the criminal justice systems' normal protections. [10]

Street Prostitutes' Clients
Prostitution clients, typically referred to as "johns" or "tricks," are attracted to the illicit nature of the encounter, desire sex acts that regular partners do not provide, view sex as merely a commodity, and/or lack interest in or access to conventional relationships. [11] Others are drawn to the fact that no commitment is required, and view these interactions as less risky than having an affair. [12] Clients' decision to solicit a prostitute is influenced by availability of prostitutes, knowledge of where to find them, access to money, perceived risk of getting caught or contracting disease, and ease of securing services. Clients gather such information in a variety of ways: from trial and error; from personal recommendations from others (including friends, bartenders, taxi drivers, and hotel workers); and, increasingly, from information posted on internet websites.

Somewhere around 10 to 20 percent of men admit they have paid for sex, but only about 1 percent pay for sex regularly. [13] While this is still a large number of potential clients, it is considerably lower than some earlier estimates based on flawed research methods. The characteristics of men arrested for soliciting vary considerably and do not form any clear patterns. [14] Many seek to rationalize their conduct to themselves and others. When stopped by police, clients often try to justify their behavior by telling a sob story of personal loss, or will admit to cruising but not soliciting, stating they were just curious. [15] Others resist the idea that prostitution is immoral.

Clients are more easily deterred than prostitutes. [16] They are more readily ashamed of their behavior, and fear harming their public reputation or their standing in their personal lives. Consequently, they fear being identified publicly more than being fined for their conduct.

Pimps
It is unclear what percentage of street prostitutes have pimps; prostitutes are reluctant to talk to anyone about their pimps, and it is difficult for police to make cases against pimps. Pimps recruit and socialize prostitutes into the prostitution subculture by appealing to either their desire for money or their desire for what they believe will be a glamorous and exciting lifestyle. [17]

Pimps seldom procure clients for prostitutes, because clients do not typically want to associate with anyone other than the prostitute. Pimps do not offer prostitutes much protection against client violence, but do offer them protection against assault by other pimps.† Although classic pimp relationships still exist in both the United States and the United Kingdom, many men with serious drug addictions force their girlfriends into prostitution to support their drug habits. [18]

† One study found, however, that women with pimps experienced higher levels of client violence than those without pimps. Women with pimps tended to work in more dangerous areas and take more risks because of pressure to earn a certain amount of money (Norton-Hawk 2004).

Pimps use violence and drug dependency as means to control prostitutes. Many pimps resemble the batterers in domestic violence situations, and women under their control often react similarly to domestic violence victims. [19] They may express love and admiration for their pimps and may feel they deserve the violence. Pimps control both their freedom and their finances. By some estimates, pimps take 60 to 70 percent of prostitutes' earnings.

Sexual Transactions
The prices for sex acts vary a little from community to community. Depending on how desperate the prostitutes are for money, they typically charge $20 to $50 for oral sex, and $50 to $100 for sexual intercourse. Among crack-addicted prostitutes, the price can be as low as the market price for a single rock of crack cocaine. The typical sexual transaction takes around 10 minutes in a vehicle (usually for oral sex), and around 25 minutes indoors.

Areas Where Street Prostitution Exists
Street prostitution markets go through stages of development—they emerge, expand, stabilize, and disappear. [20] Sometimes they emerge by accident, when a few prostitutes happen upon a new location; sometimes they emerge because of changes in an area's traffic or commercial patterns (e.g., new roadways or new businesses such as adult entertainment establishments); and sometimes they emerge because police enforcement displaced them. It is important that an area be known for street prostitution so clients will know where to look.

Street prostitution is more prevalent in run-down neighborhoods. Those that are populated heavily by unattached males are more vulnerable to street prostitution than those with a lot of women, families, or elderly residents, because the likelihood of vocal community opposition is lower. For street prostitution to thrive, the surrounding neighborhood cannot be too crime-ridden or appear too threatening to potential clients. Consequently, it is often found in areas that are marginal or in transition, rather than in thoroughly blighted areas. However, the emergence of street prostitution will almost certainly speed up decline. Neighborhood redevelopment or gentrification frequently prompts strong community opposition to street prostitution, and clearly drives much of the pressure on the police to control it.

Street prostitution areas are typically small, less than a square mile. Larger cities usually have several such areas. They are typically industrial sites; declining residential areas; those near major thoroughfares, including tunnels, bridges, or airport access roads; or those near transportation hubs, such as train and bus stations. Street prostitution flourishes around convention centers and hotels, especially when mostly male conventions are held.

Street prostitution thrives in areas where it does not conflict with legitimate business, but rather, supports and is supported by that business. The following foster street prostitution:

places where sexual transactions can occur, such as cheap motels and hotels, dimly lit parking lots, alleys, and abandoned buildings

Street prostitution often thrives in areas where there are cheap motels and hotels. Photo: Bob Heimberger

places where prostitutes can take a break, such as coffee shops or bars
places near a street drug market, so prostitutes and clients can readily buy drugs
places offering escape avenues from the police and dangerous clients
roads that allow drivers to slow down or stop, ideally where the driver's side of the vehicle is closest to the curb.
Prostitutes usually take clients to places that minimize the risk of violence and ensure that transactions occur without incident. [21] These places are often near the street where the negotiation occurred so that the amount of time required for each transaction is limited. Most are out of sight of passersby but not so secluded that prostitutes will be unable to attract attention if they need help.


Street prostitution thrives along roads where prostitutes can talk to drivers from the curbside. Photo: Bob Morris

Links Between Street Prostitution and Drugs
Street prostitution and street drug markets are often closely linked, supporting and reinforcing one another. [22] Many street prostitutes use illegal drugs, mainly methamphetamine, cocaine, or heroin. Many female serious drug users turn to prostitution at some point to finance their habit. Some prostitutes develop drug habits before turning to prostitution, while others start using drugs as part of the street prostitution lifestyle. Prostitutes are a significant customer base for street- level drug dealers.

Crack cocaine markets drive down the price of street prostitution, as some prostitutes, desperate to buy drugs, sell sex cheaply. Other prostitutes resent them for driving down prices or permitting sex without condoms, and pimps punish them for withholding their earnings to buy drugs. Drug-dependent prostitutes are more vulnerable to violence and more likely to rob their clients. In summary, where drugs and street prostitution are linked, street prostitution becomes less predictable and more dangerous.

  The specific prohibitions mentioned in the San Bernardino restraining order are:

approaching or signaling to any vehicle in any street, alley, or other public passage area, thus causing the vehicle to stop, unless a legitimate emergency so requires
blocking the passage of any person or vehicle in any street, walkway, sidewalk, driveway, alley, or other public passage area
being on, or causing others to be on, private property, except (1) with the property owner's prior written consent, or (2) in the property owner's presence and with his or her voluntary consent
being on the premises of an uninhabited or abandoned building
making, causing, or encouraging others to violate noise restrictions
fighting in public or any place open to public view or hearing
drinking any alcoholic beverage in public or any place open to public view
urinating or defecating in public or any place open to public view
littering, including discarding cans, bottles, cigarettes, condoms, or hypodermic needles other than in a proper trash can
damaging or vandalizing another's property, including any light fixture, fence, gate, wall, or window
applying graffiti to any public or private property, including any building, fence, wall, garage door, street sign, tree, pole, or vehicle
congregating in any public place for the purpose of engaging in any conduct prohibited by this injunction, or any criminal activity
intimidating, provoking, harassing, challenging, or carrying out any acts of retaliation, including, but not limited to, using abusive or vulgar language to harass any person (San Bernardino Police Department 1999).
You should consult with legal counsel about the requirements for obtaining restraining orders. It may also take a lot of time and effort to obtain the documentation necessary for a restraining order.

These are factors that lead to the death and so called undeclared war.

Now, a group of former prostitutes in South Korea have accused some of their country's former leaders of a different kind of abuse: encouraging them to have sex with the American soldiers who protected South Korea from North Korea. They also accuse past South Korean governments, and the United States military, of taking a direct hand in the sex trade from the 1960s through the 1980s, working together to build a testing and treatment system to ensure that prostitutes were disease-free for American troops.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 08, 2009, 01:09:34 PMhowever then still have more of the other sicknesses. Which your info avoids.

I'm sorry Lisa, but you'd have to provide evidence of this before I could take it at face value.

QuoteThen again only where legal prostitutes get regular health inspections Neither of the killed black prostitutes did.

Which is kind-of the point. Legalising and (importantly) regulating prostitution improves the overall situation.

QuoteMoral and Nuisance Concerns. Prostitution offends some citizens' moral standards.

Moral standards are not universal and cannot be universally applied.

QuoteProstitution is a nuisance to passersby and to nearby residents and businesses.
Prostitutes and clients offend uninvolved people in the area when they solicit them.

A valid concern. However, as with any other business, certain areas should be zoned for sex work. Obviously one would not have such areas near residential areas, in the same way that you would not have industrial estates near residential areas.

QuoteJuveniles, less capable of making informed choices, may become prostitutes.

Yes. Providing them with clear, unbiassed information upon which to make those choices improves matters.

QuoteProstitutes and clients may spread sexually transmitted diseases such as syphilis, herpes, and AIDS.†

As we've established, the opposite is actually true where prostitutes are protected and informed. This material confirms that:

Contrary to popular belief, prostitution has not been demonstrated to be a primary means of HIV transmission, at least not in the United States, largely because most street prostitution sex acts are oral rather than vaginal (oral transmission is less likely), most prostitutes insist that clients use condoms (less true of drug-dependent prostitutes), and transmission is more difficult from female to male. Of course, fear of contracting HIV has likely changed the sex practices of some prostitutes and clients.[

Quote
Used condoms, syringes, and other paraphernalia left on the ground are unsightly and potentially hazardous.
Street prostitution and street drug markets are often linked.
HIV transmission among prostitutes is more likely to occur from sharing needles for drug injections.

Agreed. Drug use amongst street prostitutes is a huge problem, one exacerbated by their generally horrid situation, exploitation by pimps etc. Improving the environment within which these people find themselves and providing them with the means they need to kick the habit will improve the problem.

QuoteProstitutes who do not have access to proper facilities may urinate, defecate, or bathe in public.

Again agreed. However, the same is true of anybody on the margins of society with nowhere else to go. Homeless people, for example, which prostitutes quite often are. Have you been on those margins yet Lisa? Not a good place to be.

QuoteClients may harm prostitutes. Clients or prostitutes may be defrauded, robbed, or assaulted. Pimps may financially and physically exploit prostitutes.

These abuses are much less likely where prostitutes and clients have legal avenues by which to protect themselves.

QuoteProstitution may provide the seedbed for organized crime. Prostitutes create parking and traffic problems where they congregate.

Again, this does not necessarily follow. All the examples I've provided have lead to the opposite situation.

QuoteProstitution attracts strangers and criminals to a neighborhood.

Strangers yes, criminals, not necessarily. Besides, strangers are equally attracted to malls, commercial areas, industrial areas ... in fact, everywhere commerce or business occurs.

QuoteLegitimate businesses may lose customers who avoid the area because of prostitution. Prostitutes' presence may negatively affect the area economy, reducing property values and limiting property use.

The same may be said of industrification of an area. The reality is that city areas tend to become specialised.

QuoteProstitutes, as citizens, have rights that need to be protected.

Agreed. Rights those citizens rarely take recourse to because they are afraid of the very people meant to protect them.

QuotePolicing prostitution creates special opportunities for police officers to engage in unethical conduct, such as taking payments in exchange for nonenforcement, because prostitutes, pimps, and clients are in weak positions to complain about police misconduct.

The highlighted text addresses the very problem stated.

QuoteStreet prostitutes have lower status than indoor prostitutes. They are often in some state of personal decline (e.g., running away from abusive situations, becoming drug-dependent, deteriorating psychologically, and/or getting less physically attractive). [3] Most have social, economic, and health problems. Most first turn to prostitution at a young age, often before they are 18.

Exactly. These people are victims, not criminals, yet almost 90% of all arrests for prostitution are of prostitutes rather than their clients, pimps or others that benefit from the trade. Provide these people with the means to improve their situation.

QuoteTheir inability to find adequately paying work elsewhere is the most common reason prostitutes give to explain their choice to work on the street. [5] Many prostitutes try to leave the streets, although they often return and then leave again. Most return to prostitution because their limited education and lack of skills make finding employment very difficult. Without a means to support themselves and their children, they may think staying on the streets is less risky than leaving prostitution.

and

Street prostitutes' lives are organized principally around prostitution itself, and around maneuvering through the legal system. It is a cycle of engaging in prostitution, getting arrested, going to jail, paying fines, and returning to the street.

This addresses your original position that prostitutes become such because they are lazy. The majority do so out of need. The point made about inability to find work is an important one, because it highlights that it's not necessarily a case of there not being work, but that these individuals are unable to find it. The majority of prostitutes are ill-educated and ill-informed. They fear using official avenues of procuring work or information or protection because they are afraid of the wrong questions leading to the wrong kind of attention. The only way to get prostitutes off the streets is to provide them with valid, achievable alternatives, not hounding them from one area to the next.

QuoteThe pattern of violence in pimp-prostitute relationships is similar to that of domestic violence. Prostitutes do not report most assaults to the police because they either fear retaliation by pimps or believe the police will not take the matter seriously, or will charge them for soliciting.

The quoted passage speaks for itself. Prostitutes deserve the same protections from violence that other people have.

QuoteBoth prostitutes and those who assault them may believe prostitutes are not entitled to the criminal justice systems' normal protections.

Another good argument for legalisation, or at the very least, decriminalisation of being a prostitute.

QuoteOne study found, however, that women with pimps experienced higher levels of client violence than those without pimps. Women with pimps tended to work in more dangerous areas and take more risks because of pressure to earn a certain amount of money (Norton-Hawk 2004).

Pimps use violence and drug dependency as means to control prostitutes. Many pimps resemble the batterers in domestic violence situations, and women under their control often react similarly to domestic violence victims. [19] They may express love and admiration for their pimps and may feel they deserve the violence. Pimps control both their freedom and their finances. By some estimates, pimps take 60 to 70 percent of prostitutes' earnings.

Prostitutes are dependant on pimps mainly for protection and for drugs. Decriminalising the prostitutes and providing them alternative avenues of protection, such as the police, removes one hold pimps have, and providing good health services removes the other. (I'm also in favour, incidentally, of legalising and regulating the drug industry, again to provide addicts with better information, health services and ultimately better choices) I am in agreement that pimping should remain illegal and be vigourously prosecuted.

QuoteNow, a group of former prostitutes in South Korea have accused some of their country's former leaders of a different kind of abuse: encouraging them to have sex with the American soldiers who protected South Korea from North Korea. They also accuse past South Korean governments, and the United States military, of taking a direct hand in the sex trade from the 1960s through the 1980s, working together to build a testing and treatment system to ensure that prostitutes were disease-free for American troops.

I have read similar accounts from Vietnam and a number of other Southeast Asian countries. Again, my opinion is that strict regulation of the sex trade and clear, unambiguous protections for prostitutes would combat these abuses. People who have no personal power are easily taken advantage of. If a prostitute knows he or she is protected from abuse or exploitation by the law, rather than it being yet another danger to them, they are much more likely to blow the whistle on pimps, traffickers and abuse by officials.

Look, Lisa, we can chuck statistics and citations at one another till the cows come home and we won't convince one another, so I'll bow out now with this thought:

QuoteSomewhere around 10 to 20 percent of men admit they have paid for sex

Think about that number. We're talking about a tenth of the world population in that statistic: 700 MILLION men. Just the ones admitting to it.

Do you propose to jail them all?

The justice system realises that's impossible, so it goes after the easy targets instead: the prostitutes themselves. Yet all they do is make those people even more likely to return to prostitution - generally poorly educated to begin with, usually in a precarious financial situation, now you go and addfinancial losses and fines, a criminal record, fear of retribution for perceived snitching, isolation from social services ... not exactly the basis from which to build a better life, is it?

The answer is to target the prostitutes, yes, but to target them with education, with health services, with legal protections. The only way those people will ever leave the street permanently is if they are shown a better way to survive. Shown, because they are usually in too weak a position to find it themselves.

Mina.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 08, 2009, 10:31:34 AM

QuoteFirst of all, single parent families can be just fine for children.

Most research points to crime from children from single parents because they do not get the attention and disciplined they need.

I come from a single parent family, as did my two brothers. Two of us are/were in the military, now I work in a hospital environment and try to help people. None of us have ever committed a single crime.

Please do not generalise and make grand sweeping statements.

The upbringing of a child is dependant on the attitude and aptitude of the parent/parents involved, not on how many of them there are.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 07, 2009, 04:52:58 PM

Quotelol... so my husband can have the hots for the neighbor and as long as she's not a prostitute, I shouldn't be jealous.

Your neighbor having sex with a married man is also degrading to all women. The idea of using sex to market products does the same thing. A study was done having men watch sexy commercials and another group watching none sexy commercials. Then the men interviewed women for an executive job. The group that saw the sexy commercials put many more degrading questions to the applicant and flirted as well as embarrassed the women and the other group of men were much more professional.

Your husband having the hots means he is missing something at home or not satisfied. Something to talk about. Perhaps the jealousy is unwarranted.

11. Not to mention it does not look good on a resume.

You've changed the subject, FYI. What does sex in advertising/work interviews have to do with prostitution? Do you seriously imply that any expression of sexuality is akin to prostitution?

By the way, if your husband is "missing something at home" or "not satisfied" there are way better ways to deal with it rather than go have sex with the neighbour. Worst of all is some of us women actually legitimizing that kind of behaviour or thinking that because he's "missing something" he has the right to be unfaithful.

EDIT: You know, sort of as a passing jest I mentioned you had patriarchal views but it's looking less and less like an unlikely joke the more we keep going. My neighbour having sex with my husband does not degrade all women, only my husband (most of all) and my neighbour.

Quotehave read similar accounts from Vietnam and a number of other Southeast Asian countries. Again, my opinion is that strict regulation of the sex trade and clear, unambiguous protections for prostitutes would combat these abuses. People who have no personal power are easily taken advantage of. If a prostitute knows he or she is protected from abuse or exploitation by the law, rather than it being yet another danger to them, they are much more likely to blow the whistle on pimps, traffickers and abuse by officials.

That is the legalization of prostitution run by the government. Now years later the women realize that had been used.

QuoteWhat does sex in advertising/work interviews have to do with prostitution?

It has everything to do with prostitution. It uses sexual desire to manipulate people into doing irrational deeds. It also reduces women into sexual objects instead of equals. The deeds of women reflect  on all women, stereotyping.

QuoteI come from a single parent family, as did my two brothers. Two of us are/were in the military, now I work in a hospital environment and try to help people. None of us have ever committed a single crime.

Please do not generalise and make grand sweeping statements.

I realize that everyone is an individual but when you look statistically as in the book "Freakonomics" you will find that data. Now you can see how the actions of some women give a bad perspective to all women.

In almost all cases people having a choice would not want their children  growing up in a place that has legalized prostitution. The majority of the population deems it undesirable behavior and has made it illegal regardless of the 10% of the male population that has used it.

If you do not like democracy go to a place that promotes vice.

Actually no. Many of the Southeast Asian coutries we're talking about here never legalised prostitution. The officials were in a better position to exploit them because those women did not have any legal legs to stand on.

As for democracy, as in the case of Proposition 8, a democracy cannot legislate the rights of an individual. That's why the constitution is the highest law rather than the ballot. Ultimately what happens between a prostitute and a client is between them alone.

Anyway Lisa, thanks for the debate. Have a good weekend.

Mina.

Quote from: mina.m->-bleeped-<-ie link=topic=53005.msg330169#msg330169 date=1231514440
Actually no. Many of the Southeast Asian coutries we're talking about here never legalised prostitution. The officials were in a better position to exploit them because those women did not have any legal legs to stand on.

As for democracy, as in the case of Proposition 8, a democracy cannot legislate the rights of an individual. That's why the constitution is the highest law rather than the ballot. Ultimately what happens between a prostitute and a client is between them alone.

Anyway Lisa, thanks for the debate. Have a good weekend.

Mina.

My feelings exactly.

QuoteAs for democracy, as in the case of Proposition 8, a democracy cannot legislate the rights of an individual.

Prostitution is not a right it is a business which all business is regulated. Now the right to have sex with whoever you choose is fine if they agree you just can not charge for it.

Prostitution is not a right it is a business

And not just any business, I'm sure there is some degree of fact in the adage that its 'the oldest profession' - since its proved to be impossible to stop it, regulating it seems to make the most sense.

I have to say I'm appalled to see Vietnamese, Korean and Chines "comfort women" talked about in the way you are discussing them lisagurl.  To characterize the recent lawsuits that have happened as in any way akin to prostitutes by choice in a legal system suddenly realizing their government was exploiting them despite their own choice to participate in the system is an offensive rewrite of history.  Comfort women were absolutely exploited, abused and coerced by their governments' militaries into breaking the laws of their country and working in incredibly dangerous conditions and giving them no recourse when they were abused by their "customers" either.

Trying to draw a parallel between that situation and that of sex workers in Amsterdam is a total misreading of history that disregards both the agency of sex workers who choose to be in their profession and the coercion suffered by comfort women.

On one of your earlier points, if you really care about what's "degrading to the female gender" you will listen to the testimony of sex workers who enjoy their work and have chosen it for themselves.  The only thing that degrades the female gender is when we start disregarding each other's choices because they are not the ones we would make for ourselves.

In other words... (http://www.womanist-musings.com/2009/01/what-if-selling-sex-is-your-business.html)

QuoteThe only thing that degrades the female gender is when we start disregarding each other's choices because they are not the ones we would make for ourselves.

Choices are choices some help humanity and others destroy it. I suppose the Hamas martyrs that want to be killed also are not degrading their religion by their poor choices.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 10, 2009, 08:14:00 AMI suppose the Hamas martyrs that want to be killed also are not degrading their religion by their poor choices.

There is no way you can seriously be comparing the two situations.

Suicide bombers inflict direct harm on others through their choices. It is initiatory violence, coercive force which murders and maims, which is why it's wrong.

By contrast, two consenting adults having sex in exchange for payment, financial or otherwise, does no violence to anybody.

Mina.

What the hell do religious fanatics have to do with people forced into sex work by poverty? NOT ALL sex workers want to do it, sure some do.... But im afraid the connection with muslim terrorism is unfair.

As for the colour issue, im rather suprised nobody made the link....

African american/Latio people make up a larger percentage of the US than caucasian now. Yet white americans still act like they are the majority... and act shocked when they see apparently disproportionate  crime figures. Wake up guys and gals, its probably happening in proportion to your precious white sex workers too...

Does some people transitioning degrade all humanity?  I hear echoes of other voices in these arguments.

Didnt you hear?

If you arnt hyper liberal with regards to identity, with conservative social views regarding 'suitable' work and 'moral' objections to 'obscene seedy' behaviour. You are not a 'Propper' Transwoman.






Im actually glad that i dont qualify.

Quote from: Starbuck on January 10, 2009, 10:58:34 AMIf you arnt hyper liberal with regards to identity, with conservative social views regarding 'suitable' work and 'moral' objections to 'obscene seedy' behaviour. You are not a 'Propper' Transwoman.

Stepford Wives UNITE!

Now where's my vacuum-cleaner...

Mina.

Quote from: Starbuck on January 10, 2009, 09:34:37 AM
What the hell do religious fanatics have to do with people forced into sex work by poverty? NOT ALL sex workers want to do it, sure some do.... But im afraid the connection with muslim terrorism is unfair.

As for the colour issue, im rather suprised nobody made the link....

African american/Latio people make up a larger percentage of the US than caucasian now. Yet white americans still act like they are the majority... and act shocked when they see apparently disproportionate  crime figures. Wake up guys and gals, its probably happening in proportion to your precious white sex workers too...

Where do you get your facts?http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2008/08/14/washington/14census.ready.html (http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2008/08/14/washington/14census.ready.html)

African american/Latio people make up a larger percentage of the US than caucasian now

Not yet, projected date for this to happen is 2024. 

Ah got to love legal census data.... considering america's rigid inpenetrable boarders, its a fair estimate of true facts.

QuoteDoes some people transitioning degrade all humanity?  I hear echoes of other voices in these arguments.

It seems that in today's world whatever one wants to do is OK. But it also leads to major problems when the effect of our actions is not looked at in the larger context. The me,me me, world cannot survive and will not last. Consideration has to be given to the effect on the whole world. Example- growing corn fro fuel to be able to drive more cars. Result food shortages, no end to CO2, no energy saved, huge additional use of fresh water, less miles per gallon, land erosion, polluted streams from fertilizer runoff, more diesel fuel used in farming, etc.

Now prostitution might solve one's immediate problem but in the long run it will destroy the fabric that makes us human. As for transition it creates a stress on many people as it does require more of the transitioner than on a person that does not transition. It also requires some very deep look into one's soul and meaning of one's life.

QuoteAh got to love legal census data....

Where do your facts come from?

It's 1,000 miles X 3,000 miles, that's pretty big, and lots of areas have very large minority populations, though what the minority is, differs greatly from region to region.  So, Hispanic groups, largely from Central America are huge in LA, but in that case, lots of them never crossed the border, the border crossed them.  They were the majority in the City of Angles from the beginning.  Other places like the Midwest, and upper Midwest are very, very, white.  Latino populations in Miami and New York are not Central American, but rather Cuban and from the other Carib islands, and have little in common with the Central American groups sharing Spanish as a language, but not much more. 

Quote from: lisagurl on January 10, 2009, 11:22:01 AMNow prostitution might solve one's immediate problem but in the long run it will destroy the fabric that makes us human.

How, exactly?

And as a feminist I don't require women to make only choices that effect all women in a positive way.  It really is ok for us to just live our lives as best we can.

the long run it will destroy the fabric that makes us human.

Considering it's the 'world's oldest profession' perhaps its just the opposite.

QuoteIt really is ok for us to just live our lives as best we can.

We are not alone on this planet. What we do has an effect on many. We can not just just live our lives, too many others depend on each other. Tell me what would living conditions be without social cooperation.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 10, 2009, 02:29:43 PM

QuoteIt really is ok for us to just live our lives as best we can.

We are not alone on this planet. What we do has an effect on many. We can not just just live our lives, too many others depend on each other. Tell me what would living conditions be without social cooperation.

What does any of that have to do with prostitution?

Isn't prostitution a form of social cooperation?  It's an economic exchange for a good or a service, which is the basis of all economics, which in turn is one of the prime kinds of social cooperation.

QuoteConsidering it's the 'world's oldest profession' perhaps its just the opposite.

The fabric now is in great shape? Prostitution has solved the worlds problems? Look at all the great accomplishments that prostitutes have brought civilization. If all those years of their hard labor, more than any other profession, what do we have to show for it?

QuoteIt's an economic exchange for a good or a service, which is the basis of all economics, which in turn is one of the prime kinds of social cooperation.

Kind of like a mercenary.

Depends on what the desired outcome was.  One person gets the money, the other the service (which in a lot of cases is not exactly what you think it is).  And the fabric of society is not being destroyed by sex, as much as by greed and our general tendency to be dumb all over. 

And its not like a mercenary at all, no one is getting killed.  They are just getting laid. 

QuoteThey are just getting laid

A slow agonizing death.

Things are not as cut and dry as you pretend to see them.  Its a complex deal, with some in a state of bondage and slavery, others who have no other options left standing on the street corner in the rain, and others who use it to enhance their income and life. 

It's not perfect, and I'll agree that a lot of the time its not very good.  However its not the be all and end all of the end times.

Quote from: lisagurl on January 10, 2009, 02:42:24 PM

QuoteThey are just getting laid

A slow agonizing death.

Isnt that slow agonising death called life? and doesnt it happen weather one has sex or not?

Prostitution is as tekla so bluntly puts it. Sex, for money, as long as people want sex, they will want to  buy it when they cannot get it free... Its the cirlcle of life for any desired substance, goods, or service.

Nobody is asking you to sell yourself... just allow people to do what they want, or have to without disaprobing looks from the rest of you....


Isnt it famouslty said, that he who is without sin, should cast the first stone....

So cast away my perfect beings.... cast away.

Quote from: Starbuck on January 10, 2009, 03:54:55 PM

Quote from: lisagurl on January 10, 2009, 02:42:24 PM

QuoteThey are just getting laid

A slow agonizing death.

Isnt that slow agonising death called life? and doesnt it happen weather one has sex or not?

Prostitution is as tekla so bluntly puts it. Sex, for money, as long as people want sex, they will want to  buy it when they cannot get it free... Its the cirlcle of life for any desired substance, goods, or service.

Nobody is asking you to sell yourself... just allow people to do what they want, or have to without disaprobing looks from the rest of you....


Isnt it famouslty said, that he who is without sin, should cast the first stone....

So cast away my perfect beings.... cast away.

WORD!

You don't pay a prostitute for sex, you pay her to go away when your done.  As opposed to her hanging out for seven years and taking your house on your way out.

Trust the bloke to take that view ;)

No, trust a guy who knows why rock stars would rather pay the 300 an hour as opposed to taking any babe in the first five rows who wants to have his baby.

Even rockstars fall in love.

Sex and love are not paticularly something that comes in series, more in paralel....

Quote from: Starbuck on January 10, 2009, 04:02:38 PM
Even rockstars fall in love.

Sex and love are not paticularly something that comes in series, more in paralel....

spoken like a lady.  ;)

True that, but oddly enough, they don't fall in love with their fans.  The fall in love with the person who likes them for what they are, rather than what they do.  They are not the guitar, not the song, not the drum drop.  I was talking with a wife recently and I go "I'm heading up to watch some of the show, want to go?"  Her reply, "I hate this ->-bleeped-<-, I trained as a classical player, I get bored with this way too fast."  You don't want someone who is 'into' the music, the music is your job, its not you.

thanks once again for the inside scoop ;)

Starbuck, do you want someone to fall in love with you because you're a short order cook?  It's nice if they like your cooking, but I'm sure you'd like to get out of the kitchen on occasion and be liked for something else.  I like it when people like me for being able to fix things, or make things, but if that's all it is, then I'm nothing more than a tradesman, not a lover.

As it turns out, Sean Conery is NOT James Bond, in fact I understand he is a bit of a lout.  Likewise I did a location shoot once with a guy who is one of Hollywood's #1 Tough Guy.  He did a series of three movies that had he had any less dialog they would have been silent movies.  But in real life, he is very soft spoken, and very, very articulate.  You don't want people who love the image, you want someone who loves you.

I dont even think i suggested that.... remotely... infact where the hell did you get this idea from?

You said rockstars would rather pay 300 than fall in love... i said well they do occasionally... they are human, i did not say that it was just for thier job... dont treat me like a nieve little girl... I dont like it, and neither will you. 
the carear point came up from your once again name droping your work in the music industry... not any point of mine.

They are not paying that money to fall in love, they pay it so the girl will not fall in love.  Huge diff.  Like I said, they don't pay them for love, they pay them to go away.

As i said last time, lovely sentiment, whats it go to do with this topic?

In the beginning, it was about how some people - minority members - get more arrests, and stronger sentences for the same crimes that others commit, and walk away from.  But of course, I'm sure that just a problem here, and would never happen anywhere else. 

Then it got into a long discussion about being a hooker. (A very American term BTW), and if that was a good, or bad, or neither deal.  I voted neither.

And I presume you know all about what motivates hookers and why they are out there freezing their butts off. Is it to sell a little piece of themselves so they can buy some cocaine or maybe a cheap motel room to be out of the cold for the night? Or maybe they fight to get into a hostel for the night. And some even used my bathtub for their weekly baths and to wash a few items of clothes I used to get from Sally Ann's for them. And yeah, why not bed down some member from a rock band, they pay good money. Some of my best friends were hookers.

Cindy

I've never said they were my friends, nor that all was one or the other.  I know that the two inches that are the only barrier from one world to another.  The stage door from Taylor Street to the stage are about an entire universe apart.  Separate realities, separate worlds, different lives.  All I'm trying to say is that while all of you see the crack ho's I see a different kind of person too.  Not that one is right, or wrong, or good or bad.  Or that either of those people are there because of choices, both good and bad that they made in their lives. 

I think on those two inches a lot.  I'm there a lot so I can do that.  Two inches, the difference between being on stage at the Warfield in San Francisco, fortune, fame and all that goes with it - including the limo ride to get you the hell out of well, hell.  Because that's Taylor Street, that's hell.  Some mornings I have to kick some bum who is sleeping in a puddle of his own piss out of the doorway that a few hours later some chucklehead who wrote some song that made him more money that god himself can count will walk through.  Out on Taylor Street, the crack ho's who will sell themselves for less then five dollars, on the other side are the the uptown girls who make more money for a few hours than I'll make that day, and I'm not badly paid.  Two inches.

That's all it is.  Two inches.  Just a door between two worlds.  (with the biggest black guy you've ever seen in your life deciding who gets to go through that door, and who does not)  Two inches. 

And my problem with a lot of this is, is the single minded idea that 'the world I know is the only world that is'.  And that just ain't happening.  There are lots of worlds.  Some better, some worse, and some, worse than you could ever imagine.  Then, on the other hand, some much better than you could ever dream of.  Two inches - that's the difference between the two.

It's like separate universes coexisting, without either one really ever changing the other one.  That you don't see both - nor the millions and millions of words in between - is just pretty much a failure of imagination more than anything else.  And I don't think I even got it until I sat out there night after night, and thought about it myself.  Hell, I was fifty years old, with a PhD and never got to see anyone die in front of my own eyes, and then, in the short space of two years I got to see three.  Two by guns, one by a knife - and that stuff will change you.

Sure, the worst exists, and you should never forget it.  Hell, I'm sure a lot of those people out there on the streets had people, mothers, fathers, kids, lovers, who loved them.  I also know that a lot of people on that stage did it despite everyone telling them they could not ever make it, and they told them all to F off.  Nothing is universal.

Two inches, nothing is universal. 

Quote from: tekla on January 11, 2009, 03:32:14 AM
I've never said they were my friends, nor that all was one or the other.  I know that the two inches that are the only barrier from one world to another.  The stage door from Taylor Street to the stage are about an entire universe apart.  Separate realities, separate worlds, different lives.  All I'm trying to say is that while all of you see the crack ho's I see a different kind of person too.  Not that one is right, or wrong, or good or bad.  Or that either of those people are there because of choices, both good and bad that they made in their lives. 

I think on those two inches a lot.  I'm there a lot so I can do that.  Two inches, the difference between being on stage at the Warfield in San Francisco, fortune, fame and all that goes with it - including the limo ride to get you the hell out of well, hell.  Because that's Taylor Street, that's hell.  Some mornings I have to kick some bum who is sleeping in a puddle of his own piss out of the doorway that a few hours later some chucklehead who wrote some song that made him more money that god himself can count will walk through.  Out on Taylor Street, the crack ho's who will sell themselves for less then five dollars, on the other side are the the uptown girls who make more money for a few hours than I'll make that day, and I'm not badly paid.  Two inches.

That's all it is.  Two inches.  Just a door between two worlds.  (with the biggest black guy you've ever seen in your life deciding who gets to go through that door, and who does not)  Two inches. 

And my problem with a lot of this is, is the single minded idea that 'the world I know is the only world that is'.  And that just ain't happening.  There are lots of worlds.  Some better, some worse, and some, worse than you could ever imagine.  Then, on the other hand, some much better than you could ever dream of.  Two inches - that's the difference between the two.

It's like separate universes coexisting, without either one really ever changing the other one.  That you don't see both - nor the millions and millions of words in between - is just pretty much a failure of imagination more than anything else.  And I don't think I even got it until I sat out there night after night, and thought about it myself.  Hell, I was fifty years old, with a PhD and never got to see anyone die in front of my own eyes, and then, in the short space of two years I got to see three.  Two by guns, one by a knife - and that stuff will change you.

Sure, the worst exists, and you should never forget it.  Hell, I'm sure a lot of those people out there on the streets had people, mothers, fathers, kids, lovers, who loved them.  I also know that a lot of people on that stage did it despite everyone telling them they could not ever make it, and they told them all to F off.  Nothing is universal.

Two inches, nothing is universal. 

Excellent post, tekla.

Even if for no other reason because I think that we sometimes never even bother to think, let alone ever bother to know or recall, that no matter how great a job we believe we've done with our lives. No matter how moral, intelligent, pretty we think we are and no matter how worthy of honor and glory we may think we are -- it all comes down to chance more than anything else.

A chance that when you were eight that you didn't dodge into the street and get mailed by the kid from across town who was speeding his dad's Buick to the drive-through. The odd chance that your father didn't come to your bed when you were in it at age ten and turn you into his "date" whether you were thought of as male or female at the time. The chance that the gun that was fired wasn't turned an inch in a different direction in the hand of a shooter and so you saw someone else die rather than being dead yourself.

There's a lot of will involved in a lot of our actions. It's easy for us to say that we are somehow more moral or more law-abiding and so we are not hounded by the law, etc. But life has a lot of chance connected to the results of any individual life as well.

It's nice that after five pages that finally gets recognized by one writer on this thread. *nod*

Nichole

Then you should like "Outliers: The Story of Success " however "Chance" is very heavily influenced by probability. Being in the right place at the right time is not always an accident.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/magazine/11Genome-t.html?_r=1&hp (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/magazine/11Genome-t.html?_r=1&hp)

The persistence of the self-made person. Lisa, Ayn Rand, no doubt, is somewhere and proud of all that! :laugh:

N~

Try this idea on morals.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html?ref=magazine (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html?ref=magazine)

I do agree with much of Pinker's ideas.

But what little I know of Ayn Rand, i do not agree with.

Well Tekla, I have lived on the other side of that 2inches. Have you? Do you really know what it's like, or do you only know it second hand. Try walking for a week in that drunks shoes who pissed on your door step.

Even when I couldn't even help myself I was helping others. Any company on the street is better then the horror of being alone on the street. Sisters watches over sister during the night hours, and each go their own way by day.  You know, hon, there is actually camaraderie among the girls that live there?

They are quite human, they have emotions and feelings just like the rest on society and their values are probably much higher then one would think. They are human.

Cindy

Quote from: cindybc on January 11, 2009, 04:54:57 PM
Well Tekla, I have lived on the other side of that 2inches. Have you? Do you really know what it's like, or do you only know it second hand. Try walking for a week in that drunks shoes who pissed on your door step.

Even when I couldn't even help myself I was helping others. Any company on the street is better then the horror of being alone on the street. Sisters watches over sister during the night hours, and each go their own way by day.  You know, hon, there is actually camaraderie among the girls that live there?

They are quite human, they have emotions and feelings just like the rest on society and their values are probably much higher then one would think. They are human.

Cindy

uh, Cindy...i hate to tell you this, but i think you and Tekla are both on the same side of this discussion.   *dashes back under rock*

-ell

Well now Ell, I'll be a hoot owls aunt. I be danged, gots some room under that rock? All we need now if we get board under the rock is a bag of marbles and a slingshot to keep the dogs from pissin on our rock.

Cindy

I don't think you have to live it to know it.  You don't have to be the person getting shot and bleeding out on the sidewalk to know that you don't want that to happen to you.  You don't have to wake up in a pool of your own urine and vomit to understand that's not the best way to live.  I don't have to do it, to know that I would not want to do it.  Seeing is believing at times.

I pray you never have to find out, I pray no one here on this board ever has to find out.

Cindy

You've clearly never attended a Frat party Cindy ;)

If being an alcoholic for twenty years qualifies the equivalent of a Frat party, and ending up being striped of everything of any value including pride and self esteem in myself, the drunk on Tekla door step so aptly described is an example, then I would say I graduated from the Frat party with flying colors.

Cindy

I think the "frat party" angle is prolly a good comparison.

TBH, a lot of young people get into the party aspects, especially whilst in college, of alcohol. All but about 10% go about their lives without any problem once school's out forever and the job line starts. That 10% though can find life really difficult years down the road when they find themselves in the positions that tekla and cindybc have mentioned.

People, with luck, age. The fart party aspects of alcoholism may be fine for younger people. When someone's out on the street in their late thirties or in their forties or older there's no party anymore: creaking joints, terribly aged skin and bones and some real evidence that street-life for any period extended beyond a few months tends toward adjustment disorders that are hard to overcome. And those tend toward what we so professionally refer to as mental illnesses.

The party is fine as long as I am able to leave it and go home. After a few years of partying though the positive returns on the partying seem to disappear to be replaced by some pretty grim realities.

Hi Nichole

Right on Senorita. yas gotchum. I was one of the few lucky ones to have come out the other end of the ->-bleeped-<- house blues with my health still intact. Call it divine providence if you so desire or just a horse shoe up my back side shortly after finding sobriety I went back to school and got what I needed to obtain a job as a social worker.

I was proud of my accomplishments and regained much of my pride and self esteem. I loved working with people so working as a social worker was right up my ally so to speak. A few years later I came to the door steps of transitioning.

I had nothing to lose, I had already lost everything that was dear to me even before I ever hit the skids, or the streets, which ever one prefers to call it. Now it's 9 years later and here I am still doing support work, well guess what? appears I have went full circle in my life and I find myself once again among both those women that work the street and those that live there, this time working with them in a woman's shelter. The very same people I was trying to help 20 years ago when I was on the street myself and could hardly even keep my own head above water.

So like I have said before in response to one of Tekla's posts, I been on the other side of that 2 inches that she mentioned. I know what it's like, it's not nice and I do pray that you all here are smart enough to stay one step ahead of that 2 inches.

Cindy

Yep, Cindy, after 13 years of working almost exclusively with people who are homeless or street-prone addicts with mental illnesses I kinda sorta knew what I was saying was absolutely spot-on.

:) But it's nice to have someone who's been there to second the motion.

Parties can be fun. Just not forever.

N~

Vous ets bien venue madam,  ;D

Cindy