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The Washington Post reports that an internet escort in Charleston, W.Va., may have saved her own life and the lives of many other women, when she shot and killed an alleged attacker who showed up at the woman's home on July 18 after answering an escort ad she had placed on Backpage.com. Neal Falls showed up with multiple pairs of handcuffs and a Subaru full of weapons and tools, including a shovel, knives, a bulletproof vest, a machete, bleach, trash bags, sledgehammers and axes. In Falls's pocket, police said, was a list of names of potential future victims, all of whom are sex workers who advertised on Backpage. Investigators are trying to determine whether Falls is responsible for a string of slayings targeting sex workers in Ohio and Nevada. "We are entering his DNA profile into CODIS, which is a national crime DNA database, to see if it matches any previous submissions from anywhere in the United States," says Steve Cooper, the Charleston Police Department's chief of detectives. "If his DNA has been located in any other crimes and his profile was entered into CODIS, there will be a match."
From the moment Falls showed up at the home of his latest alleged victim, he turned violent. "I knew he was there to kill me," says the victim who asked not to be identified. Falls pulled a gun on her and began strangling her. "When he strangled me he just wouldn't let me get any air. I grabbed my rake and when he laid the gun down to get the rake out of my hands, I shot him. I just grabbed the gun and shot behind me." Local authorities are treating the shooting as an act of self-defense. According to Cooper, "when we find multiple sets of handcuffs, a machete, an axe, a bulletproof vest and container of bleach, the first thing that comes to an investigator's mind is, 'This is a serial killer kit.'"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Monday July 27 2015, @06:08AM
Prostitution is banned because of moralism. And as the poster above me already said, trafficking is a symptom of the black market. Is anyone trafficking secretarial services? As in abducting young girls and forcing them into a lifetime of servitude answering the phone and transferring calls? Who would want to own a receptionist?
Seriously, our laws create half our problems.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by hemocyanin on Monday July 27 2015, @06:10AM
lame, that "who would want to own a receptionist" was part of an aborted thought along the lines of: receptionists are annoyingly immature, drama magnets, and typically unreliable for any extended duration. Who would want to own that problem when you get them for minimum wage and fire them whenever they wear out?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 27 2015, @01:44PM
receptionists are annoyingly immature, drama magnets, and typically unreliable for any extended duration
Except when they're not, of course.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Monday July 27 2015, @11:10PM
I've tried all age groups, males and females -- the good ones use the job for what it is, a stepping stone to get further in life and thus don't last long -- maybe a year. The ones who can't get further in life, inherently suck. When you hire a receptionist, you're looking for someone who is smart, pleasant, and has no aspirations in life. Those types of people are really rare.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 27 2015, @06:21AM
> Is anyone trafficking secretarial services?
Probably not, but labor trafficking is a big problem. Here's one high-level article about it, [cnn.com] there are tons more out there. [google.com] Its just that sex traffickers get lots of press because it's sex. We like to pretend that slavery doesn't exist anymore.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Monday July 27 2015, @06:44AM
Labor traficking is another black-market like issue. I'm not for open borders, so don't misunderstand, but the reason this is possible is because there are people who want to come to the US but can't legally. This artificial restriction causes them to seek other methods of entry, which puts them in contact with criminals, which puts them at risk of being indentured or enslaved. If the US' borders were totally open, it wouldn't really be a problem because all they'd need is bus fare. Of course, if that was the case, our employment economy would likely be horrific and the environment totally hosed.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday July 27 2015, @11:58AM
Seriously, our laws create half our problems.
Its some weird primate behavior thing. In theory you can have legal prostitution but it always seems to devolve into a mess of human trafficking and abuse. Likewise, in theory, there's no physical, economic, or biological reason that very humane and civilized slavery couldn't exist. However in practice it usually seems to be implemented as a total cluster F and the propaganda engines say its a 100% fail.
The best thing I can come up with for an answer is privacy. If you keep the sex workers in a private room where nobody sees nothin then they're going to end up victims. Doing it out on the street or a beach might not fit culturally or even primate instincts, but at least it would work better. Likewise slavery, and for that matter, sweatshop industrial conditions, work best 100 miles out in the country on the plantation where nobody sees nothin or behind locked factory doors.
I can provide some evidence of semi-humane legal slavery, look at the prison industrial complex, people being owned (theoretically by the state, practically by the warden and guards) doing grunt labor outsourced from corporations yet its at least semi-humane or at least no less humane than the prison experience without slave labor aka just sitting in cells. And the key seems to be prison labor is at least semi-public and there's a continuous turnover of people arriving and leaving prison and X percent where X is huge of some subcultures end up in prison so its so public its practically a way of life in those subcultures. Documented, monitored, etc. Its no picnic being a slave in America in 2015 but its "not that bad" or not much worse than just being a plain ole prisoner.
People seem willing to pay lots of $$$ for sex, so at least theoretically extreme government regulation seems possible, which would at least reduce the level of trafficking. One interesting idea is making it illegal (or illegal-er) to hire illegals, you want to hire an escort the punishment is 100x or 1000x higher for a non-citizen or non-local. You can come to a financial agreement with the girl next door, but its hard to forcibly traffic the literal girl next door. Maybe not impossible, but certainly not easy, or as easy as trafficking someone kidnapped in a foreign country.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Monday July 27 2015, @01:22PM
In theory you can have legal prostitution but it always seems to devolve into a mess of human trafficking and abuse.
Except of course, when it doesn't. Someone mentioned the Netherlands. Despite having some modest amount of human trafficking and abuse, they are an obvious counterexample already present in the discussion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 27 2015, @04:26PM
What? You cite an example proving the guy's point and claim it disproves it? Come on man. Delusional arguments like that do not help your case.
How about an actual counter-example?
That is kind of bullshit reasoning I was talking about with respect to you and runaway being fellow travelers when it comes to not understanding human psychology. When faced something that calls your beliefs into question you just convince yourself that it actually supports them. That's straight up cognitive dissonance. You need some serious introspection.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 28 2015, @12:21AM
You cite an example proving the guy's point
Note that it doesn't actually prove the guy's point.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2015, @12:57AM
>> You cite an example proving the guy's point
>
> Note that it doesn't actually prove the guy's point.
Yes it does. The NL legalized prostitution in 2000 and yet sex trafficking still continues.
Or are you doing that minutiae thing again where since it doesn't exactly match the hyperbole it actually disproves the intent? Because that's a game for people who retreat into literalism when the real world is too complicated for them.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday July 28 2015, @01:25AM
The NL legalized prostitution in 2000 and yet sex trafficking still continues.
The solution is imperfect so it doesn't count?
Or are you doing that minutiae thing again where since it doesn't exactly match the hyperbole it actually disproves the intent? Because that's a game for people who retreat into literalism when the real world is too complicated for them.
Hyperbole such as:
In theory you can have legal prostitution but it always seems to devolve into a mess of human trafficking and abuse.
The minutiae argument wins yet again. I recognize that there were, even by our standards some particularly hyperbolic statements made on the perfection of legalizing prostitution. That wasn't what I responded to nor defended.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2015, @02:50AM
> The solution is imperfect so it doesn't count?
Where is there proof that it was a solution at all?
> Hyperbole such as:
Yes. That is the exact phrase I was referring to.
> The minutiae argument wins yet again.
It is so weird that you can say that and actually mean it. Its like you are a computer or something. If there is a syntax error that negates the entire meaning of the argument.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2015, @03:37AM
Its called "harm reduction". It'll happen no matter what, and there's nothing we can do to stop it, so we should try to make it as safe as possible for the workers. See this [harmreduction.org] page and just replace "drug use" with "prostitution".
And your argument that it hasn't completely eliminated sex-worker trafficking is the nirvana fallacy [logicallyfallacious.com]. The goal is not to eliminate it completely but significantly reduce its occurrence and harms.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 28 2015, @02:02PM
Where is there proof that it was a solution at all?
I treat it as a solution hence circularly it is. Now, I think what you're really asking is if it is a solution that works. I don't know. We never got that far until now.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 27 2015, @04:58PM
Prostitution is legal in Las Vegas, Nevada, too, so there's another counter-example to the FUD. Prostitution will happen no matter what, it can't be stopped (even fucking monkeys [outsidethebeltway.com] engage in prostitution), so the only sensible choice is to try to make it as safe for the workers as we can.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2015, @12:10AM
> Prostitution is legal in Las Vegas, Nevada, too,
No it isn't. It's only legal in a couple of rural counties so far out in the boonies that the population is practically nil and then its only in highly regulated brothels that are pretty expensive. You can't draw much of any conclusion from such a tiny sample size with such high barriers to entry.
All the places where it is legal in the general populace, like, say Canada, still have sex trafficking problems too. Trafficking happens for a number of reasons, most of them are under the umbrella of the victims not having a choice - they lack social support systems (e.g. the runaway teen) or don't speak the language, don't know their rights, don't know where their next meal is going to come from and the traffickers install themselves in the place of the normal support systems and then exploit the hell out of their position.
I'm not arguing against legalizing prostitution, what I am arguing against is trivialization of the social complexity of sex trafficking by guys like khallow who simply can't even comprehend that the complexity even exists. If you do a half-assed job of legalizing it, you only fix one tiny piece of leverage that the traffickers use and can end up enabling them by taking some of the legal pressure off.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 28 2015, @12:37AM
No it isn't. It's only legal in a couple of rural counties so far out in the boonies that the population is practically nil and then its only in highly regulated brothels that are pretty expensive. You can't draw much of any conclusion from such a tiny sample size with such high barriers to entry.
Wikipedia says [wikipedia.org] 12 of 17 Nevada counties allow for it. And there's supposedly "66 times" as much illegal prostitution as legal, however that's measured.
I'm not arguing against legalizing prostitution, what I am arguing against is trivialization of the social complexity of sex trafficking by guys like khallow who simply can't even comprehend that the complexity even exists.
You forgot to wiggle your fingers mysteriously when you said "social complexity". For someone supposedly into the nuance of this thing, you sure have a simple-minded way to describe it.
If you do a half-assed job of legalizing it, you only fix one tiny piece of leverage that the traffickers use and can end up enabling them by taking some of the legal pressure off.
And there we go. Another socially complex problem solved by Slashdot's groupmind: don't half-ass it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2015, @12:51AM
> Wikipedia says 12 of 17 Nevada counties allow for it.
You seem to be trying to refute my point with minutiae rather than meaning. That doesn't change he fact that they are "rural counties so far out in the boonies that the population is practically nil." Nevada only has a couple of population centers and none of them have legalized sex work.
> And there's supposedly "66 times" as much illegal prostitution as legal, however that's measured.
So? You are disproving your own position with that. Despite the fact that it is legal in parts of nevada there still is well over a magnitude more illegal prostitution. By your simple-minded theories that shouldn't happen, they'd all go next door where it is legal. Except they don't because legality is only one small factor.
> You forgot to wiggle your fingers mysteriously when you said "social complexity".
Did you miss the part where I just finished listing factors of that complexity? You are just proving my point that you are mentally incapable of recognizing these things, even when they are spelled out for you in black and white.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 28 2015, @01:46AM
You seem to be trying to refute my point with minutiae rather than meaning. That doesn't change he fact that they are "rural counties so far out in the boonies that the population is practically nil." Nevada only has a couple of population centers and none of them have legalized sex work.
/minutiae relevant to the topic. Two thirds of the counties of the state allow prostitution. That's significantly more than your " a couple".
Did you miss the part where I just finished listing factors of that complexity? You are just proving my point that you are mentally incapable of recognizing these things, even when they are spelled out for you in black and white.
Let's look at that paragraph in question:
All the places where it is legal in the general populace, like, say Canada, still have sex trafficking problems too. Trafficking happens for a number of reasons, most of them are under the umbrella of the victims not having a choice - they lack social support systems (e.g. the runaway teen) or don't speak the language, don't know their rights, don't know where their next meal is going to come from and the traffickers install themselves in the place of the normal support systems and then exploit the hell out of their position.
Notice the complete absence of anything quantifiable. It's vague talk about things that do happen, but which can be moderated in severity and occurrence by legalizing prostitution (particularly, creating social support systems, protection from exploitation (by creating viable escape routes), and better pay (solves the next meal problem). The real question isn't whether Runaway's hyperbole is correct or not, but whether legal prostitution helps reduce human trafficking. Also, note that most human trafficking is actually not particularly exploitative and entered into voluntarily. You just hear about the kidnap for sex rings, not about the illegal migrants who were supporting a family at home on gainful employment.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 27 2015, @05:46PM
Yeah, they're called "H1B"s.