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A Washington, D.C. city councilmember has introduced a bill that would decriminalize prostitution:
D.C. Councilmember David Grosso is behind a bill that would decriminalize prostitution, arguing it's in keeping with his advocacy for human rights and marginalized communities. "We basically criminalize too many activities," Grosso argued in a recent news conference. "It is time for the District of Columbia to reconsider the framework in which we handle commercial sex work, and move from one of criminalization to a focus on human rights, health and safety."
Grosso says he worked with the Sex Worker Advocates Coalition, and followed recommendations from a variety of human rights organizations from around the world as he drafted the bill. "The bill is quite simple, really," argues Grosso. "It repeals a number of laws or parts of laws that criminalize adults for exchanging consensual sex for money or other things of value." "By removing criminal penalties for those in the sex trade, we can bring people out of the shadows, help them lead safer and healthier lives, and more easily tackle the complaints we hear from communities about trash or other nuisances."
If passed, D.C. would become the only city in the U.S. to decriminalize prostitution:
While prostitution has been legal in some parts of Nevada in the form of brothels for more than a century, what's often called "the world's oldest profession" remains criminalized in the rest of the United States. An effort to decriminalize prostitution via referendum in San Francisco failed in 2008, after heavy criticism from city officials at the time. Kamala Harris, then the city's district attorney and now a rising star senator, said the measure "would put a welcome mat out for pimps and prostitutes to come on into San Francisco."
But in the near decade since then, there's been a shift in perspective alongside a growing international movement further popularizing the policy change that sheds stigma in favor of pragmatism. The idea is that if sex workers don't fear arrest, they'll be able to access healthcare and other services. One 2014 study from The Lancet found that decriminalizing sex work could "have the largest effect on the course of the H.I.V. epidemic."
Reducing Criminalization to Improve Community Health & Safety Amendment Act of 2017
Also at Reason. Grosso press release at Scribd. HIPS.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by arcz on Wednesday October 11 2017, @12:43AM (16 children)
Smart decision, but smart doesn't win votes. I wonder what will happen here. Maybe the folks in D.C. are smarter than the average person, so we'll have to wait and see.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 11 2017, @01:02AM (7 children)
You think so?
Here's the sale pitch: "With the extra budget from a now-legal industry, we won't need to raise the local council taxes in the next 5 years".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday October 11 2017, @02:09AM (6 children)
There are taxes to be had from prostitutes - but the savings in harassing them will be tremendous as well. Maybe they can send half of the vice squads to traffic? Not to mention that real crime should see a bit of a drop. As things stand, prostitutes and other crime go together. It's like they're all cloistered together in the worst parts of whichever town you live in. Even if prostitution never becomes "respectable", at least they can move to somewhat better neighborhoods, and avoid the worst of the riffraff.
I wonder just how many prostitutes have been murdered in this country, and they are just written off as "another dead whore". I don't think that solving the murder of a prostitute is a high priority case in most places.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Wednesday October 11 2017, @03:01AM (4 children)
You never ceased to amaze me, Runaway.
In the same post you manage to side with the prostitutes (at least have some sympathies for them as victims of murder) and shoot your disdain for " the worst of the riffraff".
This in the conditions in which both of the categories should have absolutely little impact on your living on your farmlet and you know nothing about their everyday life. Is it not enough that "you've got yours"? Could have the common sense to stop passing your opinions in terms of value judgements?
You know your opinion posted on S/N will be inconsequential for the categories of people you despise, what's the point of unloading your frustration on the rest of the people here?
Is it any wonder that doing so you fall so easily pray to the tactics of those happy to see the American society as deeply divided as possible instead of considering what can be done - grass-roots even, politicians are not your friends - to make the life of all of you a bit better?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday October 11 2017, @05:04AM (1 child)
Well, perhaps you could explain the reasoning behind your post? It sure looks like an opinion passed as a value judgment to me. Not that concerned about the potential hypocrisy, but why should we care?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 11 2017, @05:38AM
To answer bluntly to your "why should I care" question: you absolutely shouldn't, but I cannot stop you from doing it anyway.
In details: this post was marked as OT and set in small typeface because it's the only way I could find to send Runaway sort of a personal message.
Yes, I know, anything here is 'in public', I'm not asking you to refrain from commenting, I'm just making you aware.
I'll be extremely happy if you would ignore my post; this would be like having the decency to look elsewhere when an act meant to be private cannot be performed in any way else but in public.
I don't have a problem with people, I may have issue with their behaviour.
So, if it is value judgement, it will be a value judgement towards a behavior.
As such, the pseudo-personal message to Runaway was meant as an observation from outside him, in regards with his S/N observable behaviour. This together with what I think is one of the effects of that behaviour, one he may not be quite happy with (blame people, you'll get division lines. Have issues with behaviours, you may find ways to solve them and have a better life).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday October 11 2017, @01:32PM (1 child)
All I see is c0lo making some wind. The post, and it's subsequent explanation are without meaning, and irrelevant to my own post. FFS, I distinguished between prostitution and real crimes. Victimless crimes, vs muggers, robbers, rapists, etc.
BTW - I haven't lived my life on this little bit of acreage. My wife has spent most of her life here, but not me. What, you thought I was just a simple farm boy? Come on, c0lo, try to keep up.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 11 2017, @09:07PM
If course it was irrelevant to your post, I admitted by marking it OT
A note to myself: Runaway may be occasionally calling those with violent tendencies with the milder appellate of riffraff (the lowest of the low, in the underclass).
Next time I'll ask, just to make sure I get what the meaning the way he intended.
Nope, I actually thought that you bought that property as a quiet place to retire from the previous stressful life.
(does it make any difference, though, on the effects the riffraff in Washington DC or San Francisco have on your life?)
(does it make any difference on the fact that judging people creates division and consumes the oxygen in useless fights between "us and them"?)
(if you ask yourself these questions, that would be enough for me, I expect no answers)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @03:14AM
The best part of making prostitution legal is that it moves it from the underground economy to the main economy. This means that disputes can be settled by calling the police and courts, instead of having to resort to violence and organized protectionism.
(Score: 3, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday October 11 2017, @01:19AM
I think we all know by now that's not the case.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @01:20AM (6 children)
Did I hear a collective sigh of relief from lobbyists and politicians?
(Score: 5, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday October 11 2017, @01:25AM (5 children)
I don't know that the politicians will appreciate the competition. They've had a fucking the people for cash monopoly in DC for a long time now.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @03:05AM (2 children)
There's a huge difference between fucking someone and fucking someone over.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday October 11 2017, @03:06AM (1 child)
True but irrelevant as they're happy to do either.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 11 2017, @04:13AM
Makes all the difference in the world for the fucked.
Which, if I trust my counting fingers, are usually higher in numbers than the fuckers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday October 11 2017, @10:26AM (1 child)
Yeah those whores charged me billions of dollars, and the sex sucked.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday October 11 2017, @06:40PM
If only the sex sucked ... all I saw for my dollars was others getting blown.