In the previous blog post, I mention that I "don't quite get" the argument that prostitution is a victimless crime. If one thinks of prostitution as only being a sexual act in which one person pays another for the service, then, I suppose one could argue the point successfully. To do so, however, is to consider prostitution outside any social context - including the imbalance of power between the genders, the history of male exploitation of women in all sorts of ways, the systematic dehumanization of women by our legal system (women were legally no better treated under law in this country than minor children until well after the Civil War, and even then the change was sporadic and slow), and all the different ways prostitution appears.
I also think it is kind of specious to argue, as both a commenter and Greenwald do in the post linked below, that there is no legal difference between pornography (in which people are payed to have sex with each other, the results are filmed and marketed to the public) and prostitution. In fact, at the beginning of the Bush Administration, back when John Ashcroft (who covered the statue of justice because her breasts were bare) was Attorney General, there was an attempt to do just that, so that argument kind of falls flat. In fact, there are several differences, not the least of which is the consumer of pornography is not having, nor is he or she paying these people to have sex with him or her. Nor are the "performers" payed by other performers to have sex. A prostitute is remunerated for the act of providing sexual satisfaction to another person (I suppose one could argue that masturbating to pornography constitutes sexual satisfaction, but I do believe we are going a bit far afield).
Furthermore, prostitution has many different faces. From street-walkers turned out to provide additional income to drug dealers and other street-level criminals to such high-end rings as the one frequented by Gov. Spitzer to the local massage parlor - the oldest profession has many faces, and the women involved have various levels of freedom and choice. Some women work for "escort" services as a way to earn extra income. Some women are forced on to the street by a variety of circumstances, some of which include a lack of any sense of self-worth and self-respect, as well as the belief that they have no choice. Is an entire set of life-circumstances that lead a person to live such a dangerous life (from the threat of violence to STDs and AIDS) "victimless"?
Just consider the way this ring presented its "ladies" - no different than the way Amazon presents their books. I bet they even have "customer reviews". I find this a bit unsettling, to say the least. When human beings are presented as a commodity, including how expert they are at providing certain "services" for which she is being traded - please tell me how this is "victimless". Should anyone say, "Well, it's always gone on," I would agree and add that all sorts of things have "always gone on" - from slavery and war to providing for one's family and running governments. Some of these things are necessary and good, some are not. Some, like slavery, have actually been ended, or are on their way out. Some, like war, are actively campaigned against, with serious alternatives being offered for dealing with disputes that do not involve killing masses of human beings. That's a lazy person's argument, saying "it's always been around." That presupposes there is something called "human nature" that is irreducible, the same in all times, places, cultures, societies across the vast expanse of human society, from prehistory to the present.
No.
Until someone can tell me how prostitution could be practiced in such a way that human beings are not commodified in the process; how the power imbalance between men and women will no longer be perpetuated by the practice of the profession; and how the various threats those involved with prostitution will be reduced - I will buy the argument that prostitution is a "victimless" crime. Until then, please save your breath.
