Pity She is a Whore

Why is prostitution illegal in most places? Moral decadence in the profession, exploitation of female body, transmission of diseases, and abomination in God’s eyes, these have been foisted as reasons for banning the sexual service. But these reasons confuse cause and effect. The question is: how come prostitution is associated with evil in the first place?

Only one condition can trigger the legal ban of a human activity: that activity must harm the interests of a group of people whose collective power can rewrite the law. For example, cocaine was banned because its use by black slaves has lead to aggravated assault on white people. In Prohibition, alcohol was declared illegal because the factory owners felt that their workers’ productivity had been negatively influenced by booze. In contemporary time, marijuana remains illegal because the tobacco companies feared its powerful competition against cigarettes.

Prostitution must have suffered a similar fate. At one time or another, it must have harmed the interests of a powerful group ruling the society. That conflict lead to a lopsided legal battle that resulted in the demise of prostitution as a legal profession.

So the real question is: who are harmed by prostitution, so much as to take the trouble to drive the prostitutes underground?

Or rather, who stands to benefit by having the prostitutes underground?

First, let’s take a look at the profession. A man pays a prostitute to have sex with her. In this act, the man gets sexual satisfaction, the woman enriches her finance, possibly also gets a bit of sexual pleasure. No one is a victim. Of course, before the introduction of condoms, there was the risk of sexually transmitted diseases. For a believer of the Bible, prostitution is an abomination. But prostitution became illegal after the advent of condoms. Also, prostitution has been an abominable occupation even before the knowledge of sexually transmitted diseases. Bible was written by men. What in prostitution offended the society?

Why was prostitution considered immoral in the first place? From time immemorial, men have patronized the brothels and the streetwalkers. If they had no qualms in the purchase, what motivated them to declare prostitution evil?

Here is an idea. Prostitution is profitable. If it were also respectable, what woman would not do it? In a male dominated society, prostitution could be a way to independence for women. Now that was a threat to men. To insure that they pass on their own genes, men need the fidelity of their wives. There is of course no surer way to do so than making the wives financially dependent on the husbands. So men are comfortable screwing around with prostitutes, but they vilify the whores so that their wives would not pursue a similar career and gain financial independence. That, more than anything else, is why prostitution got its bad name.

Nonetheless, in many places, prostitution had been legal for a long time, before it was declared illegal. What happened?

In China, prostitution has been sanctioned until the communist’s rule. Why did the communist government ban prostitution? Simple, it was part of a scheme to control people’s ideology. A sexually deprived mass is a lot easier to control than a sexually active population. When life is bleak, one might as well believe in anything. It is for the same reason that institutionalized religions condemn prostitution.

In New York City, prostitution had been a prosperous business in the famous, or should we say infamous, red light district next to the United Nations. Then Giuliani decided to drive all the prostitutes out. Why? Not because the sinful profession is a blemish on the city’s reputation. Oh, no. The real reason is that the real estate developers coveted the untapped neighborhood. It is far cheaper to drive all the sexual workers out of the city, than to organize the profession and detach it from the organized crime.

Should prostitution be legal after all? By all means I think the answer is yes. Transmission of disease? Condoms can stop that. Exploitation of women? This no longer applies in a society where there are many careers for women to financial independence. Vulnerable to organized crime? Well, how many casinos in Las Vegas are still run by mafia?

The remaining question is just: how much?