Thanks to Heaven Swan and Parel and Identity and others for this thread!
Project Willow wrote:
A question for the men opining in this thread, as there seems to be some sort of romantic blindness when it comes to imagining prostitution as a choice for women (or in some cases, progeny?). Would you, yourself, perform fellatio on hundreds of men whom you did not know and/or allow them to sodomize you in exchange for money? Is this something you would willingly choose to do in the current job market? Under what circumstances would you allow this? Do you think you could perform this work with no additional detriment to yourself than any other "job" in our current system?
PW: No. I couldn't. I wouldn't choose it. and I'd have to be very desperate to do it. But that by itself is insufficient to oppose its legality, of course. My reasons for opposing the legality of sex work haven't been articulated yet in this thread - they have absolutely nothing to do with carcerality and I VEHEMENTLY oppose all forms of criminalization of sex workers.
If I
have to choose 'in the real world' (but I don't want to) between allowing sex work and not, I would choose to allow it (by which I mean, to not criminalize sex workers for doing sex work), but I would not want to do it under the auspices of governments for the reasons I state below. And I would of course want severe penalties for those who mistreat sex workers (because they're people, not just sex workers).
I think parel is missing an important objection to his/her/their POV. Parel wrote to Heaven Swan:
You are not addressing the capitalist dictates I have pointed out in relation to placing sex workers into sweat shops. Are you suggesting that sex work is not dignified? If so, we have reached an impasse. It's not about your morality or mine. It's about people having sovereignty over their own bodies.
First, while lots of would-be sex workers may be being forced into sweat shop labor by Christian NGOs or others across the world, it's still a false dichotomy to present these as the only options/realities for would be SWs. I understand the difference between IRL and in theory, and don't deny the reality parel is sharing, but this is too narrow a framing of SW, at least in lots of places around the world.
The bolded section is the real key. I think it's the defenders of sex work who may be miscasting the anti-capitalist objections to sex work as moral objections (who the fuck cares about morality?).
Let's talk about "bodily sovereignty for a second. Can we agree bodily sovereignty isn't equal across all social classes? The interesting thing is to look at where it succeeds and fails to win larger public support when its invoked. The advent of fetal surgery technology in the 1980s, for instance, created a very thorny ethical questions of this sort, and on lots of occasions women's bodily sovereignty was violated in favor of the "rights" of a fetus (who, it was argued, should have the same "sovereignty" you do). If you were a rich or even affluent women, and white, this was far less likely to happen to you, of course, so social approval is not going to be as much about sovereignty as it is about the class dimensions of who is calling for/demanding it.
In light of your defense of bodily sovereignty, I'd be interested to know your stance on mandatory vaccination?
The big objection concerns not morality, but alienation and exploitation. Individuals can do pretty much whatever they want, as I see it. But we're talking about legalization and normalization of sex work, not what one or another person does. I'm already in favor of full de-criminalization. The question is: should it be official policy and backed by governments?
The answer is: If we accept the implications of what PW asked above, we have to ask, "Well, WHY WOULDN'T YOU choose to suck a thousand dicks for a living, or have those dicks sodomize you as they saw fit as a line of work, if you HAD other options?" The further implication is clear: it's deeply alienanting.
But parel would say: not everyone would feel that way! And I get it!
But, see, that lack of feeling alienated by sex work still isn't sufficient to for you to win the argument in favor of the legalization of sex work. By the way, I think sex work is perceived to be alienating way more than you often allow, parel - it's more in line with Heaven Swan's contribution. But that's still not the main point.
The main point is about
exploitation. If, by my freely chosen actions (sex work in this case), I am contributing to a world in which that freely chosen activity gets returned
against me and others (women in this case, mostly) in ways I can't foresee or don't experience as directly connected to it (like sexism, gendered violence, mediated and non-mediated objectifications, etc), then my sex work labor is being turned into an alien force and contributing to the creation of a more hostile, misogynistic world. All of this happens whether or not I have a subjective experience
of being exploited in or alienated from my sex work.
So it's not about individual morality for me. It's not about how you or I feel when we do it. It's about whether or not a practice is (or can avoid being) part of a system of exploitation on a large scale. If it can, then yeah, I wouldn't have an objection on moral grounds (again, who gives a fuck about morality?)
