Should men describe themselves as feminists, if they are supportive of feminism?

[Orang Utan]

Sex can be different things to different people at different times.

Part of the argument against sex work is moralists wanting to protect sex as a precious thing, almost as if anything else devalues their own experience of sex: if it can be had without love, if it can be traded, then it's no longer a precious thing. If you want to restrict yourself to sex within marriage or romantic sex, then that's up to you, but you don't have the right to force your view on how sex should be had on other consenting adults.

Sex can still be freely given by consenting parties without love or romance.

 

[Johnny Vodka]

Sex can still be freely given by consenting parties without love or romance.

Yes, it can.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

But sex should not be a part of that. That way lies much misery.

Your 'should' is the crux of this, no?

So, what to do with those that disagree? You've brought up the Swedish solution - criminalise men buying sex, but not women selling it. But what is this effectively doing? It's saying that no woman could ever conceivably freely decide to sell sex. It is denying female sex workers any agency, infantilising them.

And aside from these ideological problems, what are its practical results? Well, last time I looked into this, they were worrying. Law used to deport foreign women, increased sex tourism elsewhere, the withdrawal of prostitution into the underground, where the authorities simply don't know how much is going on or what damage it is causing. It 'shouldn't happen', perhaps. But it does, and a strict morality-based solution to a problem crying out for harm-reduction is fraught with the danger that it will just make a bad situation worse.

 

[Santino]

You can't get around the fact that sex holds a special value in human society.

 

[Johnny Vodka]

You can't get around the fact that sex holds a special value in human society.

Seriously? As I wrote earlier, sex means different things to different people at different times. Some people think sex should be confined to one lifetime partner. Some people would have sex with a different person every Saturday night. Some people would trade sex for £x. There's no universal agreement around what conditions should be necessary for sex, and neither should there be (other than, I'd hope, there being adult consent).

 

[Santino]

Seriously? As I wrote earlier, sex means different things to different people at different times. Some people think sex should be confined to one lifetime partner. Some people would have sex with a different person every Saturday night. Some people would trade sex for £x. There's no universal agreement around what conditions should be necessary for sex, and neither should there be (other than, I'd hope, there being adult consent).

You've missed the point.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

You can't get around the fact that sex holds a special value in human society.

Hmmm. I dispute that, tbh, or at least, that specialness and its nature are in dispute. There have been plenty of societies in different times and places where partnerships have been habitually arranged for political or financial considerations. Arranged marriages are effectively the turning of sex into a commodity to be negotiated.

Plenty of examples of societies in which it has not been the norm to get to freely choose your sexual partner.

 

[Johnny Vodka]

You've missed the point.

Explain to me again. Did you actually mean everyone wants sex as opposed to society attaches a weight to sex? People WANT sex otherwise the human race would not continue. Beyond that, the weight good 'society' puts on sex needn't necessarily be the weight you put on sex, if that make sense.

 

[Orang Utan]

Not everyone wants sex.

 

[Santino]

Hmmm. I dispute that, tbh, or at least, that specialness and its nature are in dispute. There have been plenty of societies in different times and places where partnerships have been habitually arranged for political or financial considerations. Arranged marriages are effectively the turning of sex into a commodity to be negotiated.

Plenty of examples of societies in which it has not been the norm to get to freely choose your sexual partner.

In order to dispute what I've said, you'd need to provide an example of a human society where sex didn't have a special value attached to it.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

In order to dispute what I've said, you'd need to provide an example of a human society where sex didn't have a special value attached to it.

Ok, let me rephrase. Either what you are saying is not true, or if it is true, it is only trivially so. It is what Daniel Dennett calls a 'deepity'. Sounds profound, but actually isn't.

 

[Santino]

Explain to me again. Did you actually mean everyone wants sex as opposed to society attaches a weight to sex? People WANT sex otherwise the human race would not continue. Beyond that, the weight good 'society' puts on sex needn't necessarily be the weight you put on sex, if that make sense.

I meant that sex always has a special value attached to it and is never treated a just another activity.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I meant that sex always has a special value attached to it and is never treated a just another activity.

It is also possible to say that, within all human societies, both men and women have been able to use sex and its promise to get things they want. It is possible to use a person's sexual desire for you instrumentally to get something you want from them, and that's always been true.

I don't think this line of thinking really helps, tbh. It doesn't tell you what to do about prostitution.

 

[Johnny Vodka]

I meant that sex always has a special value attached to it and is never treated a just another activity.

Do you mean value as in 'extremely enjoyable/desirable' or value as in 'religious'? To many people, sex is extremely enjoyable/desirable but also, if you're lucky, pretty routine. It's not necessarily something that has to be shared only with 'the one'. Sex is something which (arguably) too much importance can be attached to. In the age of contraception, it's entirely up to the individual how much importance they place on sex and the conditions they'll attach to it.

 

[equationgirl]

It's not a human right as such, but equally lack of human contact and touch isn't trivial. Answer my question: do you think people have the right to sell sex? If you or I so desire, why shouldn't we be allowed to sell a shag for £50 or whatever? Do you look down on women who buy sex and disabled people who buy sex in the same way you do 'regular' men?

It is not illegal in Scotland to exchange sex for money, for example.

It is illegal to publically solicit, operate a brothel, or pimp. You'll note that these crimes punish the sex worker and not the purchaser.

As usual, I suggest you go away, read up about what you are trying to debate, and them come back to the discussion.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

It is not illegal in Scotland to exchange sex for money, for example.

It is illegal to publically solicit, operate a brothel, or pimp. You'll note that these crimes punish the sex worker and not the purchaser.

As usual, I suggest you go away, read up about what you are trying to debate, and them come back to the discussion.

And again, like OU, you're suggesting things that JV hasn't said. He hasn't, as far as I can tell, been defending the UK's rather perverse set of laws about prostitution.

You're not correct, btw. There are laws in Britain against kerb-crawling and other ways of procuring sex, and those laws are tougher in Scotland than in England and Wales.

 

[Orang Utan]

I do think more focus needs to be on the punters than the sex workers. They're the ones getting ripped off, beaten, tortured and killed. So if you're going to criminalise anyone, it should be them

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I do think more focus needs to be on the punters than the sex workers. They're the ones getting ripped off, beaten, tortured and killed. So if you're going to criminalise anyone, it should be them

"if you're going to criminalise anyone"

That makes a rather huge assumption that someone needs to be criminalised here.

 

[Pickman's model]

I do think more focus needs to be on the punters than the sex workers. They're the ones getting ripped off, beaten, tortured and killed.

surely you have it arse about tit here, ou. while i grant you punters may now and again feel they've been ripped off, they're not so frequently the ones getting beaten, tortured or killed.

 

[Orang Utan]

"if you're going to criminalise anyone"

That makes a rather huge assumption that someone needs to be criminalised here.

i don't have a problem with criminalising punters

 

[Orang Utan]

surely you have it arse about tit here, ou. while i grant you punters may now and again feel they've been ripped off, they're not so frequently the ones getting beaten, tortured or killed.

sorry, clumsy wording. i meant the sex workers, d'oh

 

[Johnny Vodka]

I do think more focus needs to be on the punters than the sex workers.

Which already happens in many countries and will probably end up happening here. But why should sex be criminalised between consenting adults? Would you happily criminalise a woman who used a male sex worker or a disabled person (or their carer for procuring) a sex worker?

 

[Pickman's model]

i don't have a problem with criminalising punters

i didn't think you would. you're quite happy for them to be beaten and killed and tortured.

 

[Orang Utan]

i didn't think you would. you're quite happy for them to be beaten and killed and tortured.

nope

 

[Orang Utan]

Which already happens in many countries and will probably end up happening here. But why should sex be criminalised between consenting adults? Would you happily criminalise a woman who used a male sex worker or a disabled person (or their carer for procuring) a sex worker?

i don't have a problem criminalising kerb crawlers and those who procure trafficked sex workers.

 

[Pickman's model]

i don't have a problem criminalising kerb crawlers and those who procure trafficked sex workers.

which is good, because they are already subject to the sanctions of the criminal law, as those who recall the fall from grace of alan green will know.

 

[Johnny Vodka]

i don't have a problem criminalising kerb crawlers and those who procure trafficked sex workers.

So you don't think all punters should be criminalised then?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

i don't have a problem criminalising kerb crawlers and those who procure trafficked sex workers.

I doubt many on here would, particularly the latter. But are you changing your position? Maybe I had you wrong, but you appeared to be advocating the Swedish solution before.

 

[Orang Utan]

So you don't think all punters should be criminalised then?

i don't know.

 

[Orang Utan]

I doubt many on here would, particularly the latter. But are you changing your position? Maybe I had you wrong, but you appeared to be advocating the Swedish solution before.

I thought it looked like a better system, yes.