Social Dilemma: Should Prostitution Be Legalized
Introduction
For many years until this current day, prostitution has been something which has always been frowned upon worldwide. It is known to be one of the oldest professions in some parts of the world and has led to million-dollar money-making industries. Prostitution is usually a choice made by a person to use their bodies to make money, what we often forget it that it is not a choice for some people, woman and children are forced into doing sex work, also leading to sex trafficking. In South Africa prostitution is illegal for various reasons, there has been an on-going debate on whether prostitution should be legalized or whether it should remain illegal. In should prostitution be legalized essay I will be debating this issue and giving my view point on why I think prostitution should not be decriminalized. I will also be discussing the consequences of prostitution and why it is important that we do not allow this profession to be legal in South Africa.
Definition of Key Concepts
Prostitution is the act or practice of engaging in promiscuous sexual relations especially for money. A prostitute is particularly a woman, who engages in sexual activity for payment. A sex worker, is a person who is employed in the sex industry, who provide direct sexual services for payment. Decriminalization is the action or process of ceasing to treat something as illegal or as a criminal offence.
The Decriminalization of Prostitution in South Africa
The question at hand is, should prostitution be legalized in South Africa? This is a question that has brought about many debates in within the country. Prostitution in South Africa has been illegal from the 1950s, by the end of apartheid prostitution grew vastly with a number of prostitutes working under illegal conditions. Buying and selling sex is illegal in South Africa as well as other related activities like keeping brothels and pimping, because of poor law enforcement it has widely spread around many parts of the country. An attempt to legalize prostitution was then made and was unsuccessful by the Constitutional Court and it still remains illegal till this day. I personally believe that it should remain this way. Prostitution should not be legalized in South Africa. Despite the widespread of prostitution in South Africa, it should still remain illegal. There are various reasons why the legalisation of prostitution would cause a great downfall in our country and below are the reasons explained in detail.
Why Decriminalization Should Not Take Place
Firstly, we have to pay close attention to the health conditions of this country. South Africa has one of the largest HIV epidemics. Research states that HIV rates are three to four times higher among female sex workers. The South African National AIDS Council estimated a 60% infection rate. The act of prostitution is essentially sex work, sex which is often done with the reluctancy to use condoms, in this case the spread of HIV/AIDS is so easily transmitted from one person to the next. This by far has to be the most magnetic profession for the spread of HIV as it is so bound to happen. Woman also find it hard to find means to protect themselves in this situation and with being left so helpless will undoubtably do as they are told. Prostitution goes hand in hand with many other sexually transmitted diseases as well apart from HIV. By decriminalizing prostitution, it will be opening doors for more diseases to be transmitted among people. The spreading of HIV and other STDs will cause great risks to communities and then to the country as a whole.
Sex workers, having the reputation that they do have, draws in a lot of negative reactions, mostly rape and abuse. Many sex workers experience an unlimited amount of abuse. They experience abuse by their customers, they are often raped and left without being paid. They also experience a lot of physical abuse when they do not obey clients and have to do what they are asked off. Another very important point is they are abused by police because they do not have any respect for these women. For example, there was a case where a sex worker was in the middle of business with a client, during which a police found them and stopped them and then went on to raping the sex worker and leaving her helpless in the situation. About 70% of woman who reported violation to the Women’s Legal Centre reported violence and abuse by police. It is clear that no one would want to experience this sort of abuse and have nothing done about it, therefore women should put their foot down and go to safe houses for ex prostitutes and try to conform and do something that wouldn’t cause them so much pain. In this case decriminalization would support abuse because no one knows what is going to happen behind closed doors, more people would be stepping up to use prostitutes as their punching bags because their reputation is still a negative one.
Sex workers do not usually choose going into this profession but are left with no choice or are forced into it. When they are involved in sexual activities it is not something that they are proud of, they are embarrassed by it and go through so much emotional pain and even physical pain, it is not something they enjoy experiencing. Sex workers use drugs to hinder their state of mind when they are involved in sexual activities. it is used to blur out the things that they do not want to feel and they depend on these drugs to feel nothing at all. The use of drugs may help sex workers deal with amount of emotional pain they experience but the illegal drug industry would be growing rapidly due to them using it so often. The use of drugs will also grow rapidly if decriminalisation takes place because the more customers become available, the more drugs sex workers will me consuming, causing higher consumption of drugs in South Africa.
Another very important issue to think about is that these women often have unprotected sex which could cause them to fall pregnant. Being pregnant in this sort of industry is a major set back for the sex workers as their bodies would no longer be available for business meaning that they will not be earning any money. The desperate need for money pushes women to consider abortion. There are babies constantly being torn out of women’s bodies in desperation, also because these babies are made with clients and it is not something that they are proud of and want to keep. They have these abortions in order to continue with their work. As well as having personal relationships and falling pregnant, they will no longer be able to work if they are pregnant. Keep in mind the fact that every time a woman aborts a baby it is damaging to the body as well as to the persons peace of mind. By decriminalizing sex work, there will be an increase in the amount of abortions taking place just to keep a job.
Something else to keep in mind is sex trafficking and child prostitution. People are being transported form one place to the next for the purpose of sexual exploitation. Majority lies with woman and children who are being forced by local criminal gangs to engage in these activities. Women and children are being transported around like objects to engage in sex work, it is often not by their free will. Criminal gangs recruit underaged children from poor areas and take them to bigger cities for sexual exploitation, an estimate of about 30000 children have been involved in this. South Africa is a popular destination for underaged sex. If South Africa legalises prostitution it would seem as if sex trafficking is “okay” to do, it is under no circumstance something that should be encouraged. Legalization would mean that a demand for children in the industry would increase and the children would be dragged into the industry, which would ruin their lives and their futures.
Lastly, there is a huge importance when it comes to the morals of prostitutes. Engaging in sex work breaks an individual’s personal morals and values and leaves them feeling of emptiness. In many religious culture’s prostitution is not encouraged. Sex workers ignore their morals to earn a living. When it comes to the morals of a marriage it is extremely important for man and woman to stand in holy matrimony and therefore prostitution threatens morals of marriage. Some sex workers are mothers they have children who look up to them, in this case these children will grow up with the impression that sex work is something that is normal and they might be encouraged to do this in their futures. Mothers will not be able to hide the fact that they engage in sex for money from their children when they are older, causing feelings of embarrassment for the mother and the child. Sex work can also lead to the breaking of homes, if it is legalized, all people would feel like it is something that they are allowed to do, customers to these sex workers may have families and homes and by them engaging in this they are at huge risk of ruining their families and breaking their homes and marriages, leading to divorces.
There are views made that legalisation would benefit those involved in sex work by making their working conditions safer and their lives easy, for example being able to report cases of abuse and rape whenever they want to and actually being heard and not being accused of being a criminal. However, the amount of negative points in the legalization of prostitution outweighs the positive, as stated above. It is understandable that sex workers want to be acknowledge as working class and want to be respected, but respect is something that would be very hard to gain. In this case I believe that keeping it illegal would be a good way to encourage women to stop being involved in sex work and to stop using their bodies for business. If legalised, South Africa would not have the funds to pursue what is set out for sex workers, as they often do not have funds to pursue a lot of other things, this would be unreasonable. Keeping this illegal should pursue prostitutes to try and find better things to do with their lives. They should turn to safe houses and try to conform and become more involved in other activities that can lead them into finding better jobs and means of income. The South African government should encourage women to be more involved in other things by creating jobs for them, perhaps start of small and then allow them to grow from there. Women would then take pride in themselves and start to realise their actual worth.
The Consequences of Prostitution
The Criminogenic Nature of Prostitution
Prostitution has been frowned upon and undesirable due to the existing close connection with other crimes. Some of the crimes that are associated with prostitution are drug trafficking, robberies, assaults, abuse and organised crimes. It is argued that prostitution is legalised then all related crimes would also be stemmed. It is believed that all other related crime will arise with the status of prostitution. Because of the status crime in prostitution, secondary crimes related to prostitution would be produced. Exploitation of prostitutes occur when prostitutes seek assistance from pimps and gangs because of knowing that it is illegal. Today prostitution is highly and tightly organised by pimps and gangs and even drug dealers.
The Moral Threat to Marriage and Family
In many cultures’ prostitution is seen as wrong, especially when it comes to the holy matrimony of a man and woman, they stand before God and take their vows and form bounding promises. Prostitution is hostile to marriage and the intention of family; it threatens the vision of unity within a family as woman refuse to comply with the norm’s faithfulness and extramarital sexual affairs. The acts of sex outside a marriage has become more accepted due to receiving rewards. Commercial sex violates a person integrity and what they believe in, as well as their bodies. Woman often like to be romanticized before sex and with men, they naturally believe that it is their responsibility to be the receiver of sex. Prostitution is normally demanded by males due to their intense sexual urges, making them desire more than one woman. Due to these urges they feel they have the right to have sex with who ever they want and do not follow the norms of romantic love. Therefore, in prostitution men are allowed to be more dominant and the woman’s (sex worker) morality is ignored. In South Africa they are trying to do away with the morality of woman be taken away from them and the acts of submissiveness to a man is indefinite. They have put reinforcements into place that there should be no stereotypes in the commercial sex industry.
Concerns Relating to Public Nuisance
Public nuisance such as street prostitution is said to be a reason why prostitution should be legalized. These factors include too much unnecessary noise, traffic pile ups, condoms and many other forms of litter being left all over the place, like roads and sidewalks. Police often receive complaints from local residence about these nuisances and they then try to create laws against street sex workers by having them to engage in these activities on one located area rather than causing corruption everywhere. Areas of street prostitution taking place often became overcrowded, making them move to new more upscale areas. The business and residents of these areas were unhappy and approached police to solve the matter but police enforcement is not strong enough to rid this nuisance and then turned to municipal reinforcement to put laws into place to remove these prostitutes from these areas so that citizens are not offended by the sight of prostitution and quickly satisfy the publics concerns. The growing of prostitution can lead to major public nuisances and therefor the practice of prohibition should be put into place.
Conclusion
Although there are various reasons to legalize prostitution, we have to keep in mind that there are too many negatives that outweigh the positives. In the above discussion we can see the amount of concerns that are brought up, over all the amount of respect that we have for woman should be elevated drastically. By keeping prostitution illegal woman should be pursued to better their lives and do something that they are actually happy doing, many women agree if they had a choice to work in something else, they would leave prostitution in an instant, which shows the first intent that prostitution should no longer take place. Woman have to seek the help of safe houses and medical care so that they can reform from such institutions. South Africa should discourage decriminalization and keep in mind the struggle of woman in the country and spend their times bettering their lives rather than legalising sex work.
Bibliography
- Cathi Albertyn, 2019. The long road to legal sex work in SA winds on. The Citizen. 2 August. Available at: http://www.google.com/amp/s/citizen.co.za/talking-point/2162894/the-road-to-legal-sex-work-in-sa-winds-on/amp/
- Christen Torres, 2018. Legalising Prostitution a Tough Issue. The Southern Cross. 12 October. Available at: https://www.scross.co.za/2018/10/legalising-prostitution-a-tough-issue/
- Anon. 2017. Crime Typologies. [custom textbook]. Pretoria, Muckleneuk
