Sex Trade Harm

On Prostitution

Prostitution, or the commercial sex trade, is a known phenomenon. Whether it be through garish images in movies and serials of half- dressed women, or jokes about ‘red light districts’ in adult conversations, everyone knows about it.

In any conversation about it today you can find that very common comment, a so-called piece of urban wisdom “prostitution is the oldest profession yaar”. This is, apparently, a fact of life, and so any conversation by urban, educated, middle class women has now become to chant the western mantra of ‘sex work is work’. Liberal feminist groups and organizations have now adopted this mantra completely – entire collectives and movements chant that sex work is work, and that prostituted women should receive recognition of being in a form of regular labour.

This approach purportedly gives these women, ‘agency’. For most of history, they have been treated as outcasts by society, blamed for an evil inflicted on them, and deprived of having their own voices. It is definitely true that a community of women victimized to service men’s every whim and fancy, have been unfairly demonized, painted as sinners, and treated as criminals.

This is an atrocious historical and present wrong. However, in another direct import from western, rich societies with very different sexual norms, ‘liberal’ feminist groups and urban, English speaking middle class women have echoed these mantras, claiming that a) that is what women in the sex trade want and b) that treating it as work will legitimize it, remove stigma, and enable these women to live normal lives. In this framing, by merely treating sexual access for money as ‘work’ we can solve problems of exploitation and dehumanization in prostitution, and those in it will have a normal life.

Are these claims actually true? Do they stand up to scrutiny, or do they even make logical sense? On what assumptions do they claim that this approach is good for women and children in the long run?

As with any subject, the fact that historically, an issue has been treated badly by our society, does not mean the other extreme is automatically correct. Reactionary positions, that are merely the ‘opposite’ of what was may seem energizing. It should be obvious though, that an answer to a terrible situation is not always as simple as ‘the other extreme’. Worse, it is irresponsible, reckless and very privileged to transport arguments made in western culture, in rich countries, in cultures with vastly different ways of life, and try to transpose it to a country where rape and gang rape of children and women is a daily occurrence

Every subject needs debate, and must be informed. Currently, the debate around prostitution is framed as ‘patriarchy (represented by the state and conservatives)’ who want to punish and dehumanize women after victimizing them vs ‘secular, liberal’ feminist groups who claim that treating it as regular work will solve the issues. More perspectives, that scrutinize the claims made by both groups, is needed. To that end, our initiatives aim to subject the Indian free-for-all-with-an-opinion feminist blogosphere to a more rigorous process, by examining claims and their underlying assumptions, and involving more testing of claims and arguments, rather than simply asserting an argument without ever being required to either support the argument, or have it be subjected to wider scrutiny.