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February 26th 2007:
REPLY TO DR SULLIVAN
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- Dr Mary Lucille Sullivan
proclaims decriminalisation of prostitution has failed in Victoria,
Australia and she promotes of the Swedish Model.
I read Dr Sullivan's letter in the BMJ with enthusiasm as I
am extremely interested in the success of decriminalising sex
work. Sadly, her letter is not based on fact. It is rather a
classic Stalinist/feminist argument putting over authoritarian
anti-sex and anti-male feminist politics, using unknown sources
of information. I was allerted to the stream of misinformation
when Dr Sullivan described Australia's Sexpo as a “trade
show for prostitution”. It is in fact just a commercial
trade show, like Britain's Erotica, promoting pornography, sex
toys and fetish wear.
Dr Sullivan, like most feminist campaigners in her camp, speaks
of prostitution as if it is only done by women, whereas we all
know that both men and women work as sex workers. She ignores
the actual democratic rights of sex workers and their clients
to engage in consensual adult behaviour. She is condescending
to sex workers rather than respectful. She singles out sex workers
as having to work out of economic necessity for their bosses
and clients, but we all know that is the same for most employees
and freelancers.
Sullivan's claim that legitimising sex work leads to more criminality
and violence is also false. For one thing, the criminality and
violence would not have been reported before the decriminalisation
took place. If sex work business has expanded, so will all aspects
of it. Many other businesses attract gangsters, such as night
clubs, gambling casinos and the construction industry, and nobody
suggests that this should lead to these industries being closed
down.
Criminality is always with us in all walks of life, despite
feminists and religious fundamentalists selling us their utopian
dreams, it always will be. What is needed to minimalise criminality
is improved policing of the criminals who work within the industry.
It is also necessary to raise the status of sex workers by transforming
sex work into a specialist social service. The latter was proposed
in the Sexual Freedom Coalition Response to the Home Office
Consultation Paper Paying the Price, with sex centres being
attached to health centres around the country (so far ignored
by the Home Office).
The Swedish Model which criminalises clients is inhumane, and
is now thankfully being challenged in Sweden. Pru, one of the
TLC sex workers who works with disabled clients, has been invited
to take part in a Swedish television documentary made by Titan
Television, Stockholm to be transmitted on their Channel 5.
Pru will be featured talking about disabled men and women using
sex workers. The producers tell us that in Sweden this is a
big issue because Swedish people feel that disabled people should
have the right to buy sex from sex workers.
Hopefully, Pru will have the opportunity to prove that the right
to buy sex from sex workers is beneficial to many people's mental
health, however socially, physically or emotionally impaired
they might be. And, who is to be the judge of that?
Dr Tuppy Owens
www.tlc-trust.org.uk
www.sfc.org.uk
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