Illegal For A Reason

I don't care what Emily Bazelon says in Slate. Prostitution is not a victimless crime. Ask Elliot Spitzer's wife.

The rationalization behind legalization as advanced by Bazelon and others is similar to those who advocate decriminalizing marijuana possession. They say it will 1) make it safer by taking it out of the criminal underworld 2) provide a basis for regulation and 3) open up a new revenue stream through taxation. Bazelon also suggests the unseemliness is overrated:

Martha Nussbaum, a law and philosophy professor at the University of Chicago, argues that lots of work involves the sale of bodily services and that lots of the work that poor women do involves bad working conditions. For her, it's all about context—there's a big difference between a street worker controlled by a pimp and a high-end call girl who picks her own clients, and the real question is how to increase poor women's access to decent and safe work in general. Legalizing prostitution "is likely to make things a little better for women who have too few options to begin with," Nussbaum writes.

Note the words "a little better." "Little" is generous. Also note the ignorant assumption in that statement: that poor women have so few choices for work, thus making prostitution a necessary career option. Please give me pause while the indignation steams from my ears.

As for legalization providing safer, regulated sex services: we regulate guns and medical services and we still have underground markets for both, as people constantly seek discounts or loopholes. Legalized hooking will inflate the cost to the average john if you consider the price of complying with the law. Any serious measure would have to require scrupulous medical examinations, fees for licenses (which would likely be high), and taxes on each session.

Then you have the human price: risk of disease. Even more devastating is the families shredded by infidelity. I cannot believe we would seriously consider legalizing a home-wrecking profession. Put yourself in the shoes of Silda Spitzer, silently standing by your philandering man while he confesses his sins to the cameras. Imagine the hurt, the sadness, the feelings of rejection -- Why was I not good enough for you? What did this woman have that I didn't? Why couldn't I make you love me? We all know it's not her fault. But I know if I were the woman passed up for a high-dollar callgirl, part of me would be blaming myself. Maybe some women can make peace with a husband who keeps a lady on the side (a la TV's Carmela Soprano), but they shouldn't have to. And our governments should not force them to put up with it.

Selling sex is not like selling maid service. It's not, like one person suggested, "ordering a pizza." GOD did not make sex a commodity to be bought and sold on the open market. Elliot Spitzer knew that, but I guess he put a signing statement in his marriage license... or his wedding vows.