and

“who was forcibly prostituted at the age of 9″

Can you stop abduction and enslavement, especially of minors, while making the market for sex legal? Minors often do not have the information nor the courage to make chocies off their own free will. The argument that they can be “freed” later does not hold since most victims are not accepted back into society (their villages) and often go back “voluntarily” to that profession.

It will be interesting to study free market sex in Mughal India or during the times when the Hindu kings ruled. By most accounts courtesans graced society. During Mughal rule, however, children were often victims. In fact, some examples of 19th century Urdu poetry are alleged to refer to paedophilia.

I think, getting getting prostitution under a rigid framework will give the sex-workers, society and the Government many advantages.

• Better control over aspects like getting roped in to the industry without choice or juvenile ages
• Safe Badges, can control the spread of HIV and other STDs

These are just a few.

Your rant about:
“…forcibly prostituted at the age of 9″ is baseless. Forcibly getting people to do anything at any age without their choice or consent is a crime. If there were concrete laws for the profession, such scenarios would be considerably lesser don’t you think?

Quizman, you are looking at prostitution from the wrong end of the gun. What has the Government and the society at large got to lose at large? Besides the stigma, parctically nothing.

a euphemism for rape and mayhem by drunked policemen

and

She managed to thwart the drunked cops

ahem!

If you had taken a deep breath and read my mail properly, you would’ve realized that my view was polar opposite of “no”. Why do you think I mentioned our culture permitting prostitution during Mughal & pre-Mughal eras.?

If you taken some more deep breaths, you would’ve also examined my statement about paedophilia and abduction vis-a-vis providing preventive protection as opposed to implementing laws ex post-ante.

You posited: “Forcibly getting people to do anything at any age without their choice or consent is a crime. If there were concrete laws for the profession, such scenarios would be considerably lesser don’t you think?”

In other words, you want more laws to protect people, since the existing laws lead to abuse. A very Galbraith-esque conclusion.

However, we need to answer the question that I posited. Let me try the Socratic dialectic between myself. :-) [Yeah, I know that is an oxymoron]

Q. Why should paid sex be legal?
A. Because laws are inefficient. There will always be a market for sex.

Q. Just ‘cos people will find a way, we shouldn’t make anything legal. Do you want to make robbery legal?
A. That’s a false argument. Paid sex should be between two consenting adults. Robbery by its very nature, implcitly entails the application of force to disrespect property rights.

Q. Oh, how does that prevent forced prostitution?
A. If you legalize it, there will always be suppliers (voluntary sex workers) who meet demand (clients) for economic benefit. Thus, there will be no incentive for coercion. It is the same principle that applies to prohibition. If you make the market for liqour free, there will be no incentive to have an illegal hooch business.

Q. Ah, I see. So what is the downside?
A. There is no clear method to reduce paedophilia.

Q. Why are you so against child prostitution? Isn’t that simply a variant?
A. No, a child cannot make informed chocies off his/her own free will. Nor is a child economically self-reliant. He/She is dependent on his wards. A child can be coerced or forced into bondage. Thus, paedophilia is deviant behavior since it is the forced infringement of a child’s liberty. Not to mention the psychological trauma that the victim has to endure.

Q. So let me get this straight. You’re saying that in the market for sex, there will always be deviants (demand) who will want child prostitutes (supply)
A. Yes.

Q. So even if we make a free market for sex, there will always be an illegal market for child sex?
A. Absolutely.

Q. But wait a minute, how do you prevent it? You just told me that laws are inefficient and that we should have a free market for sex.
A. Exactly my question. How does one prevent it?

Q. Explain.
A. Anecdotal evidence shows that there was a free market for sex in the Mughal era. But that did not prevent child prostitution. In fact, during Ghalib’s times, Turkish boys were kidnapped and forced into slavery. It is alleged that there are many urdu shairs/shayari that extoll the poets love for children.

Q. So even if we pass a law banning child prostitution, there may be corrupt cops or deviants who will always find a workaround.
A. Yes.

Q. But can’t we catch them?
A. Yes, we can catch them. But it is *after* the crime is committed. But that is way too late. The child has already been sodomized and cannot often find a way back into society. Even if the child does find a way back, he/she is very traumatized.

Q. So how do we prevent this from happening?
A. You tell me.

A. Because laws are inefficient.
I don’t think “laws are inefficient” will ever be a good reason in my eyes. The right reason, in my view, is that there is nothing wrong with it as it “is between two consenting adults“.

I also dont buy the argument that coercive prostitution will go away because there will always be suppliers (voluntary sex workers) who meet demand (clients). That something is legal does not mean a “black market” doesn’t exist in parallel. One of the important valid opposition to legalizing prostitution is that prosecuting pimps who force women to prostitution will be more difficult.

But then, all this is from the legal point of view. What about the actual CSWs? removing the taboo associated with prostitution will be the first step in accepting CSWs and their children into the main stream. It will be the first step in ensuring rehabilitation of someone forced into doing this… rather than leaving her at the mercy of societal (sic) vultures.

I think the most important word in entire Yazad’s post is dignity. Yazad, you couldn’t have used a better title.

The purpose of a law is not to prevent something but to discourage what the society at it’s current state of evolution thinks is a hindrance to progress.

But what is progress and collective wisdom - in my opinion, they are actually voices of those who are powerful and wise enough to make sure they are heard. Creation is fascinating.

A black market does not exist in a market that is truly free. Since suppliers can charge exorbitant prices in cases where demand is inelastic. [Assuming that there will be people who will always want sex and will not suddenly turn into monks when prices go up]

I would argue that most libertarians, if not all, would believe in legalising prostitution. The struggle that I’m facing is to frame a system of checks and balances that would legalise prostitution and yet prevent the more deviant form - and this is important - **before it occurs**.

Maybe Yazad already has an answer to my question and I’m simply wasting time repeating myself. I’ve hogged enough bandwidth already.:-)