[nathanbedford]

You might ask yourself who are the "victims" of criminalizing prostitution?

How about the prostitutes themselves who are put outside the law and left to the vicious mercies of pimps?

How about the police force which is corrupted and made cynical by unenforceable laws about morality?

How about a judicial system and a political system where our judges and politicians find themselves hypocrites for outlawing the prostitutes that they frequent?

How about the innocent folks with nothing to do with prostitutes but who find themselves the victims of street crime because the neighborhood deteriorates?

How about the innocent folks who find that their justice system grows more and more corrupt and hypocritical?

How about the taxpayer whose taxes are squandered uselessly on jails to incarcerate and courts to convict?

List of victims goes on and on.

[PieterCasparzen]

How about a judicial system and a political system where our judges and politicians find themselves hypocrites for outlawing the prostitutes that they frequent?

The hypocrite argument.

Because a judge or a politician commits a criminal act that does not invalidate the idea of the act being criminalized. In order for such a statement to be a valid argument, it would have to hold true for ALL crimes. Now, certainly a judge or politician may commit the crime of stealing or theft. But when a judge or politician does that, it does not give any justification for decriminalizing stealing or theft. The fact that individuals in politics, law enforcement or the judiciary commit crimes does not change the fact that the crimes are crimes. It simply means that sometimes these people commit crimes like every other segment of the population.

How about the innocent folks with nothing to do with prostitutes but who find themselves the victims of street crime because the neighborhood deteriorates?

"It's the criminalization that ruins the neighborhood, not the crime"

The neighborhood does not deteriorate because criminals are arrested and prosecuted; again, that is not the case with traffic tickets, robbery, rape or murder. If this were the case, we could stop enforcing all laws and crime would cease to exist. A little John Lennon and a bong and this idea starts to seem more and more practical.

What you don't mention is the effects of people choosing to have sex outside of marriage.

It fosters a lack of a unique respect and love for spouses. "Open" or adulterous relationships do not foster effective families. Sex without family commitment works to the detriment of families.

Prostitutes have lost self respect, they have "sold out". Customers say it is either out of desperation or "smart business" on the part of the prostitute; the prostitute will most often say it is "smart business" as that rationalizes things in her mind and intrigues, provides rationalizaton for and even excites the customer. But neither justifies the selling of one's body. If that is the highest value a woman can earn and she desires the earning enough to trade the intimate parts of her body, this proves only that to herself she is worth nothing more than as a sex object, which is humiliation. She will tell herself that she is an "artist", a "professional", like the naive young who fancy themselves great poets or artists. But in the end, the customer is humoring her and wants only the acts, even though he feels friendly towards or sorry for her. After all, is he to criticize her ?

A husband that will cherish his wife and keep himself for her would find her value as a woman worth infinitely more than the price of her sex to a stranger; yet she insults an unknown future potential husband by selling what he would cherish for a mere pittance though it seems like a high price to her at the time. After all, what is the redeeming nature of the work ? A few moments of pleasure ? All of that is vanity, it's all for naught in the end.

Rampant sex outside of marriage, whether prostitution or not, in and of itself causes societal decay, as the participants prioritize sex over concern for the family. The breakdown of families is what causes crimes of all types to increase in a neighborhood.

Our eyes have to be opened and our pride humbled to admit that something we do ourselves is nothing more than dirty deeds done dirt cheap.