Posted on 10/21/2004 12:09:37 PM PDT by NYer
At the polling booth this year, Berkeley residents will have a unique voting choice: Yes or no to the decriminalization of prostitution.
Decriminalization means the repeal of measures that outlaw prostitution, soliciting, pimping, pandering, and brothels. Although the vote will take place only in the city of Berkeley, the decriminalization campaign's ultimate goal is the repeal of California state laws on prostitution and related offenses.**
Decriminalization is a more extreme measure than legalization. Legalization would mean the regulation of prostitution with laws regarding where, when, and how prostitution could take place. Decriminalization eliminates all laws and prohibits the state and law-enforcement officials from intervening in any prostitution-related activities or transactions, unless other laws apply.
If Measure Q, as it is called on the ballot, passes, Berkeley will have to do the following: 1) make enforcement of prostitution laws the lowest priority for the Berkeley Police Department; 2) set the city of Berkeley in opposition to state prostitution laws and direct the Berkeley City Council to lobby for the repeal of prostitution laws in the state of California; and 3) require the Berkeley Police Department to report semi-annually to the City Council and Police Review Commission on the enforcement of prostitution laws.
The decriminalization campaign is being led by Robyn Few of the Sex Workers Outreach Project. Few was arrested by the FBI and pleaded guilty in 2002 to a federal charge of conspiracy to promote prostitution in connection with a multi-state prostitution ring. At the time, she was also working for Americans for Safe Access, a group advocating the legalization of marijuana. Few said at a recent conference entitled "Prostitution, Sex Work, and the Commercial Sex Industry" that she was shocked and hurt that marijuana activists subsequently disowned her; after all, she thinks both activities should be decriminalized, so why should one group of people involved in illegal activities discriminate against another? She said she got her revenge by marching topless in a San Francisco gay parade with a sign that read "Sex Workers for Medical Marijuana."
Few's personal background is, tragically, typical for a woman in the sex industry: incest, child abuse, runaway (at age 13), high-school dropout, domestic violence, rape, and stripping — all before she entered prostitution. Few presents herself as a sex worker and an activist for sex workers' rights, but there is one little problem: Her conviction wasn't for soliciting, it was for a federal pimping offense. It therefore stretches credibility to say she is working on behalf of women in prostitution.
Few and her friends have received guidance from a visiting adviser from the Australian sex industry, where prostitution is legal in several states. The Australian activist is helping groups in various cities in the U.S. organize efforts to decriminalize prostitution. They selected Berkeley as their first venue, not only for its liberal voters but also because they needed just 2,100 signatures to get the measure on the ballot. Few said that only one out of twelve people they approached signed the petition, but they had great fun "being irreverent" and setting up tables decorated with "balloons with boobs on them."
While Few and friends may be giddy from their in-your-face politics, city officials worry about what the effects of Measure Q would be if it passes. The city manager prepared an impact report that states that if the ordinance passes it will likely increase crime and community complaints in the following ways: 1) Berkeley could become the Bay Area's prostitution center, attracting prostitutes and "johns" (the men who pay for sex acts); 2) the number of robberies, sexual assaults, thefts, batteries, and disturbing-the-peace calls would increase, as would the amount of litter; 3) the exploitation of women and children would increase; 4) rates of sexually transmitted diseases, tuberculosis, and hepatitis would increase; 5) the police department's enforcement activities would be limited; 6) the quality of life in neighborhoods of increased prostitution would decrease; 7) drug activity in houses that cater to prostitutes and pimps would increase; 8) the incidents of violence against prostitutes, such as assault, battery, rape, robbery, kidnap, and murder would increase; and 9) businesses in commercial districts whose customers would stay away due to increasing prostitution and crime would be harmed. The impact report was a sweeping condemnation of decriminalization.
Campaigners for Measure Q try to sell the initiative as promoting women's rights, claiming that decriminalization will end the stigma against prostitutes and enable them to integrate into society as "sex workers." This is utopian thinking that has no basis in the reality of the lives of women in prostitution — women who are defined by how men can and do use them.
What Measure Q activists don't talk about is the impact of decriminalizing the activities of "johns," pimps, panderers, and brothel owners. At a recent conference on prostitution at the University of Toledo, decriminalization advocate Norma Jean Almodovar of the International Sex Worker Foundation for Art, Culture and Education said: "I don't want to arrest clients. They give me money!" Almodovar is another activist who claims she is working for the rights of women, but like many decriminalization activists, she too is protecting the money stream flowing from customers to the pimps and bosses of the sex industry.
Supporters of Measure Q claim that decriminalization of prostitution will decrease the violence against prostitutes. Women and children in prostitution do suffer from extreme violence. Research I've done with Janice Raymond of the Coalition Against Trafficking Women found that the majority of women in prostitution have been physically assaulted and raped, often multiple times, by "johns" (86 percent were physically assaulted, 80 percent were sexually assaulted, and 65 percent had weapons used against them). Removing the penalties against pimps and men who purchase sex acts will not cause them to be less violent.
Presently, prostitution is on the rise in Berkeley, as it is in many cities and towns across the U.S. The impact report says that from 2002 to early 2004 there was a 57-percent increase in calls for police service regarding prostitution. Police data show that Berkeley police are arresting an increasing number of underage girls for prostitution, some as young as 13. Decriminalization would escalate these trends.
Women and children in prostitution do need assistance. According to research by Melissa Farley, a clinical and research psychologist and director of Prostitution Research and Education in San Francisco, 89 percent of women in prostitution want out, but are trapped by violence, addictions, and hopelessness. Decriminalization of the sex trade will do nothing to help them escape; instead, it will ensnare them more tightly.
Passage of Measure Q will make Berkeley a prostitution capital and a destination city for sex tourists and trafficked women and children. Defeating Measure Q will send a clear message that prostitution and the harm it does to women, children, families, and communities are not wanted in Berkeley. Doing otherwise would send a troublesome one.
**Measure Q aims to repeal portions of the following Sections of the California Penal Code: 266, 266d, 266e, 266f, 266h, 266i, 315, 316, 318, 647, 653.20, 653.22, 653.23 and 653.28, which criminalize prostitution-related activities among or between adults.
— Donna M. Hughes is professor and Carlson Endowed Chair in Women's Studies at the University of Rhode Island.
Lawrence v Texas was not decided on some "right to privacy".
"Held: The Texas statute making it a crime for two persons of the same sex to engage in certain intimate sexual conduct violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment."
>>you haven't been behind closed doors with her<<
Ever heard the saying:
"The ideal wife is a whore behind the closed bedroom door when evening comes and a perfect lady when the door is open."
Give the poor gals Bill O'Reilly's number.
heh heh heh.. I'm searching for one of those!
Your reply is absolutely baffling. Is it some sort of rebuttal?
Using foul language and acting as a slut "behind closed doors" (and, as witnessed, nowhere else) would be exactly what one would be paying for, right?
Are you just going for a debate point here? Just trying to fold your hands over your chest and say "yep, that poster wasn't exactly correct"?
Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote an opinion declaring that the liberty and privacy rights found within the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution confer upon consenting adults a right to engage in sodomy, and seemingly anything else they so choose, within the privacy of their homes.
Could ALL men have anal sex with ANY woman?
There was no "unequal protection". All pairs of men and all pairs of women were prohibited from engaging in same sex sodomy.
Your interpretation of "equal protection" would legitimize same sex marriage.
Also note, if it was about "equal protection" and not "right to privacy" that struck down ALL sodomy laws, what do you say to the handful of states that saw their sodomy laws (prohibiting the act between all persons, heterosexual and homosexual) ended with this ruling?
I am in other places, I`m just a clairvoyant in my spare time.
Government has no business regulating prostitution.
Either fornication laws of old should still stand (prohibiting unmarried sex and adultery) or anyone can have sex.
Payola in the radio industry was not a crime in the early 1960s. The unreported income that radio employees received was a crime. The same would be true of a woman who accepts "gifts" as incentives to go out with someone (and possibly have sex).
The Center for Disease Control has abandoned their post by politicizing AIDS rather than trying to find out the sexual partner history of all those infected.
Since the CDC won't inform possibly infected partners anymore for all STDs, I see no point to having the government regulate potential sex partner to give a USDA-type stamp that this orifice has been determined to be disease free.
If a prostitute is seeing several men a day, there will be no way to guarantee that all of those Johns are getting a sterile "environment".
The same is true of bar sluts who may only be going home with 5 different men a month (and not charging for their services).
Solicitation on the street, "white slavery", houses of prostitution, etc. can all be prosecuted. Individual transactions are pretty much impossible to stamp out. And in the absence of supporting morals laws, somewhat difficult to understand.
Be careful too about institutionalizing legal prostitution.
There are some socialized nations that have and they find (and approve) claims for some people with sexual "disfunction" to visit prostitutes for sexual pleasure.
If a government is going to pay for Viagra tablets and abortions, you can bet that you would eventually also be paying for prostitutes as a taxpayer.
I suspect these percentages are quite a bit lower in legal establishments in Nevada.
I don't support government or insurance coverage to pay for prostitution. I was simply sharing my opinion for reasons to decriminalize prostitution.
I'm just following some scenarios to possible conclusions. Such events have already occurred elsewhere.
2 men or women can live together without their circumstance being institutionalized.
Just like I say that legalizing drugs would require the legalizing of ALL drugs (including quack medications), otherwise there will always be "something illegal" to restrict. And "taxing the Hell out of drugs" just moves the DEA under the ATF (which is a gun carrying, tax regulating agency); that's no "solution" to me.
In the absence of a government subsidized "safety net", some of these "personal choices" may be acceptable to society (even if they would send some people on a downward spiral), but we have not dismantled the system yet so it is certainly difficult to argue a case for putting more people on public assistance.
It's no coincidence that this is happening in Berkeley. The radicals that control things there understand that hedonism is a social-political weapon.
Oh, sorry! :)
Woah!
Where did I even mention "equal protection" much less interpret it? The majority USSC opinion rejected the equal protection argument in Lawrence v Texas.
Lawrence v Texas was badly decided on the right to liberty as protected by the 14th amendment -- but the right must be found fundamental (as abortion was) for this protection to apply, yet sodomy was not found by the USSC to be fundamental.
Yes, Justice Kennedy wrote about "privacy rights found within the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment". There are none, of course.
In Griswold v. Connecticut, the so-called "right to privacy" was found in penumbras of constitutional provisions other than the Due Process Clause, and that case expressly disclaimed any reliance on the doctrine of "substantive due process".
"The privacy right created in Lawrence -- "
Our right to privacy is as old as common law & common sense. It was not "created in Lawrence".
-- is based on the most dubious and most criticized doctrine in the Court's jurisprudence
It is "dubious & criticized" by those who want States to have the power to ignore due process, to infringe upon fundamental individual rights.
States have never been granted such powers.
-- a concept known as "Substantive Due Process." The 14th Amendment states:
"No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the Untied States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law."
A straightforward reading of the constitution would seem that this involves two things: the privileges or immunities of citizens (their substantive rights)
Our rights to life, liberty or property are not substantive/ essential?
and proper process -- a jury of one's peers, appointed defense counsel, the right to confront witnesses, etc.
However, the court has held that Due Process also includes certain substantive rights that are "fundamental to ordered liberty" yet for some inexplicable reason not mentioned in the text of the Constitution.
Odd claim. Does this man really think its "inexplicable " that most of our essential/substantive rights are not mentioned in the Constitution? Has he ever read the 9th Amendment, and understood it's impossible to enumerate all of our rights?
Most prominent of these is the right to privacy ---
Privacy is essential, certainly, but I doubt that the framers gave much thought to specifically enumerating the right to be 'left alone'. --- It's an obvious freedom, and would be akin to enumerating our right to lock our doors.
Statist's here on FR seen to think that any individual liberty not specifically mentioned in our Constitution is fair game for State 'regulations', even for outright prohibitions. -- Some, like paulsen, even believe that States can prohibit our RKBA's.
This is 'conservatism'?
There you go again, trying to apply the 9th amendment where it shouldn't.
Lawrence v Texas involved a state statute, not a federal one. If the 9th amendment does include a "right to privacy" (and no court has found that it does), that right would be protected by the 9th from federal intrusion, not state intrusion.
If a person is seeking protection from state statutes, the 14th amendment is used. In this case, petitioners used the "due process" clause; to wit:
"nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law"
They claimed that they "were free as adults to engage in private conduct in the exercise of their liberty under the Due Process Clause". Now, in order for the USSC to find this "right to engage in private conduct" (ie., sodomy), the must find this right to be "fundamental to the concept of liberty", which they did not.
"Most prominent of these is the right to privacy ---"
Privacy is essential, certainly, but I doubt that the framers gave much thought to specifically enumerating the right to be 'left alone'. --- It's an obvious freedom, and would be akin to enumerating our right to lock our doors.
Statist's here on FR seen to think that any individual liberty not specifically mentioned in our Constitution is fair game for State 'regulations', even for outright prohibitions. -- Some, like paulsen, even believe that States can prohibit our RKBA's.
This is 'conservatism'?
There you go again, trying to apply the 9th amendment where it shouldn't.
Lawrence v Texas involved a state statute, not a federal one. If the 9th amendment does include a "right to privacy" (and no court has found that it does), that right would be protected by the 9th from federal intrusion, not state intrusion.
The Ninth says "the people" retain all of their rights, whether enumerated in the Constitution or not. -- Thus, -- your silly opinion that States can infringe upon our unenumerated rights is simply authoritarian wishful thinking.
If a person is seeking protection from state statutes, the 14th amendment is used. In this case, petitioners used the "due process" clause; to wit: "nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law"
They claimed that they "were free as adults to engage in private conduct in the exercise of their liberty under the Due Process Clause".
Indeed they are. Private conduct that harms no other person is obviously not subject to the regulatory power of the State. NOWHERE, in any of our Constitutions, are any level of our governments granted such a power.
Now, in order for the USSC to find this "right to engage in private conduct" (ie., sodomy), the must find this right to be "fundamental to the concept of liberty", which they did not.
Specious argument. They found the Texas 'law' in question unconstitutional. -- Case closed.
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