Although Prostitution is illegal in many countries and states of the world, its existence cannot be denied. It has existed since time immemorial as many sacred texts even talk about glorious women. Prostitution is defined as the act of selling sex; hence there is an obvious distinction between prostitution and casual sex. Additionally, the concept of prostitution is only limited to the prostitution of women and does not encompass virtual possibilities. The term “Legalize” is defined is defined as acknowledging prostitution as a legal business by the law and the prostitutes must be given the rights to police protection and to legal recourse as the rest of us. To study such a possibility in isolation, we are attempting to apply the model to a modal secular state, without any state religion or religious majority. The advantages of the idea of such a modal state is that cost benefit analysis become more accurate, we can look at the reasons in isolation and ignores the religious issue with the concept of prostitution. We are looking to see whether legalization will empower and emancipate women.
In order to do such an analysis it would not be prudent to simply present a hypothesis and prove that. What is of paramount importance is to present both sides of the argument before coming to a definite conclusion. Furthermore, the main arguments are divided under three broad categories namely those of “Crime Rate”, “Health” and “Human Rights”. Such categorization helps simplify the arguments and give them a certain direction. Firstly, Prostitution has a direct and indirect influence on crime rate. Direct in the sense that the act itself is illegal and indirect because it leads to other crimes for example the killings of prostitutes because they are deemed to be easy targets. We see in the cases of Jack the Rippers, Robert Pickton and Gary Ridgway, all of them killed prostitutes and were convicted. The social stigma guided such brutal actions is analyzed as a cause of violence. It cannot be denied that women as prostitutes are not targeted so it makes it even more important for the state to provide protection to these women as they themselves feel powerless. The women find it very difficult to break through the social stigma. Amy Allen’s theory of power structure is used to ensure that women would be able to claim legal protection. As legal entities women will be empowered. The practical evidence reflects such a stance as the figures of Murders, rapes, adults prosecuted and Prisoners per 1000 people in Netherlands are considerable less than in states where prostitution is illegal.
The second arguments revolve around the concept of Health. Both the health of the woman working as a prostitute and the society are considered. Prostitution causes spread of sexually transmitted diseases as people contract these diseases from prostitutes. Additionally, prostitutes are subjected to brutality and their health suffers. Health injuries, STDs, unwanted pregnancies and miscarriages and emotional consequences all almost seem part of the profession. These hypotheses are confirmed by the Minneapolis/St.Paul study on prostitutes and the survey by the ‘Council for prostitution alternatives’. However the question arises whether the prohibition of prostitution will lead to a control of the diseases? That is not true if the law enforcement agencies fail to effectively eliminate prostitution and as we can see prostitution flourishes in the dark neighborhoods of countries like Thailand and Pakistan where prostitution is officially illegal. By recognizing prostitution legally, regular checkups can be carried out and there can be checks and balances on the health of the prostitutes. For example in Nevada where prostitution is legal there are routine checkups. This assertion is supported by practical evidence which shows that the people infected with HIV/AIDS per 1000 and the deaths caused by it per 1000 people are both less in Netherlands than in countries like Canada, France and Mexico where prostitution is illegal.
Finally, the human rights aspect of prostitution is a heavily debated issue. Andrea Dworkin is one of the feminists who argue that “commercial sex is a form of rape enforced by poverty”. Following such a stance would make prostitution inherently exploitative. Legalizing it would mean that the state allows the exploitation. Women under the control of pimps cannot be freed or emancipated and they are still forced to be a part of this profession. Women are categorized into second-class citizens as prostitutes and this gender discrimination causes substantiation of the social stigma against prostitutes. Michel Foucault’s theory of power and knowledge can be used to perpetuate this internationalization of gender discrimination and stratification. Patriarchy is used to categorize women into ‘good’ and ‘bad’ women. This is the same as the model of the Panopticon, as presented by Bentham. However, if prostitution is considered the voluntary sale or rental of labour then making prostitution illegal would infringe on the rights and liberties of these women.