FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT PROSTITUTION                                    HOME

Q. Isn't prostitution just a job like any other?

Q. If we were to eradicate prostitution, wouldn't we be robbing women of a rightful income?

Q. Aren't men who visit prostitutes just lonely?

Q. Don't lots of men go to prostitutes because they want someone to talk to?

Q. What about male prostitutes aren't we forgetting about them?

Q. Isn't prostitution the oldest profession?

Q. Isn't prostitution safer for women if it is legalised?.

Q. Since many brothels are run by 'madams' aren't women just as guilty of
exploiting women as men are?

Q. Without prostitution, won't men just go out and rape?

Q. Isn't prostitution just a job like any other?                                                                                 TOP

A. Prostitution is not a job like any other. Firstly, prostitution only
exists because of the attitudes, behaviours and demands of men.  It is the
culture of male violence whereby men regard the buying of a woman's body
for sexual purposes as a legitimate activity that has created this
'job'.  No other job is created specifically out of a culture of violence,
inequality and sexual abuse.  Secondly, there are no other jobs where a
woman's reproductive system is the site of the work, and she is at risk of
pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV every time she goes
to work.  In this 'job', women risk death from violent men, serious
physical harm as well as psychological damage.


Q. If we were to eradicate prostitution, wouldn't we be robbing women of a
rightful income?                                                                                                                               TOP

A. The reasons for women entering prostitution and so having an income from
it are complex and any discussion of the eradication of prostitution must
take this into account.  Many women enter prostitution as a last resort -
to meet basic living expenses, to support a drug or gambling habit or to
pay their way through university. Governments need to address, through
changed economic and social policies, the social inequities that force
women into prostitution   The eradication of prostitution must be coupled
with programmes to retrain women and provide them with genuine alternative
forms of employment.  Any harmful industry, be it prostitution or logging
of old growth forests must be eradicated and alternative employment
provided for the workers.

Q. Aren't men who visit prostitutes just lonely?                                                                         TOP

A. Men who buy women are not just socially inadequate. All kinds of men buy
women and most are married. Saying that buyers are 'lonely men' suggests
that they are seeking some kind of intimacy rather than sexual power. In
fact there is a gross power imbalance between a prostituted human being and
the buyer. Prostitution is inequality made sexy. This power imbalance is
clear in the way that buyers decide who they will buy in prostitution
whereas prostitutes can rarely if ever refuse a 'customer', no matter how
disgusting his smell, ugly his looks or foul his temper. Prostituted human
beings typically use a pseudonym and wear a costume whilst working, not
because they are happy to live out men's sexual fantasies but to protect
themselves from feeling violated. For this reason too, many prostituted
people refuse or thwart buyer demands to be kissed on the lips or hugged.
The violation that goes on in prostitution occurs regardless of how lonely
the buyer is.

Q. Don't lots of men go to prostitutes because they want someone to talk to?                            TOP

A. If a man wants someone to talk to he can go to a friend, a relative, a
therapist or priest. When he buys a woman he has someone less powerful and
unthreatening to listen to him and then he can penetrate her to make
himself feel better at her expense. Prostituted women are not therapists.
Therapists earn good money, are respected and  they are the ones with power
in the exchange.

Q. What about male prostitutes aren't we forgetting about them?                                               TOP

A. The buyers of prostituted men and boys are overwhelmingly male. Though
the sex industry tends to say that there are women clients using brothels,
this is generally because they are taken by their male partners to sexually
arouse the man in a threesome. Independent female buyers of males are
unusual. The men and boys bought in prostitution often suffer from very
similar harms to those that women suffer, such as harm to their own
sexuality, and thoughts of worthlessness and suicide. Street prostituted
men and boys in particular are likely, like the women in prostitution, to
have histories of abuse in childhood, to find themselves homeless, to have
a drug habit and no means of support. CATW Australia's analysis that the
buying of people in prostitution constitutes a form of violence extends to
the buying of girls and boys, men and women by buyers of either sex.

Q. Isn't prostitution the oldest profession?                                                                                TOP

A. This statement suggests that prostitution must be OK because it has been
in existence for so long. It is important to remember that prostitution is
as old as slavery and some historians suggest that it emerged from slavery
in ancient Babylon. Justifying a practice by reference to tradition (i.e.
how long it has gone on in a culture) is one criterion for recognising what
are called in United Nations documents harmful traditional/cultural
practices. Such practices are 'harmful to the health of women and girls'
and create sex role stereotypes. They arise from the subordination of
women, and are for the benefit of men. Prostitution fits the definition of
a harmful cultural practice very well.

Q. Isn't prostitution safer for women if it is legalised?.                                                               TOP

A. It does seem that women are less likely to be murdered in legal brothels
than in street and illegal prostitution. The other forms of violence that
women suffer in prostitution are not necessarily reduced. Brothels
frequently have panic buttons so that women can get help when they are
threatened or assaulted. This does not prevent the assault. CATW Australia
calls the violence that men pay to do to women in prostitution, (i.e. the
ordinary penetration) commercial sexual violence. Women may 'consent' but
they still suffer emotionally and physically. They emotionally disassociate
to survive the touching and penetration and try to limit the areas of their
body that men have access to. In any other workplace this would be seen as
sexual harassment but in prostitution it is the part and parcel of the
'job'. Occupational health and safety codes developed to cover legal
brothels in Australia show just how harmful prostitution is to women's
health. They cover what to do when condoms are removed by men without
women's knowledge, and what to do when they break. They cover how to
sterilise the whips and branding irons used in sadomasochist prostitution
and how to deal with infectious organisms in the wounds from the branding.
When an industry has so many harms for women the answer is to end it by
penalising the buyers and pimps rather than regulating the violence.

Q. Since many brothels are run by 'madams' aren't women just as guilty of
exploiting women as men are?                                                                                                 TOP

A. Most 'madams' have been prostituted. It is difficult to exit the
industry because women usually have few skills, other experience or recent
qualifications. They do not have references. Also when prostituted women
age they are forced out and need some other way to earn a living. Some may
move into brothel management, but these few do so not with the intention of
exploiting other women, rather to escape their own exploitation. The big
money in prostitution is not usually made by madams but by the men who run
the industry.

Q. Without prostitution, won't men just go out and rape?                                                          TOP

A. This argument suggests that prostitution is a safety valve for men's
sexual urges. In fact the reverse is the case. For example, in cases of
gang rape by sportsmen in Australia in 2004, it has become clear that the
use of prostituted women and strip clubs is integral to the womanhating and
male bonding which led to the sexual violence.  The argument also suggests
that women who are not prostituted are safer because some other women are
set aside to be commercially raped on their behalf. Women's equality
requires that all women should be free from sexual exploitation.
Prostitution cannot eliminate rape when it is itself bought rape. The
connection between rape and prostitution is that women are turned into
objects for men's sexual use; they can be either bought or stolen. A
culture in which women can be bought for use is one in which rape flourishes