Arguments Against Legalizing Prostitution

Numerous people believe prostitution is a fountainhead of vice that leads to crimes like rape and adultery. However, prostitution is grounded in vital freedoms, and there will always be a market for it, thus prostitution legislation is necessary for our new colony. Voluntary prostitution should be permitted and regulated because legalizing prostitution requires the freedom of jurisdiction over your own body, freedom of privacy, and the right to attain justice. Voluntary prostitution is a consensual agreement between adults to perform sexual acts with clearly defined parameters in exchange for compensation. Voluntary prostitution differs considerably from human trafficking, which is essentially sexual slavery. To paraphrase Article 3 of the

Jurisdiction over your body entails the authority to possess ownership of your body. This freedom is best illustrated in legal sex and organ donation in which consent is required because people have jurisdiction over their bodies. Losing the freedom of authority over your body can have incredibly detrimental consequences. For instance, victims of the Holocaust lost jurisdiction over their bodies and as a result, they were tattooed, abused, murdered, and stripped of all rights. There are limits to a person’s jurisdiction over their body; for instance, it is reasonable for mentally ill citizens to be granted a guardian with a small degree of jurisdiction over the mentally ill person’s body and parents have some jurisdiction over their children’s bodies. However, in some cases, prostitutes are denied full jurisdiction over their bodies due to the existence of pimps. Pimps govern prostitutes and locate clientele in exchange for a percentage of the prostitute’s earnings, taking away a prostitute’s jurisdiction over their body by forcing them to accept the clients the pimp selects. If our colony legalized prostitution, prostitutes would not be forced to rely on pimps and could freely search for clients. Although prostitutes expressed their desire for jurisdiction over their bodies and freedom from pimps in the World Charter for

Privacy is essential because it protects citizens from totalitarianism. Dr. Perry points out, “a statute that prohibits only the private sex act and not any of its public aspects is extremely difficult to enforce” and requires a major invasion of privacy (Perry 444). An individual should be able to “engage in private intimate actions” without fear of government interference (Perry 453). Although Dr. Reid found that adults “were 3.44 times more likely to use drugs prior to prostitution” this does not imply that prostitution breeds drug dependence, rather it suggests that because prostitution is a career which requires little formal education it is an easy way for addicts to fund their addiction (Reid 248). Since most visible prostitution occurs in red light districts it is wrongly associated with the organized crime and substance abuse which plagues red light districts. In fact, if legalized, prostitution could even prevent