Prostitution In America Essay

454 Words2 Pages

Unquestionably, the presence of prostitution is inevitable, but a new approach that Sweden has taken led to a decrease in the sex trade. In 1999, the Sex Purchase Act was adopted by Sweden, making the selling of sex legal while making the purchase of it illegal (Goldberg). The Sex Purchase Act goes by the philosophy that the real sufferer of prostitution is the sex workers themselves and that they should get all the support they need to leave the sex trade. Also in this law, the purchaser is the criminal because they use another human being as an object, which is unacceptable in an equal society (Talita). In addition, many consider the Sex Purchase Act to be successful because Sweden has less prostitution than its neighboring countries and …show more content…

In America today, prostitutes are criminalized for their actions while the buyers are left unscathed. The United States’ current view on how prostitution should be dealt with are clearly problematic being that the presence of prostitution in America is forever increasing. Consequently, America’s laws corner sex workers to where they are unable to reach out for help to leave the sex trade, increasing its presence. Not only that, but the buyers of prostitution often go unpunished leaving the message that using prostitutes is acceptable for the buyer also leading to an increase in the sex trade. Evidently, the United States should and need to follow in the footsteps of Sweden and its counterparts being that America’s current laws have not been exceptionally successful. There are well over a million prostitutes in America, while in Sweden today, there is less than 1 thousand prostitutes (Thompson). With this in mind, the adoption of the Sex Purchase Act can lead to a chain of auspicious effects in the United States. By adopting the act, all of the issues caused by the United States’ current laws on prostitution will be resolved. Prostitutes will no longer be discouraged by the law to seek help, and buyers would be unwilling to run the risk of being caught, ultimately leading to a decrease in