April 8, 2016
By Leonid Bershidsky
...The logic behind the "Swedish model" (click here) is ostensibly feminist, but essentially abolitionist. It's a way of banning prostitution while putting the onus on the client rather than the prostitute, who is viewed as a passive victim of sexual exploitation. As Jay Levy and Pye Jakobsson noted in a 2014 paper exploring the effects of Sweden's 1999 law that criminalized paying for sex, the voices of sex workers as owners of their sex-selling have been excluded from mainstream political debate in Sweden....
Sex trafficking exists in the USA because the pimps have nothing to lose and are out of reach for adult women. Women are penalized in the USA for their circumstances.
...This week, the German cabinet approved the draft law, making it all but certain that parliament will pass it. The proposal does away with the flat-fee brothels and "gang bang parties," as similar establishments are known. It also establishes fines for clients -- but not for buying sex as such; Germany will punish clients for having sex with a forced sex worker....
Germany's official estimate of sex workers is 200,000, but, other social estimates are 700,000. It is the German's belief with that number of workers in a specific industry the side effects into the economy is too much to tackle at once. The German society is already not accepting the law with public demonstrations of those earning their rent through sex work.
A woman can be FORCED to prostitute herself for many reasons. The most compelling reason for social responsibility in a living wage in the USA is the fact women have to make ridiculous and criminal decisions when poorly employed. There are women in USA prisons for no other reason except prostitution.
April 8, 2016
By Journalism for Social Change
As a children’s social worker (click here) I believe the term “child prostitute” is inaccurate, misleading and should be removed from the conversation when discussing issues of sexually trafficked children. Thankfully the Associated Press now agrees.
By bringing attention to the damage that can be caused by using such a misguided term, it is my hope that we can begin to change attitudes regarding what is the proper treatment of child victims of sex trafficking.
In the last five years alone the term child prostitute, or a variation thereof, has been used more than 5,000 times in the media, according to research by the Human Rights Project for Girls in 2015.
5,000 times.
Let’s break that down.
The term prostitution refers to the act of engaging in sexual activity for money. It does not refer to being abused, exploited or trafficked, all which pertain to an underage victim of sexual exploitation.
Referring to a child victim of sexual exploitation as a prostitute discounts the huge amount of trauma experienced by the victim. It also contradicts the fact that children cannot legally consent to sexual activity, regardless of whether money is involved or not.
There is also an underlying connotation that a child prostitute has chosen that lifestyle for themselves....
The iconography of Mary as a prostitute is used to justify a legitimate method of work.
Graphic novelist Chester Brown, (click here) seen above in Toronto comic book shop
Beguiling on April 1, says he doesn’t expect his new book on
prostitution and the Bible to spark any particular controversy.
April 8, 2016
By Jacob Brogan
By Leonid Bershidsky
...The logic behind the "Swedish model" (click here) is ostensibly feminist, but essentially abolitionist. It's a way of banning prostitution while putting the onus on the client rather than the prostitute, who is viewed as a passive victim of sexual exploitation. As Jay Levy and Pye Jakobsson noted in a 2014 paper exploring the effects of Sweden's 1999 law that criminalized paying for sex, the voices of sex workers as owners of their sex-selling have been excluded from mainstream political debate in Sweden....
Sex trafficking exists in the USA because the pimps have nothing to lose and are out of reach for adult women. Women are penalized in the USA for their circumstances.
...This week, the German cabinet approved the draft law, making it all but certain that parliament will pass it. The proposal does away with the flat-fee brothels and "gang bang parties," as similar establishments are known. It also establishes fines for clients -- but not for buying sex as such; Germany will punish clients for having sex with a forced sex worker....
Germany's official estimate of sex workers is 200,000, but, other social estimates are 700,000. It is the German's belief with that number of workers in a specific industry the side effects into the economy is too much to tackle at once. The German society is already not accepting the law with public demonstrations of those earning their rent through sex work.
A woman can be FORCED to prostitute herself for many reasons. The most compelling reason for social responsibility in a living wage in the USA is the fact women have to make ridiculous and criminal decisions when poorly employed. There are women in USA prisons for no other reason except prostitution.
April 8, 2016
By Journalism for Social Change
As a children’s social worker (click here) I believe the term “child prostitute” is inaccurate, misleading and should be removed from the conversation when discussing issues of sexually trafficked children. Thankfully the Associated Press now agrees.
By bringing attention to the damage that can be caused by using such a misguided term, it is my hope that we can begin to change attitudes regarding what is the proper treatment of child victims of sex trafficking.
In the last five years alone the term child prostitute, or a variation thereof, has been used more than 5,000 times in the media, according to research by the Human Rights Project for Girls in 2015.
5,000 times.
Let’s break that down.
The term prostitution refers to the act of engaging in sexual activity for money. It does not refer to being abused, exploited or trafficked, all which pertain to an underage victim of sexual exploitation.
Referring to a child victim of sexual exploitation as a prostitute discounts the huge amount of trauma experienced by the victim. It also contradicts the fact that children cannot legally consent to sexual activity, regardless of whether money is involved or not.
There is also an underlying connotation that a child prostitute has chosen that lifestyle for themselves....
The iconography of Mary as a prostitute is used to justify a legitimate method of work.
April 8, 2016
By Jacob Brogan
...Your central contention (click here) is that Mary was a prostitute. Why was this an important assertion for you?
It’s important because I’m someone who’s involved in the sex worker
rights movement—at least to some degree, at least an ally in the
movement. It seems to me that Christianity is the force behind the
opposition to prostitution, starting with St. Paul. The condemnation of
sex work and prostitution all comes from there. If I want to attack that
sort of thinking, why not attack it at the root? Christianity.
But I’m coming at it from a Christian point of view. I consider
myself religious. I was raised in Christianity. I still respect the
religion, but not that aspect of it....
Whatever happened to Joseph? It is believed he was 90 years old at the time Jesus was born, but, he is suppose to have accepted Mary as his wife. That was a community decision actually.
Religions claims mysticism because of the clear demonstration of a very young Mary married to an elderly man, Joseph. Now, with a 1986 work analyzing the scriptures that all changes?
October 17, 2006
By Jane Schaberg
This work of impeccable (click here) New Testament scholarship was a sensation when it was first published in 1987. Jane Schaberg argued that Matthew and Luke were aware that Jesus had been conceived illegitimately, probably as a result of a rape of Mary, and had left in their Gospels some hints of that knowledge, even though their main purpose was to explore the theological significance of Jesus' birth. By having the Messiah born out of the exploitation of a woman of the poor, God demonstrates the vindication of the oppressed in a truly miraculous manner....
Stating Christianity in any of these documents is at the core of the understanding portrayed is incorrect. Not all Christianity accepts saints as part of reality. As a matter of fact, the Jesus of the southern Christian of the USA appears to have been born to ordinary people and then matured into God's son.
These branches of Christianity don't consider Mary or Joseph as saints at all. They were simply chosen to bring a man made god into the world. That reality is also the case of the Disciples/Apostles, too. Jesus hung out with these guys, but, they were ordinary men with no special sainthood.
It would be really interesting to have a solid TRUTH to all this.
The Jewish are waiting for a second coming and they don't believe in saints either. Miracles, such as the tables presented to Moses, come from God. The interesting aspect of the Jewish documents is that they admit God had no written or spoken name from the beginning of time.
The name of God (click here) used most often in the Hebrew Bible is the Tetragrammaton YHWH (Hebrew: יהוה). It is frequently anglicized as Jehovah and Yahweh and written in most editions of the Bible as "the Lord" owing to the Jewish tradition of reading it as Adonai ("My Lords") out of respect....
While the icons in any religious writings (I think the first three chapters of Jewish text speaks of god's identity.) brings some interesting interpretations. The reason any of this is relevant to prostitution is because they are part of the Bible. Prostitutes were mentioned in those texts.
As a matter of fact in a text not published as part of the Bible, but, written by James the Lesser; Mary is brought to a temple at the age of three and her feet touched the ground for the first time on the temple steps. She enters the temple and is feed to the age of 12 years old by the angles of god with manna. She is attended to in the temple by prostitutes.
At the age of 12 she emerges from the temple to be given to Joseph as his wife.
It is a common knowledge that throughout ancient history back to Mesopotamia, prostitutes (unmarried women) were found at the temples to the gods. It was not unusual for men to seek out the prostitutes. They were provided for by the priests and priestesses.
Prostitutes have always been supported in society by dialogues that call upon the deity side of their identity in history. The work of Jane Schaberg and Chester Brown prove a real compassion for women when they earn their living as a prostitute. Perhaps societies trying to limit prostitution should open discussion with these artists and historians. Respect for the women are important to move them out of their sex work and into the arts and sciences of a society. Respect and dialogue can transform their lives.
This week France (click here) became the latest in a growing list of countries to decriminalise sex workers while banning the purchase of sex.
The French legislation is based on what has become known as the Nordic Model, a form of decriminalisation that treats prostitution as a cause and effect of gender inequality and a site of violence against women.
The Nordic Model shrinks the market for prostitution by targeting demand: making the activities of sex buyers illegal while removing any punitive measures against prostituted persons. It has been effective in Sweden, and has since been adopted in Norway, Iceland, Canada and Northern Ireland.
In places like Victoria, a state with one of the world’s oldest legalised systems of brothel prostitution, the sex industry has a lot to lose from the success of the Nordic model....
Prostitution Research (click here)
Whatever happened to Joseph? It is believed he was 90 years old at the time Jesus was born, but, he is suppose to have accepted Mary as his wife. That was a community decision actually.
Religions claims mysticism because of the clear demonstration of a very young Mary married to an elderly man, Joseph. Now, with a 1986 work analyzing the scriptures that all changes?
October 17, 2006
By Jane Schaberg
This work of impeccable (click here) New Testament scholarship was a sensation when it was first published in 1987. Jane Schaberg argued that Matthew and Luke were aware that Jesus had been conceived illegitimately, probably as a result of a rape of Mary, and had left in their Gospels some hints of that knowledge, even though their main purpose was to explore the theological significance of Jesus' birth. By having the Messiah born out of the exploitation of a woman of the poor, God demonstrates the vindication of the oppressed in a truly miraculous manner....
Stating Christianity in any of these documents is at the core of the understanding portrayed is incorrect. Not all Christianity accepts saints as part of reality. As a matter of fact, the Jesus of the southern Christian of the USA appears to have been born to ordinary people and then matured into God's son.
These branches of Christianity don't consider Mary or Joseph as saints at all. They were simply chosen to bring a man made god into the world. That reality is also the case of the Disciples/Apostles, too. Jesus hung out with these guys, but, they were ordinary men with no special sainthood.
It would be really interesting to have a solid TRUTH to all this.
The Jewish are waiting for a second coming and they don't believe in saints either. Miracles, such as the tables presented to Moses, come from God. The interesting aspect of the Jewish documents is that they admit God had no written or spoken name from the beginning of time.
The name of God (click here) used most often in the Hebrew Bible is the Tetragrammaton YHWH (Hebrew: יהוה). It is frequently anglicized as Jehovah and Yahweh and written in most editions of the Bible as "the Lord" owing to the Jewish tradition of reading it as Adonai ("My Lords") out of respect....
While the icons in any religious writings (I think the first three chapters of Jewish text speaks of god's identity.) brings some interesting interpretations. The reason any of this is relevant to prostitution is because they are part of the Bible. Prostitutes were mentioned in those texts.
As a matter of fact in a text not published as part of the Bible, but, written by James the Lesser; Mary is brought to a temple at the age of three and her feet touched the ground for the first time on the temple steps. She enters the temple and is feed to the age of 12 years old by the angles of god with manna. She is attended to in the temple by prostitutes.
At the age of 12 she emerges from the temple to be given to Joseph as his wife.
It is a common knowledge that throughout ancient history back to Mesopotamia, prostitutes (unmarried women) were found at the temples to the gods. It was not unusual for men to seek out the prostitutes. They were provided for by the priests and priestesses.
Prostitutes have always been supported in society by dialogues that call upon the deity side of their identity in history. The work of Jane Schaberg and Chester Brown prove a real compassion for women when they earn their living as a prostitute. Perhaps societies trying to limit prostitution should open discussion with these artists and historians. Respect for the women are important to move them out of their sex work and into the arts and sciences of a society. Respect and dialogue can transform their lives.
This week France (click here) became the latest in a growing list of countries to decriminalise sex workers while banning the purchase of sex.
The French legislation is based on what has become known as the Nordic Model, a form of decriminalisation that treats prostitution as a cause and effect of gender inequality and a site of violence against women.
The Nordic Model shrinks the market for prostitution by targeting demand: making the activities of sex buyers illegal while removing any punitive measures against prostituted persons. It has been effective in Sweden, and has since been adopted in Norway, Iceland, Canada and Northern Ireland.
In places like Victoria, a state with one of the world’s oldest legalised systems of brothel prostitution, the sex industry has a lot to lose from the success of the Nordic model....
Prostitution Research (click here)
