Prostitution Must Be Legalized in the US - Essay Example

Prostitution Must Be Legalized in US Introduction Prostitution is referred to the act of offering oneself on rental basis for sexual purposes. The term prostitution is mostly used to refer to the act of selling a female or the female selling herself for sexual reasons. Prostitution is considered illegal in every state of US, only the state of Nevada has accepted it as a legal job and even in Nevada heavy rules and regulations are applied to legal act of prostitution. Certain states have strict rules and regulations against prostitution and these rules and regulations apply to those who are selling themselves, to those who are selling prostitutes and even those who are purchasing such services. Legalizing refers to the act of changing the status of an act from illegal to legal through changes in constitution and rules and regulations made by the courts. To legalize prostitution, the current illegal stats applied to the act of prostitution will have to be changed to legal status through policy making. When the debate of legalizing prostitution occurs several reasons are stated for and against this act. Statistical prevalence rate of prostitution are hard to figure out as the act of prostitution is conducted in quite a secretive manner and very few are held responsible for being a part of it. The most vulnerable stakeholder of the act of prostitution is the female gender and due to their vulnerability they are the ones who are mostly held responsible. Those who purchase prostitutes and those who act as middlemen are hardly found to be held responsible for being a part of the act of prostitution. According to FBI statistics provided during 2009, the number of arrests conducted for purpose of prostitution and commercial purchase and sale of sex was 56,560 (FBI, 2012). Out of this figure 31, 699 were whites, 23,021 were blacks, 427 individuals were natives of the region of Alaska and American Indians and those from Asia were 1,413 individuals (FBI, 2012). The arrest rates during the same period of individuals who were below the age of 18 and were involved in prostitution totaled to 1,072 individuals and those above 18 were 55,488 individuals (FBI 1). Certain nations have legalized prostitution, others have decriminalized prostitution and certain countries have even decreased the laws regarding the act of prostitution. In Africa only two nations have recognized prostitution as legal; prostitution is even legal in European nations, North American nations, Oceanic nations and Nevada which is located within US and certain South American nations. The point to be noted is that although it has achieved legal status in all these areas, but it is governed through strict rules and regulations. This paper will focus on the benefits that will be attained through the act of legalizing prostitution. The benefits of legalizing prostitution but in a strictly regulated manner can be experienced in field of economics, security and health. If prostitution is legalized its benefits can be both experienced by the private and the public sector. Body Economic Benefits for Prostitutes and Government Those in the favor of legalizing prostitution have stated various economic benefits that can be attained through legalizing prostitution. The current criminal justice system of the US is experiencing various problems. The population of the jailhouses is increasing day by day and the government does not have enough reserves to provide funds for the increasing cost of operating prisons. There are several solutions through which the problem of funding prisons and managing prisons can be settled. In order to change the face of the criminal justice system and the prison management system, prostitution should be made legal and it should be highly supervised and regulated. The estimated cost of arresting a prostitute and dealing with his/her case costs thousands of dollars. According to the statistics of 1987, the total cost of arresting and then conducting a trial and imprisoning prostitutes cost $2000/case (Jacobsen 135). According to the statistics of 2009 provided by the FBI, total arrests of prostitutes stood at 56,560 individuals. This means that in one particular year the total cost of arresting and imprisoning prostitutes cost $113,120,000. This money is not paid by the criminal justice system and the government, this amount comes from the pockets of the tax payers and the entire amount is wasted as soon as the prostitute is released from the prison. The amount spent is wasted because when a female or a male is labeled as a prostitute by the criminal justice system, they face difficulties in obtaining jobs in the civil society and after loosing all their hopes they rejoin the profession of prostitution. Prostitution can assist the government in raining money through taxes. One of the major costs that government and the criminal justice system pay for arresting prostitutions is the cost of parole. When parole is assigned to an individual (prostitute) the government has to bare all the cost of the parole officer. The parole officer is assigned to ensure that the prostitute does not enter in the act of selling sex once she is back on the streets. This might create problems for the prostitute because if parole officers will supervise prostitutes, they would not be able to earn money through prostitution and finding a job is already very difficult for a female who has once been recognized as prostitute. Legalization of prostitution will eliminate the costs associated with probation and parole. The statistics of 2009 show that total prostitutes arrested were 56,560 individuals. This shows that such a huge number of people do not pay taxes for what they are earning. If prostitution is recognized as a legal business, this huge population will start paying taxes and these taxes will increase the treasury of the government. By legalizing prostitution, government will earn more funds from licensure requirements that will be purchased by prostitutes and settings where sex is sold. Prostitution is linked with various crimes such as drug abuse, human trafficking, rape and other petty crimes, if prostitution is legalized, the occurrence rates of several crimes will decline and this will provide economic benefit to the government as they will have to deal with lower number of criminals. One of the reasons due to which prostitution should be legalized is the reason due to which individuals choose the path of prostitution. Prostitutes conduct their business in a pretty secretive manner as the law enforcement agents do not all people of this profession to conduct business openly on the streets. Due to this, the business does not seem to attract decent people within the society to conduct this business. Females who are a portion of this business come from quite meager backgrounds or they conduct this business because they are quite desperate. Women prostitutes even comprise of those individuals who have been sexually exploited during a certain age or they are experiencing issues that are sexual in nature since their birth or early ages of life. Another type of prostitution is recognized as escort services, this kind of prostitution is considered legal. This kind of prostitution is not sanctioned by rules and regulations just because the service providers in this form of prostitution do not charge money for sex. Officials of this profession are paid for going out with their customers for a particular date or to attend a particular formal or an informal event. Escort services operate while stating that during the tenure when the customer and the escort are together, the activities that take place between these two individuals are not regulated by the escort services and whatever they do is their own choice. Females who are work as escorts come from good backgrounds and families that earn good and live in good homes and are quite good looking. These women do not end up serving the same profession throughout their lives, they are paid very high compensation and after they earn hefty amount of money, they alter their profession. Escort services is not only a kind of prostitution business that is not sanctioned by the law, pornography is another business that has been able to escape the laws of prostitution. The professionals within this business even exhibit similar behavior; they even work for a small period of time within the profession, make money and change their profession as soon as they have made enough (Brents 270). Similar behavior is expected by those individuals who sell sex as prostitution if the business was made legal and highly regulated. The legalization of prostitution would diminish the need for secrecy in the business and individuals would no longer opt for this profession due to the factor of desperation. This means that females working within this profession would no longer have to be afraid of being prosecuted and imprisoned if they start working under brothels that are directed, controlled and monitored by the state. Improvement of Health Prostitution is considered as a very harmful occupation and is said to lead to several disease for those who sell and for those who buy sex. If US legalizes prostitution it can help in improving health issues related to the profession of prostitution by setting rules and regulations that would result in safe and healthier work environment for the prostitute as well as the consumers. Prostitution is said to be one of the major reasons of increase in sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV and AIDS within the society. By legalizing prostitution the issue of sexually transmitted diseases can be countered on a huge scale. If prostitution is made legal and government sets rules and regulations regarding tests and medical examinations for both the customer and the prostitute, then both the stakeholders can live a healthy life. Currently, the prostitutes are only held responsible if such diseases occur in consumers as well as the prostitutes. It is mandatory for the government to apply similar medical examinations for both the customer as well as the prostitute. This is because STDs can be experienced by any individual in the world, whether he is a male or a female or from any race or color or from any social status. This might be considered as a con for legalizing prostitution, but it is a necessary cost that needs to be bared in order to make this profession successful, healthy and legal. These tests will differentiate those customers and prostitutes who have STDs from those who do not experience such diseases and this segregation will ensure that STDs do not spread (Brewis 210). Sex is a very important part of human life, if sex is restricted, human beings experience physical as well as cognitive issues. Sex is even considered as important for a healthy human being; it keeps away human beings from various health diseases. Researches have stated and proved that sexual activity has aided individuals mentally and physically, one of the benefits associated with having sex is lower amount of stress and higher amount of relaxation and proper flow of blood level (Griffin 26). Increase in immunity level has even been associated as a benefit with sexual activity. Sex is even considered as a type of exercise, research states that thirty minutes of sex can result in burning 85 calories, this amount of calories can be burned through extended periods of sex or sex conducted in intervals. Research even states that sex can aid in decreasing the risk of an individual being affected by cardiovascular diseases and sex has even been associated with increase in confidence. By restricting prostitution, the government is stopping individuals from participating in the healthy act of having sex which might cause further issues for those who can not have sex as they do not have intimate partners in their lives. Illegal prostitution may result in harming the health of the sex worker and the customer and increase the health care cost that government has to pay, in order to reduce health care cost, government needs to accept prostitution as a legal business. Improvement of Security Due to the illegal status of prostitution, police officers are busy with handling petty crimes such as prostitution. Even though an enormous amount of scarce police officers are being used to counter prostitution, the issue can not be controlled as prostitutes continue to offer themselves even when there is threat of being arrested because they can not find suitable jobs in other organizations as they have been labeled as sex workers or prostitutes. Instead of trying to countering an issue that is hard to counter and not quite destructive in nature for the society, the police resources should be assigned to solving other major crimes involving women and children such as human trafficking and sexual abuse of these two stakeholders. According to research police officials prefer busting prostitutes instead of working to stop other forms of crime because due to this they gain sexual favors. Surveys conducted on the national level show that citizens keep complaining that the response from police officers have become quite slow and one of the reasons of this slowness is that they are busy chasing prostitutes. Women are quite vulnerability, due to their level of vulnerability, men take advantage of them, beat them, rape them and even transport them for sexual purposes. Researches clearly state that legalizing prostitution will decrease crime rate (Raymond 1156). Various prostitutes are raped and they never report incidents to the criminal justice system because they know that if they inform that they are prostitutes, the criminal justice system will put them behind the walls of prison. If prostitution is legalized, these crimes will be openly reported and actions will be taken against criminals. Conclusion There are several benefits that can be obtained through legalization of prostitution within United States. Legalizing prostitution will decrease government expenditure as arrest and imprisonment of prostitutes will not take place. Government will earn revenue as prostitutes will have to pay taxes for conducting sex work. Prostitutes will be able to make a better living and the level of secrecy in the prostitution business will decline. Legalizing and assigning strict rules and regulations such as mandatory medical tests will decrease the chances of increase in sexually transmitted diseases. Sex is important for human wellbeing and for this purpose those individuals who do not have intimate partners can stay healthy by having sex with prostitutes. Police officials will have more time for solving other criminal cases and the crime rate of sexual crimes will decrease. Works Cited Brents, B, and K Hausbeck. "Violence and Legalized Brothel Prostitution in Nevada: Examining Safety, Risk, and Prostitution Policy." Violence & Abuse Abstracts. 11.3 (2005). Print. Brewis, Joanna, and Stephen Linstead. "Managing the Sex Industry: Dialogue and Debate." Culture and Organization. 8.4 (2002): 307-326. Print. Griffin-Shelley, Eric. Adolescent Sex and Love Addicts. Westport, Conn: Praeger, 1994. Print. Jacobsen, C. "Fighting for Visibility: Notes on the Censorship Battle of "porn'im'age'ry: Picturing Prostitutes"." Social Text. 37 (1993): 135. Print. Raymond, Janice G. "Prostitution on Demand: Legalizing the Buyers As Sexual Consumers." Violence against Women. 10.10 (2004): 1156-1186. Print. Table 43 - Crime in the United States 2009." FBI — Federal Bureau of Investigation Homepage . N.p., n.d. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. . Wojcicki, J. Race, Class and Sex: the Politics of the Decriminalisation of Sex Work." Agenda. (1999): 94-105. Print Read More