Prostitution in Deeper View of Countries Regulations and Diseases Faced - Literature review Example

Prostitution in Deeper View of Countries Regulations and Diseases Faced Prostitution in Deeper View of Countries Regulations and Diseases Faced Legalization of prostitution began in 1973, when the prostitutes’ rights movement was born. In areas such as Europe and America, such movements have since moved a notch higher to forming organized activists groups to push for decriminalization of prostitution in developing countries. Today, the debates on regulation of prostitution have taken another twist, with entities of activists championing its decriminalization, prohibition or legalization (West, 2000). But countries that have legalized prostitution are currently grappling with blows of Sexually Transmitted Diseases. Collectives have been agitating for complete decriminalization of prostitution. In addition, they have been rooting for entitling commercial sex workers with license and employment rights like their counterparts in the legitimate job and business sectors. These concerns are still far from realization. As a result, there has been a considerable paradigm shift in the balance, between decriminalization, prohibition and legalization (West, 2000). Furthermore, commercial sex workers’ discussions have had immense effects on legislations and health practices. The sudden twists and turns in rules and regulations, coupled with prostitutes’ discourses, point to an urgent and dire need of revision of current regulations (West, 2000). In Australia, the momentum for legal reforms has surpassed that of UK. This is owed to establishments of powerful alliances between commercial pressure groups, the nation’s senior lawyers and state organs (Svati & Shah, 2010). In as much as the radical push for decriminalization has to some extent bore fruits, such reforms have met sharp resistance and condemnation in some states by community members and local parliaments, amounting to even more stringent rules prohibiting prostitution. In Queensland, suggestions to legalize brothels and escort agencies were substituted by the populist agenda with stringent penalties and prohibition (West, 2000). In Netherlands, illegalization of brothels coexisted with informal ‘red lights’ zoning in many towns. There has since been a widespread internalization of prostitution in the Dutch nation, leading to a particular admixture of control and liberalization. In Germany, the issue of eros centers had been opposed in early 1970s, but at the turn of 1980, licensing was championed by the de Graaf Foundation, to take care of both public order complaints and to improve the occupational status of commercial sex workers. The legislation advocacy carried out by the Institute for Prostitution Issues was further boosted by the support it got from the press in terms of media coverage (West, 2000). Health is essentially an important issue to sex workers and their clients. But the inclusion of collectives in the agenda has downplayed their civil rights aim. The United States collectives had no option but to opt out of civil rights activism and direct involvements in health and education campaigns turned out to be a protectionist strategy of watering down stereotypes and social problems discourse. This is because the state had identified prostitutes as the leading vectors of AIDs transmission. However, critics like Poel suppose that any welfare concerns are not in consonance with the occupational challenges commercial sex workers go through, since they zero in on pressing issues such as poverty, interpersonal conflicts and abuses (West, 2000). Sex worker programs understand health and safety issues to include violence and police reluctance. They therefore agitate for legal and administrative transformations that will lower health perils. Also, health per se is of less weight than the context in which it becomes the center of attention. For sex workers who are to a high degree alienated like Third World immigrants health issues are a matter of life and death (West, 2000). It is worth noting that in developing countries, peer sensitization programs are rarely founded on collectives. They focus on control and self surveillance The push for legalization of prostitution and protection of commercial sex workers’ welfare has led to the emergence of two types of prostitutes: street walking and the sauna commercial sex workers. Studies conducted by Woolley, Bowman and Kinghorn (1988) showed that fewer street-walking prostitutes use protection or preventive measures with their customers or were ready to undergo HIV test when offered. The mushrooming of street walking girls is widespread in liberal nations such as Britain. In Sheffield and London, street walkers show reluctance to use protections and conducting HIV test in order to have knowledge of their status. They therefore offer a possible channel through which heterosexual spread of the virus is accelerated in the region. The most widespread STD among street walkers is AIDs and Trichomonas Vaginalis. Others include Gonococcal Cervicitis. Regular clients are said to be the most common factor dictating the spread of HIV and other STDs. This is because prostitutes rarely use protection when having sex with them (Woolley, Bowman & Kinghorn, 1988). To a greater degree than other plagues, the spread of STDs is dictated by individual’s behavioral responses. With the rise in information and knowledge on the risk factors, people keep off the risky sex practices towards restrain, protected sex, or from heterosexual to same-sex intercourses. Likening risky sex practices to other commodities in the market, observers expect the demand to go down as the price increases. For this reason, economists are inclined to think that behavioral responses to STD vulnerability as bringing forth a self-limiting incentive effect of epidemics (Shah & Arunachalam, 2012). The market forces may to some degree downplay the self-limiting characteristics of STD infections. Prostitutes draw a risk premium for their involvement in unprotected intercourses. In Mexico for example, prostitutes charge a risk premium of approximately 15% per intercourse to involve in unprotected sex (Shah & Arunachalam, 2012). Researchers have spotted risky sex premia in a group of settings. Taking the premium drawn for unprotected sex as a compensating differential likened to other lines of career, economists assert that market incentives may explain the stubborn existence of unprotected sexual intercourse, therefore restraining the effectiveness of typical public health interventions, which strive to increase the awareness of prostitutes on the perils of engaging in unprotected sex (Shah & Arunachalam, 2012). At the heart of the compensating differential supposition is the thought that men get disutility from condom use. Even though prostitutes are not knowledgeable of or indifferent to STD risk, their capability to tax customers more depending on their tastes and preferences for unprotected sex brings about a market premium for unprotected sex. In that context, the existence of a price premium for risky sex does not show proof of a compensating differential. Therefore, even small-scale behavior change communication campaigns or social marketing targeted at prostitutes may prove fruitful in increasing protected sex (Shah & Arunachalam, 2012). Direct identification of the cause of risky sex premium from an evaluation of information is an uphill task since the mushrooming of such campaigns to increase use of condom have made it even more complicating to examine prostitutes’ responsiveness to disease perils. When meeting public health campaigners, prostitutes may exaggerate their responsiveness by providing the supposed ‘right’ answer to health related queries. Moreover, data sets are generally deficient of disease risk, and as such data evaluations depend on self-reports, which may be dictated by normative presumptions (Shah & Arunachalam, 2012). Prostitutes provide sexual services for cash or assets. At this present day and age, different forms of prostitution have emerged. They range from female and male, to homosexuality and lesbianism. In many cases, people charge fees for sexual favors without considering themselves as commercial sex workers. In some cases, they may indulge in more or less full time in solely providing prostitution services. Such a diversity of forms and ways of prostitutions has brought about an array of implications for public health bodies. Sexual practices are in most cultures stigmatized and pronounced criminal, especially in developing countries. For that reason, provision of preventive health interventions to prostitutes is a challenging task to contend with. Some of the most common HIV control strategies employed in social marketing are screening, health education and behavior change communication. As such, to come up with an appropriate intervention for any common group of prostitutes, a detailed knowledge and picture of locality of all sex industries and markets is necessary. Commercial sex is in near decline in some parts of East Asia and Afghanistan. Social and legal condemnation in such regions against prostitution has bore fruits in edging out the activities to other localities, or a different type of setting that can work out. All states located within the Asian countries have their own different forms of composition to its sex market. This is attributed to history, legal frameworks, religion and socio-economic factors. The reasons for which individuals claim money or assets for sex are sharply varied. In some medieval traditions, prostitution was regarded as the hereditary calling of certain specific subgroups or classes of people. In such situations women were ‘born into prostitution’. Traces of this practice can be found in the present-day India and Nepal, where Devadasis, who are offsprings of temple dancers and female court singers (Nautch girls), still follow their calling to date. However, their spiritual importance is slowly diminishing. Most sex practices at the moment are founded on economic basis, where the doers consider prostitution a major source of income. Even dependent relatives, associates and pimps believe so. At personal level, prostitutes have many levels of wants, ranging from repaying debts to need for riches and social mobility. These fundamental motives have control over the prostitute’s independence and capability of taking heed to health communication and campaign messages (Kelly & Bindel, 2003). For instance, a refugee with dependent children in a war tone zone is less encouraged to be firm on condom use, than a call girl in a pub or rich country, whose probable motive is to purchase a car (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Prostitution in streets and public settings is perhaps the most rampant across the world. Large numbers of prostitutes based in the streets is a reflection of socioeconomic breakdown in third world countries and war-torn states. In first world economies, commercial sex workers are likely to seek sex openly if laws are passed that bar them from access to in-house venues, they are drug addicts or in cases where the unemployment plague is high. Many commercial sex workers view street sourcing as uncomfortable due to the risk of violence and social bad blood (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Some sex workers work best in relatively autonomous situations and uncontrolled settings associated with outdoor sourcing. Street work is often considered in certain conditions as lucrative, and as such more valued by prostitutes. In some cases, lack of privacy constrains services to offer of oral sex or hand relief, thereby lowering risks related with actual sexual intercourse. Some prostitutes prefer male dominated venues such as pubs, cinemas, hotels and clubs. Others survey transport centers to provide services to travelers and passengers in exchange for money or intercity journeys (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Other forms of street workers in US drive their own vehicles on interstate roads to source cash from lorry drivers through CB radio. In the midst of streets and indoor sex workers are the doorway and window prostitutes. The red light sections of Amsterdam and Hamburg are prominent for their shop-window prostitutes. In most cases, prostitutes reside in poorer European suburbs. Many regions of the developing world look for passing trade from the door paths of tiny brothels or their own houses (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). In-house prostitution is characterized by brothel sex work. Brothels differ largely in their sizes and décor, from meager huts through apartment service rooms to elaborate pleasure hubs furnished with lavish fantasy themes. They also differ in their managements from sole proprietorships to satisfactorily staffed business firms. On the same scale, the human rights and job settings of brothel sex workers are dissimilar. However, all brothels provide greater safety than street sex with regard to personal security, health and education services (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). In many regions across the world, brothel sex services can be found in areas where there is a fully developed sex industry. Brothels are the form of sex that is most likely to be the subject of government regulation. Another well known kind of indoor commercial sex work is escort prostitution. In this form of prostitution, prostitutes are contacted by telecommunication device or emails and directed to the customer’s premises. Escort agencies may extend their services beyond the national frontiers. The advantage that escorts have over other forms of prostitutes is that they are covert, thus better tolerated by societal members and law implementers. Be that as it may, escorts are vulnerable to violent customers and may have inadequate access to healthcare in comparison to brothel prostitutes (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Private prostitutes working as lone rangers or in tiny isolated groups in estate and hostels form a considerable fraction of commercial sex workers in Australia, Britain and other developed economies. In first world countries, unlike door path sex workers, do not depend on passing trade but need their customers to make arrangements by phone or email. Consequently, they are capable of managing their work environment and to some extent choose their clients. But it is not easy to quantify or measure the sexual health and welfare parameters of private prostitutes since like escorts, they operate covertly (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Unlike direct prostitution, the indirect sex work is not the central source of livelihood for the parties involved, even in comparatively poor settings. It can act as a source of extra income especially for poorly or unstably paid employees in other sectors of the economy. In such circumstances, the transactions may not be regarded as commercial sex work. Therefore, the individual or public health risks may be higher than in the direct prostitution settings (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). During the Great Economic Depression in Australia, amateur sex workers were faulted for spread of a huge proportion of venereal infection in the community. Similar accusations were leveled against Good Time Girls, who spent time with foreign servicemen on wartime leaves in Sydney. In the existence of prostitution licensing governments, unregistered ones are at peril of contracting STIs than their licensed counterparts (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Some indirect sex practices have little or no genital intercourse or contacts. Rampant forms of such services take the form of massage, lap dancing, bondage and discipline. Even less perilous are services phone sex and other categories of online sex. They only become a matter of public health attention if they mature and unfold to an actual sexual intercourse. These services are in most cases restricted to developed economies (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). There are other forms of indirect sexual work characterized by genital contacts, but on conditions prior transactions, like purchase of alcohol or entertainments had taken place. This together with other kinds of opportunistic sexual intercourses, have been found to have major public health implications. In most cases, the parties involved consider the transactions as unplanned, spontaneous decisions. This implies that sexual health measures are less likely to be considered. At worst, parties involved may not recall the transactions as potentially risky prostitution (Donovan & Harcourt, 2004). Indirect prostitution is also characterized by accepting money or drugs for sex. Women who do that are at risk of being infected with STIs such as HIV and Syphilis. In Philadelphia and other parts of United States, Crack House sex and first day sex are not frequent, thus not associated with Syphilis. Heterosexual intercourse correlates with drug use and overdose since parties involved in substance abuse engage in unplanned sex when they are not in their sober state of mind. Participants may not even know what transpired after dosage (Sharrar, Goldberg & Rolf, 1990). In view of the above mentioned forms of prostitution and their related health risks, it is prudent for United States and other states across the planet to review legislations related to prostitution. In the last three decades, there has been inadequate in-depth analysis and evaluation of strategies of regulating prostitution in the US and beyond. Prostitution regulation in America comprises the criminal justice system’s commitment, with negligible effects on sex trade, victimization of sex workers, and adverse effects on the host societies (Weitzer, 1999). Law enforcement has been found to have negligible effects on regulating prostitution, protecting prostitutes and giving aid to community members surrounded by street prostitution. The enforcements have at best tackled problems within specific spots, where prostitutes are regularly subjected to a cycle of arrests, fines, short-lived imprisonments, and the eventual release, which brings us back to a repetition of the same cycle of events. Infrequent arrests and crackdown on prostitutes have proven futile in containing prostitution (Weitzer, 1999). Street prostitutes are prone to violence from clients, misuse from pimps, as well as health and drug challenges. A survey of street prostitutes in San Francisco revealed that two-thirds had been physical attacked by clients and pimps (Weitzer, 1999). In addition, seventy percent had been raped by clients. Since rape is not planned for, the street prostitutes risk being infected by STDs because no protection is used in sexual intercourses involving rape. That said, street prostitutes are the most susceptible to abuse and the current strategies put in place to regulate prostitution provide insufficient shield against such abuses (Kuhn & Wisdom, 1996). From the aforementioned facts on prostitutes, prostitution and STD prevalence, we can deduce that there exists a variety of regulations which are overlooked by law enforcers, who focus on prostitutes’ movements and prostitute-client encounters. The boundary between decriminalization and legalization of prostitution is thin, with more pronounced impacts for commercial sex workers than previously thought of. References Donovan, B., Harcourt, C. (2004). The many faces of sex work. Sex Transm Infect, 81, 201-206. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.gov Kelly, L., Bindel, J. (2003). A Critical Examination of Responses to Prostitution in Four Countries: Victoria, Australia, Ireland; the Netherlands; and Sweden. Personal Communication, 1-80. Retrieved from http://www.prostitutionetsociete.fr Kinghorn, R.G., Bowman, A. C., Woolley, D.P. (1988). Prostitution in Sheffield: Differences between prostitutes. Genitourin Med, 64, 391-393. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.gov Kuhns, B. J., Wisdom, S. (1996). Childhood Victimization and Subsequent Risk for Promiscuity, Prostitution and Teenage Pregnancy: A Prospective Study. American Journal of Public Health, 86(11), 1607-1612. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.gov Shah, M. Arunachalam, R. (2012). Compensated for Life: Sex Work and Disease Risk. The Journal of Human Resources, 48 (2), 345-371. Retrieved from search.ebscohost.com Sharrar, G.R., Goldberg, M., Rolfs, T.R. (1990). Risk Factors for Syphilis: Cocaine use and Prostitution. American Journal of Public Health, 80 (7), 853-858. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.gov Svati, P., Shah. (2010). Codes of Misconduct: Regulating Prostitution in Late Colonial Bombay. Contemporary Sociology, 39 (4), 483-486. Retrieved from search.ebscohost.com Weitzer, Ronals. (1999). Prostitution control in America: Rethinking Public Policy. Crime, Law and Social Change, 32 (1), 83-102. Retrieved from search.ebscohost.com West, J. (2000). Collectives and the Politics of Regulation. Gender, Work and Organization, 7 (2), 106-119. Retrieved from http://www.myweb.dal.ca/ Read More