Why can't "right to privacy" be used to force legalization of prostitution?

[J842P]

But what's the point of the second system which attracts you to the same sex? I don't see the evolutionary value of something like that developing. An evolutionarily useful system which works a bit differently from time to time in various organisms makes a lot more sense to me than a parallel system without equivalent value.

What's the point of having both a dick & balls system and a vagina, uterus and ovaries system?

And how do you build an attracted-to-the-opposite-sex system anyway? It has two very different objectives. It's much easier to model it as two different systems.

I think there is a misunderstanding. You aren't claiming there is a 'same sex' and 'opposite sex' system, but a 'attraction towards male' and 'attraction towards female' system.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Toni, I really do think it would help if you clarified your position regarding voluntary consensual prostitution.

You do seem to be advocating a ban on all prostitution, and you have been asked numerous times by numerous people why, and the only answer we have gotten out of you is that legal prostitution won't fix abusive or forced prostitution. You seem to imply that keeping all prostitution illegal somehow clamps down on abusive or forced prostitution, but you have given no evidence or even coherent arguments on why that would be?

Are we simply misunderstanding you? Perhaps you are not for the banning of consensual prostitution and just want to talk about how we address the abusive and forced kind?

Please clarify your position here so we don't run in circles for more pages of this thread.

I'm very skeptical that legalizing prostitution for consenting and willing adults actually improves the situation for prostitutes.

I've read a good number of pieces written by prostitutes and well as a number of pieces a out whether legalization works to reduce harms to sex workers. Opinion seems to be quite mixed.
The fact is that despite legal and regulated prostitution in places like Amsterdam, there is still significant illegal sex trade mostly involving women-and minor girls and boys. In places like Amsterdam. Where prostitution is legal.

That suggests to me that the supply of willing sex workers is dramatically short of demand. Balance is t reached by raising prices and profits of prostitutes but by what is essentially slavery.

Schemes of testing prostitutes on a weekly basis does NOTHING to protect those most at risk: prostitutes and is inadequate to protect customers. I actually know a great deal about testing for a host of STIs and am extreme cognizant of the limitations of current tests , windows of transmission vs windows if detection and so how easy it is to get inaccurate results.

This does not take into account the extremely high number of sex workers who have a strong history of being sexual a used as children or young adolescents. Few enter the profession froma position of strength .

Yes, the opinions of whether it actually reduces harm can be quite mixed. Have you seen data to suggest that it increases harm, though? If so, could you link to some of that data because I haven't seen it. If legalization does absolutely nothing to reduce harm across the industry, then it's still a good idea because it increases the ability of consenting adults to make free choices with their money and their bodies with no associated downsides. If that's the worst case scenario and any better cases end up reducing harm, legalization is a positive.

 

[bilby]

But what's the point of the second system which attracts you to the same sex? I don't see the evolutionary value of something like that developing. An evolutionarily useful system which works a bit differently from time to time in various organisms makes a lot more sense to me than a parallel system without equivalent value.

What's the point of having both a dick & balls system and a vagina, uterus and ovaries system?

And how do you build an attracted-to-the-opposite-sex system anyway? It has two very different objectives. It's much easier to model it as two different systems.

Ease of modelling is only a relevant condition for designed systems. Evolved systems might superficially appear to be designed, but by assuming that a similar process to that you would use as a designer has lead to the result we see from evolution, you are making an error.

The 'dick and balls' system and the 'ovaries, uterus and vagina' system may look completely different to you, but they started out as a single system, and then diverged due to different evolutionary drivers.

There is no reason at all to assume that the mental constructs controlling sexual desire developed from the start as two different systems; we know for certain that the objects of desire did not. They have diverged enormously, but they started from the same place.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What's the point of having both a dick & balls system and a vagina, uterus and ovaries system?

And how do you build an attracted-to-the-opposite-sex system anyway? It has two very different objectives. It's much easier to model it as two different systems.

I think there is a misunderstanding. You aren't claiming there is a 'same sex' and 'opposite sex' system, but a 'attraction towards male' and 'attraction towards female' system.

Exactly--one system for attracted to male, one system for attracted to female. Just like we have one system for male anatomy and one for female anatomy.

- - - Updated - - -

What's the point of having both a dick & balls system and a vagina, uterus and ovaries system?

And how do you build an attracted-to-the-opposite-sex system anyway? It has two very different objectives. It's much easier to model it as two different systems.

Ease of modelling is only a relevant condition for designed systems. Evolved systems might superficially appear to be designed, but by assuming that a similar process to that you would use as a designer has lead to the result we see from evolution, you are making an error.

The 'dick and balls' system and the 'ovaries, uterus and vagina' system may look completely different to you, but they started out as a single system, and then diverged due to different evolutionary drivers.

There is no reason at all to assume that the mental constructs controlling sexual desire developed from the start as two different systems; we know for certain that the objects of desire did not. They have diverged enormously, but they started from the same place.

Except that wouldn't explain bisexuality or asexuality.

 

[Toni]

I'm very skeptical that legalizing prostitution for consenting and willing adults actually improves the situation for prostitutes.

I've read a good number of pieces written by prostitutes and well as a number of pieces a out whether legalization works to reduce harms to sex workers. Opinion seems to be quite mixed.
The fact is that despite legal and regulated prostitution in places like Amsterdam, there is still significant illegal sex trade mostly involving women-and minor girls and boys. In places like Amsterdam. Where prostitution is legal.

That suggests to me that the supply of willing sex workers is dramatically short of demand. Balance is t reached by raising prices and profits of prostitutes but by what is essentially slavery.

Schemes of testing prostitutes on a weekly basis does NOTHING to protect those most at risk: prostitutes and is inadequate to protect customers. I actually know a great deal about testing for a host of STIs and am extreme cognizant of the limitations of current tests , windows of transmission vs windows if detection and so how easy it is to get inaccurate results.

This does not take into account the extremely high number of sex workers who have a strong history of being sexual a used as children or young adolescents. Few enter the profession froma position of strength .

Yes, the opinions of whether it actually reduces harm can be quite mixed. Have you seen data to suggest that it increases harm, though? If so, could you link to some of that data because I haven't seen it. If legalization does absolutely nothing to reduce harm across the industry, then it's still a good idea because it increases the ability of consenting adults to make free choices with their money and their bodies with no associated downsides. If that's the worst case scenario and any better cases end up reducing harm, legalization is a positive.

Sorry: real life issues/demands are making it hard for me to keep on top of this thread. I'm on the fly now and can't hunt sources at the moment.

But will jump in to disagree that if there is NO net decrease in harm as a result of legalization that would be sufficient reason to legalize. Harms and burdens could be shifted and my gut is telling me that the harms would be shifted more heavily onto prostitutes who already bear the greater level of risks by a huge margin.

I don't particularly care if some southern baptist conventioneers get caught up in a prostitution sting.

 

[Derec]

But will jump in to disagree that if there is NO net decrease in harm as a result of legalization that would be sufficient reason to legalize. Harms and burdens could be shifted and my gut is telling me that the harms would be shifted more heavily onto prostitutes who already bear the greater level of risks by a huge margin.

I do not see how they will get shifted to prostitutes if they can take advantage of things like calling the police if their work is no longer criminalized.
Besides, same "logic" can be used to ban all sorts of other things, from strip clubs (like the feminist government in Iceland did), porn, alcohol. Are you in favor of criminalizing all those things? Or do you think prostitution is somehow special? Note that both strip clubs and porn are forms of sex work.

I don't particularly care if some southern baptist conventioneers get caught up in a prostitution sting.

Southern Baptist conventioneers are hardly the only patrons of sex workers. But thanks for being explicit that you do not care one iota about freedoms of consenting adults.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Yes, the opinions of whether it actually reduces harm can be quite mixed. Have you seen data to suggest that it increases harm, though? If so, could you link to some of that data because I haven't seen it. If legalization does absolutely nothing to reduce harm across the industry, then it's still a good idea because it increases the ability of consenting adults to make free choices with their money and their bodies with no associated downsides. If that's the worst case scenario and any better cases end up reducing harm, legalization is a positive.

Sorry: real life issues/demands are making it hard for me to keep on top of this thread. I'm on the fly now and can't hunt sources at the moment.

But will jump in to disagree that if there is NO net decrease in harm as a result of legalization that would be sufficient reason to legalize. Harms and burdens could be shifted and my gut is telling me that the harms would be shifted more heavily onto prostitutes who already bear the greater level of risks by a huge margin.

I don't particularly care if some southern baptist conventioneers get caught up in a prostitution sting.

How does your gut tell you that? A person with less barriers preventing them from going to the police is less at risk than a person with more. A person who won't risk alienating her client base by having one of them arrested has more incentive to charge an abusive customer than one who needs to worry about that. A person receiving regular medical checkups is at less risk than someone receiving none. A person with a well structured and regulated support system for her industry is at less risk than someone without that.

Now, there will be those who don't take advantage of the support services available to them for whatever reason, but that's not a reason to avoid having them for everyone else.

I do care if southern baptists get arrested in prostituion stings, the same way that I care if Mormons get arrested for marajuana possession or neo-Nazis getting pistol whipped for speaking out against the government. If something shouldn't be against the law, I'm against people getting arrested for it, no matter what kind of hypocrites they might be for doing the thing in the first place.

 

[bilby]

I think there is a misunderstanding. You aren't claiming there is a 'same sex' and 'opposite sex' system, but a 'attraction towards male' and 'attraction towards female' system.

Exactly--one system for attracted to male, one system for attracted to female. Just like we have one system for male anatomy and one for female anatomy.

- - - Updated - - -

What's the point of having both a dick & balls system and a vagina, uterus and ovaries system?

And how do you build an attracted-to-the-opposite-sex system anyway? It has two very different objectives. It's much easier to model it as two different systems.

Ease of modelling is only a relevant condition for designed systems. Evolved systems might superficially appear to be designed, but by assuming that a similar process to that you would use as a designer has lead to the result we see from evolution, you are making an error.

The 'dick and balls' system and the 'ovaries, uterus and vagina' system may look completely different to you, but they started out as a single system, and then diverged due to different evolutionary drivers.

There is no reason at all to assume that the mental constructs controlling sexual desire developed from the start as two different systems; we know for certain that the objects of desire did not. They have diverged enormously, but they started from the same place.

Except that wouldn't explain bisexuality or asexuality.

However sexual attraction works, asexuallity is easy to explain as the absence of whatever system(s) you imagine.

Bisexuality is very easy to explain if attraction to men and attraction to women evolved from a single common ancestral root.

We know that gender itself evolved from an asexual root; so why not the system(s) of attraction?

It's all FAR more complicated than any set of labels can explain anyway - a heterosexual man is rarely, if ever, sexually attracted to another man; but equally he is far from always attracted to all women. There is a huge variation in sexual partner selection within that 'single' category 'heterosexual male', so it seems implausible that only one or two simple 'systems' are used to determine what people find sexy.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Exactly--one system for attracted to male, one system for attracted to female. Just like we have one system for male anatomy and one for female anatomy.

- - - Updated - - -

What's the point of having both a dick & balls system and a vagina, uterus and ovaries system?

And how do you build an attracted-to-the-opposite-sex system anyway? It has two very different objectives. It's much easier to model it as two different systems.

Ease of modelling is only a relevant condition for designed systems. Evolved systems might superficially appear to be designed, but by assuming that a similar process to that you would use as a designer has lead to the result we see from evolution, you are making an error.

The 'dick and balls' system and the 'ovaries, uterus and vagina' system may look completely different to you, but they started out as a single system, and then diverged due to different evolutionary drivers.

There is no reason at all to assume that the mental constructs controlling sexual desire developed from the start as two different systems; we know for certain that the objects of desire did not. They have diverged enormously, but they started from the same place.

Except that wouldn't explain bisexuality or asexuality.

However sexual attraction works, asexuallity is easy to explain as the absence of whatever system(s) you imagine.

Bisexuality is very easy to explain if attraction to men and attraction to women evolved from a single common ancestral root.

We know that gender itself evolved from an asexual root; so why not the system(s) of attraction?

It's all FAR more complicated than any set of labels can explain anyway - a heterosexual man is rarely, if ever, sexually attracted to another man; but equally he is far from always attracted to all women. There is a huge variation in sexual partner selection within that 'single' category 'heterosexual male', so it seems implausible that only one or two simple 'systems' are used to determine what people find sexy.

I think the idea of gay/straight/bisexual is going to disappear within the next 10-20 years. At least among people who read books. Today's gender division is based on 19'th century ideas of gender that doesn't apply any longer. The terminology has stayed with us even though it doesn't really match the ideas of gender we have today. It's more like we're attracted to certain body parts or types of body parts. These can vary a lot. They can vary among purely biological aspects. Some are more into boobs, other people ass, or long hair, eyes etc. Some gender theorists argue that we're also attracted to gendered personality types/traits. Some of the stuff we know for a fact is learned behaviour (gender coded clothes for example). If you don't buy that some of it is learned behaviour I recommend reading up on fetischism if you don't believe it. It's not as uncommon as we used to believe and can't be explained with biology.

If we're labelled as straight men we'll find more of the stuff we're attracted to among women. If gay, more among men. But this will not be universal for anybody. It's more about probabilities. So don't worry if you once get a boner when looking at a dude. It tells you next to nothing about your sexual orientation.

The division into straight/gay/bisexual simply isn't helpful any longer. Today it only acts to confuse matters IMHO. That isn't to say that being gay is a choice. That is to misunderstand what I'm saying. This is nothing we have any conscious control over.

It's important to keep in mind that sexually we're mostly like any other animal. All the stuff they do, we also do, but in the human version of that same behaviour. Our channels of attraction can be fooled just as easily. A straight man who hasn't caught themselves being attracted to a tranny is lying. Human sexuality is complicated, but it's not particularly advanced. It's fucking dumb-ass and easily fooled.

Also... why this need to label ourselves as straight/gay/bisexual? I understand why non-CIS gendered do. But the label "straight" is worthless. I suggest two labels. CIS-gendered and the rest/queer. Which is what people in the queer scene do.