I wrote about this for an editorial in early December 2012 that wasn't, for space reasons only, published in its entirety. In particular the bit towards the end about the men, the customers, was left out. This is a subject that annoys the hell out of me, not least because it involves such a avoidance of reality.
The critical faculties of many members
of society appear to depart them when they consider the issue of
prostitution.
There is the quiet, but strongly held
view that quite a good percentage of the women who work as
prostitutes in every town in Kildare are doing so of their own
volition, that they are simply businesswomen who have chosen this
activity as a way of making a living.
The Leinster Leader views that train of
thought with its most jaundiced and sceptical eye.
It is known that a large number of
these women are controlled by a pimp and that they are trafficked
into this country in order to service a booming market. The evidence
is undeniable.
It is alleged that some are not
controlled by a third party, that they are “just doing it to pay
the bills”.
But even if we are to take the broadest
view of the matter, it is surely not relevant whether a woman is
trapped, coerced or forced into prostitution by a pimp, a trafficker
or by economic circumstances.
Prostitution is and remains an offence
to the human dignity of any woman who finds herself performing sexual
favours on strangers for money.
Also, are we to believe that a woman
with very little english who flies into the country on a holiday visa
can, with no assistance whatsoever, find herself in a matter of
weeks, with an advertisement on an escort website that is both well
written and in english, have a lease in an apartment in some suburb
of the greater Dublin area, numerous, Irish registered mobile phones,
and a steady flow of clientele?
Another quiet but strongly held view is
that the men who avail of the services of prostitutes are innocent of
all blame, and that society would somehow break down, come to a
grinding halt, if men were to stop using prostitutes.
This leads to resistance to the idea of
tackling prostitution by targeting and prosecuting the users rather
than the providers of the services.
We are asked: “What would that do to
his marriage or his children?”
Clearly, it is a widely held view that
the sexual urges of the male side of the population must be managed -
as if prostitution were to be considered a handy pressure release
valve.
It is devastatingly depressing and
disappointing to consider the inherent inference that a man can be so
beholden to his sexual urges that he can banish any pause for concern
from his mind about whether the frightened naked woman with very
little English, whom he knows for all of 10 minutes and who is now
performing sexual favours on him, is there by choice or not.
If we are to tackle prostitution in
this country, it must be from a humanitarian point of view with the
well-being of the women involved as the guiding principle of our
actions.
Unlike the men who use their services,
they are the vulnerable ones.
