Taking a Stand:

The case for legalizing prostitution

Denise Brunsdon, The McGill Daily (McGill University)

MONTREAL (CUP)—If 50
Vancouver lawyers had mysteriously gone
missing, the police would have noticed.

If 50 Vancouver doctors had mysteti-
ously gone missing, every media outlet in
the city would have noticed. Yet, when
more than 50 Vancouver prostitutes went
missing from the Eastside, it seemed like
nobody noticed, and if they did, they cer-
tainly didn’t seem to care.

There are many explanations for what
went wrong. Some say that because the
women were transient or homeless, it was
hard to verify they had indeed disap-
peared, while others blame funding
crunches that ate away at the police’s
capacity to investigate the case. Few have
pointed to the lack of respect and con-
cern that we as a society demonstrate for
sex-trade workers.

The current justice system criminalizes
sex-trade workers and assuages only the
neighbours who wish the trade forced out
of sight, rather than recognizing the
inevitable existence of the sex trade and
building a system that mutually benefits
prostitutes, johns, and neighbours.

Section 213 of the Criminal Code
makes the clever differentiation between
the transaction itself and communicating
for the purposes of the transaction.
Prostitution in Canada is technically legal,
as long as it’s not done or talked about in
the public domain.

According to Jodi Paterson, executive
director of Prostitutes
Empowerment Education and Resource
Society (PEERS) and advocate of full sex-
trade legalization, the fear of ticketing and
jail is what leads street-working sex-trade
workers into dangerous situations.

“Picture any other commodity, like
shoes,” she said. “Everybody in society
buys shoes, yet imagine that shoe-sellers
need to sell their shoes by getting into cars
late at night hoping that they aren’t beaten
up and the shoes aren’t stolen.”

The NDP member of Parliament
from Vancouver East, Libby Davies,
agrees that the solicitation restrictions in
the Criminal Code result in unsafe work-

Victoria’s

ing conditions for prostitutes.

“IT believe that the law itself is con-
tributing to the great risk and harm that is
happening on the street,’ said Davies.
“{Prostitutes are] being driven away in
cars, making split-second decisions and
having to do their business out in back
lanes in very unsafe situations.”

Davies is well informed of the dynam-
ics of the Criminal Code surrounding
solicitation. She was the motivating force

10 | OUNEPPPeSS

behind the creation of the parliamentary
subcommittee on solicitation laws, a com-
mittee within the justice portfolio.

Following the deaths of so many sex-
trade workers in Vancouver’s Downtown
Eastside, Davies decided that the govern-
ment needed to explore changes to the
Criminal Code.

“If the law was designed to protect
these women, it has failed,” she said. “The
Criminal Code is not working. The soon-

with this issue. Criminalizing women who
are marginalized is not a way to deal with
this issue.”

Davies has called on Justice Minister
Irwin Cotler to bring forward a moratori-
um on the communicating law until the
committee has finished its
Although Davies grants that Cotler is
“quite sympathetic and supportive of the
committee,” he has yet to act on the issue.
The Department of Justice said it is not

work.

 

“Full legalization and regulation of the trade
will not improve sex-trade workers’ safety and
security if they continue to be ostracized by
society at large.”

 

er we understand that the sooner we can
come to grips with it and find something
better”

Although the committee died as a
result of the election, Vancouver Centre
Liberal member of Parliament and sub-
committee member Hedy Fry ensured the
body was re-struck to continue its analy-
sis.

Davies is unsure of what recommen-
dations the subcommittee will make, but
is Optimistic that the current system of
criminalizing prostitutes will be deter-
mined outdated.

“Law enforcement is not a way to deal

H

 

prepared to comment until the committee
has thoroughly reviewed the issue.

There is a growing demand for the
federal government to commit funds to

increasing sex-trade worker safety.

Many organizations that have histori-
cally provided advocacy and support for
sex-trade workers are now attempting to
turn their efforts to federal lobbying,
unfortunately, with little success.

PEERS has no core funding at all.
Their six-month exiting program is fund-
ed by a three-year provincial government
contract, gaming money, and private
donations.

 

“We are always going to various levels
of government, begging for money,”
lamented Paterson.

The only federal funding they receive
is for implementation of their fetal alco-
hol-syndrome education program. They
receive no federal funds for their sex-
trade worker programs.

Paterson’s dream is to test a business
model for prostitution as though it were a
non-profit escort agency.

There would be vacation days, fair
fees, a benevolent employer, worker’s-
compensation-board benefits, no
exploitative fees like those found in
escort agencies, and all the profit would
go back into programs for the sex trade
workers.

Paterson is quick to point out that
this utopian sex-trade work environment
wouldn’t completely eliminate exploita-
tion. She is clear that as long as there is
a demand for child prostitutes and as
long as some sex-trade workers become
addicted to drugs, there will always be an
outdoor stroll; however, she thinks her
model would create a healthier sex-trade
work force in the long run.

“Tf it’s a benevolent employer, a soci-
ety, and you see someone moving
towards a heavy addiction, you just say,
‘We're going to put you on a medical
leave for treatment and your job will be
here when you get back,” reasoned
Paterson. She feels that if escort agen-
cies weren’t so rapidly throwing their
employees onto the street for drug
addiction, there would be fewer street
sex-workers to exploit.

Although there are many other
places, such as Germany, Australia, New
Zealand, and Amsterdam, that have
legalized prostitution, none has a model
like Paterson’s. She feels that although
the situation of the prostitutes may have
improved in these countries through
legalization and regulation, oppression is

still prevalent.

“The problem is, when I look at their
models, what I still see is men solving the
problems for men. The women are going
to be health-checked more often so that
the men don’t get diseases,” said Paterson.
“What none of the models do is give it
over to women to create a model.”

Paterson and many feminists argue
that one of the largest social problems
contributing to an unhealthy and unsafe
sex trade is the unfair blame placed on
women for bringing “their” dirty business
into good neighbourhoods.

“People tend to talk about prostitution

January §=19/2005