Legalizing prostitution would be more harmful than helpful to the world. Legalization of prostitution would increase child prostitution, doesn't protect the women in prostitution, and doesn't enhance women's choice. These reasons for not legalizing prostitution will be discussed throughout this report.
Child prostitution in the Netherlands has increased dramatically during the 1990's. The Amsterdam-based Child Right organization estimates that the number has gone from 4,000 children in 1996 to 15,000 in 2001. The group estimates that at least 5,000 of the children in prostitution are from other countries, with a large segment being Nigerian girls. Child prostitution has dramatically risen in Victoria compared to other Australian states where prostitution has not been legalized.
Women in prostitution have indicated that prostitution establishments did little to protect them, regardless of whether they were in legal or illegal establishments. The only time they protect anyone is to protect the customers. Eighty percent of all women interviewed suffered physical violence from pimps and endured similar and multiple health effects from the violence and sexual exploitation. Of the women who have reported that sex establishments gave some protection, they qualified it by pointing out that no protector was ever in the room with them, where anything could occur.
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Most women in prostitution did not make a rational choice to enter prostitution. A prostituted woman more accurately complies to the only options available to her. Her compliance is required by the very fact of having to adapt to conditions of inequality that are set by the customer who pays her to do what he wants her to do. Women in prostitution must continually to lie about their lives, their bodies, and their sexual responses.
