699. Is The Own Body A Merchandise?
"French MPs have approved a bill that will penalise anyone paying for sex.
The bill, which was adopted by a vote of 268 to 138, with 79 abstentions, establishes a fine of at least 1,500 euros ($2,030) for buying sexual acts."
"The 1,500-euro fine is for first offenders - subsequent offences could be more than double that."
There are some more articles concerning the controversial aspects.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/09/opinion/frances-new-approach-to-curbing-prostitution.html
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/12/05/france-s-new-prostitution-law-targets-johns-ignites-national-debate.html
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/technology/2013/12/across-europe-growing-sense-legalized-prostitution-isnt-working/7777/
Opposition to the new law comes not only from men, but also from misguided feminists, who are probably too desensitized to be aware of the fallacy of their thinking.
Prostitution fills the asymmetrical gap between the magnitude of most men's biological urges and the lack of the same amount and urgency in the majority of women. If women would enjoy copulation without emotional attachment and without commitment as much as men, enough women would want this and no men would have a reason to pay for it.
Prostitution is enabled by the combination of the asymmetrical male urges and men's onesided advantages of physical and/or economical power.
Opposition to the new law comes not only from men, but also from misguided feminists, who are probably too desensitized to be aware of the fallacy of their thinking.
Prostitution fills the asymmetrical gap between the magnitude of most men's biological urges and the lack of the same amount and urgency in the majority of women. If women would enjoy copulation without emotional attachment and without commitment as much as men, enough women would want this and no men would have a reason to pay for it.
Prostitution is enabled by the combination of the asymmetrical male urges and men's onesided advantages of physical and/or economical power.
There are two fallacies in the demand for legalized prostitution:
Fallacy 1.
Prostitution is called sex work. Whenever there is no direct coercion, it is alleged and claimed to be a more or less fair deal.
It would only be a fair deal and a free choice in the case, when a woman has a real, not only a legal right and chance to get all the schooling and training she wants and a well paid agreeable job, and when in spite of this she nevertheless prefers to sell the self-abuse of her body.
Defining a woman's last straw in a dire need for survival as a free choice and as a fair deal is a fallacy of desensitized people.
Fallacy 2.
There is a claim, that women should be completely free to do with their own bodies, whatever they want, including selling it.
If this is to be accepted, then this has to be applied fully and with no other restrictions. Women then should be given the full freedom of choice, how to use their bodies as a source of an income and what kind of harm they are most willing to suffer.
Right now, except selling blood, in most countries other methods are not legally available. If there are illegal practices, the owner of the bodies get themselves very little, while criminal agencies make profit.
Comparing the non-financial costs and benefits, prostitution is undoubtedly the worst option for the abused women themselves:
1. Prostitution
When a prostitute sells her self-abuse, she serves as a toilet for a selfish man's body waste.
The costs for the women are the disgust and agony during the recurrent abuse and the long-term psychological and physical damage, for example often substance abuse and the inability to ever emotionally bond with a man.
The only benefits are what the abusers perceive as pleasure.
2. Selling body parts
Would the women be allowed the choice to sell a kidney (or any other body part, which can be sold without disabling oneself) instead, this would not merely enable a man to acquire selfish abuse, but it would help someone to survive and it would also safe resources needed for the general health care. Recurrent dialysis is extremely expensive and inconvenient. A woman (or any person) could be paid the amount of money saved by preventing some years of dialysis.
2. Selling body parts
Would the women be allowed the choice to sell a kidney (or any other body part, which can be sold without disabling oneself) instead, this would not merely enable a man to acquire selfish abuse, but it would help someone to survive and it would also safe resources needed for the general health care. Recurrent dialysis is extremely expensive and inconvenient. A woman (or any person) could be paid the amount of money saved by preventing some years of dialysis.
The costs for the women are the risk of an operation and the loss of one kidney.
The benefits are for all persons getting off dialysis and having a normal life with a working kidney.
3. Selling unwanted babies.
Even the uterus and its contents are a part of a woman's body. If unwillingly pregnant women are allowed any choice at all, it is between abortion and donating the child for adoption. While it is considered as suitable to impose the paid more general abuse upon women's reproductive area for the mere satisfaction of men's instincts, there is no logical reason, why they should not be allowed to sell the use of the filled uterus instead.
Women should have the right to the alternative of selling unwanted children or of producing babies for other people as surrogate mothers. This should be a fair option for the avoidance of the agony of prostitution.
3. Selling unwanted babies.
Even the uterus and its contents are a part of a woman's body. If unwillingly pregnant women are allowed any choice at all, it is between abortion and donating the child for adoption. While it is considered as suitable to impose the paid more general abuse upon women's reproductive area for the mere satisfaction of men's instincts, there is no logical reason, why they should not be allowed to sell the use of the filled uterus instead.
Women should have the right to the alternative of selling unwanted children or of producing babies for other people as surrogate mothers. This should be a fair option for the avoidance of the agony of prostitution.
The costs for the women are the inconvenience, suffering and expenses of pregnancy and giving birth. For those women, who do not want to breed, there are no emotional costs.
The benefits are the fulfilling of the breeding urges of those people, who are unhappy without children. They would be spared futile fertility treatment and more babies would be available to be adopted. The benefits are also for the babies, who grow up as wanted.
Selling body parts and babies has to be restricted as a direct deal between the giver and the health insurance or the receiver, without any greedy third party making profit from it.
Of course I cannot know it, but I am convinced, that many prostitutes would prefer to sell a body part or a baby, if only they were allowed to do this to prevent the agony of being abused.
Either the own body is a merchandise to be freely used by its owner, then all forms of use have to be legal. If it is not a merchandise, then prostitution cannot be defined as an exception, only because those powerful men with the influence over legislation are too often themselves the abusers wishing to perpetuate their privileges.
It is an outrage that even in rich countries, some women are deprived of any other means of survival except the use of their bodies. But it is even more an outrage, that these women are not even allowed a fair choice, how to use their bodies to acquire survival with the least harm for themselves.
As long as it is considered as morally wrong to sell body parts or a baby, prostitution cannot, neither logically nor ethically, be justified by the right of women to do with their body, what they want.
As long as it is legally impossible to sell a body part or a baby, men taking advantage of women selling self-abuse as this being their only legal option are abusers, who deserve to be punished.
