Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Hi Ricky,
I have a couple of friends who work in the sex industry and, believe me, they think that they have the best job in the world. They are both independent women who work in the industry through their own choice and thoroughly enjoy it. Both are well-educated, and came to work in the industry after having professional careers. They'd certainly disagree with your view of the work as being "degrading", although I'd be the first to agree that there is a side to the industry which is appalling - street girls who are abused by pimps and more often than not dependent on drugs. That side of the industry needs to be stamped out, and the sooner it happens the better.
Many towns and cities in the UK take a very enlightened attitude to the industry these days, and operate all sorts of support services to ensure that abuse does not happen. I think there is a widespread realisation that it's going to happen no matter what, so it's a lot better to operate openly and properly run, rather than for it all to be driven underground and "criminalised" (it's not illegal in the UK - I understand that in some parts of the US it is). In the case of my friends, for example, they tell me that a nurse visits them once a month to carry out health checks.
One potential problem with sueing for industrial injuries is that it's normal in the sex industry for people to be independent contractors rather than employees. Both my friends have the legal status of "limited companies", for example.
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Oh, I hear you Harry. Most of the girls I lived around in LA were your basic street hookers, and it was a degrading job to say the least. I was the neighbor that got called in the middle of the night to bail them out if their pimp wouldn't (or if they didn't have one).
I don't have any experience at all with the higher paid escorts and call girls. Most of my neighbors back in those days were making around $15 a trick, and then AIDS sort of started decimating them.
I am quite sure there are a few women (and men) in the industry who are really happy with their jobs. But I do think that the vast majority (at least in this country) are uneducated, often drug addicted, and not living in the best of circumstances.
Based on the facts of that case, my assumption would be that as a phone sex worker, the lady probably wasn't making much over minimum wage, but at least what she was doing was legal.
My thinking is that if a person is forced into an occupation because of lack of education or other circumstances, and it's low paying ... barely meet the cost of living sort of low paying ... well, I consider that degrading. If they are well educated and make a conscious choice, are making a good living and not breaking any laws in the process, then I don't consider the fact that they are a "sex worker" to be the least bit degrading.
Of course, there are a whole mass of people living around me who would disagree with me on that point ... they consider any and all sex outside of marriage to be degrading. It's something we just all don't talk about socially, because we will get into an argument, and most of the folks down here are still in shock from finding out I'm not a Christian.