prostitution

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prostitution,

act of granting sexual access for payment. Although most commonly conducted by females for males, it may be performed by females or males for either females or males.

Early History

In ancient times and in some primitive societies, prostitution often had religious connotations—sexual intercourse with temple maidens was an act of worship to the temple deity. In Greece the hetaerae [Gr.,=companions or associates] were often women of high social status, but in Rome the meretrices were on a low social level and were forced to wear wigs and special garments signifying their trade. In the Middle Ages prostitution flourished, and licensed brothels were a source of revenue to municipalities.

Attempts at Control

In Europe

As a result of the epidemic of sexually transmitted diseasesexually transmitted disease
(STD) or venereal disease,
term for infections acquired mainly through sexual contact. Five diseases were traditionally known as venereal diseases: gonorrhea, syphilis, and the less common granuloma inguinale, lymphogranuloma venereum, and
..... Click the link for more information. in Europe in the 16th cent., efforts were begun to control prostitution. Brothels were closed throughout Western and Central Europe during parts of the 16th cent., and stricter punishment was meted out to those engaged in the trade. When these measures proved unsuccessful in stopping prostitution, many cities instituted even stricter controls. Berlin required medical inspection in 1700; Paris began to register its prostitutes in 1785. In Great Britain legislation to control the spread of sexually transmitted disease was embodied in a series of Contagious Diseases Prevention Acts (1864, 1866, and 1869) requiring periodic medical examination of all prostitutes in military and naval districts and the detention of all those found to be infected. Having failed to control the diseases, the acts were repealed in 1886. In 1898 the Vagrancy Act prohibited males from living on the earnings of prostitutes.

Internationally

During late 19th cent. efforts were made to control the international traffic in women for the purpose of prostitution. Cooperation on an international scale to stamp out such traffic began in 1899 with a congress in London. This was followed by other conferences in Amsterdam (1901), London (1902), and Paris (1904), which resulted in an international agreement providing for a specific agency in each nation to cooperate in the suppression of the international traffic in women for the purpose of prostitution. In 1919 the League of Nations appointed an official body to gather all facts pertaining to the trafficking of prostitutes, and in 1921 a conference held at Geneva and attended by 34 countries established the Committee on the Traffic in Women and Children (the work of the committee was assumed by the United Nations in 1946). In 1949 a convention for the suppression of prostitution was adopted by the UN General Assembly.

In the United States

In the United States, where prostitution was widespread, it was thought to be closely connected with other crimes. No major effort to stamp out prostitution appeared until about the end of the 19th cent. In 1910 the Mann Act, or White Slave Traffic Act, was passed through the efforts of James Robert MannMann, James Robert,
1856–1922, American legislator, b. McLean co., Ill. A Chicago lawyer, he held many local offices before serving (1897–1922) as a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
..... Click the link for more information. ; it forbade under severe penalty the interstate and international transportation of women for immoral purposes. By 1915 nearly all the states had passed laws regarding the keeping of brothels or profiting in other ways from the earnings of prostitutes. Nevertheless, during World War I there was a great increase in prostitution, accompanied by an increase in sexually transmitted disease. In 1941 Congress, spurred by reports of widespread prostitution near military bases and a rise in sexually transmitted disease, passed the May Act; the law made it a federal offense to practice prostitution in areas designated by the secretaries of the army and the navy. On a local basis all states except Nevada now have legislation that makes it a crime to operate a house of prostitution. Most states have laws against all forms of prostitution, although they often exempt from prosecution the customers of prostitution. Among the many agencies in the United States and elsewhere that have worked for the suppression of prostitution are the Society for the Prevention of Crime, organized in 1877; the Committee of Fourteen (1905); the National Vigilance Association; and the American Social Hygiene Association.

Movement toward Regulation

Current legislation both in the United States and elsewhere concerning prostitution has tended to concern itself less with the suppression of the practice of prostitution than with the removal of crimes thought to be connected with it, although in recent years the rise in incidence of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases has revived discussion in the United States of the regulation of prostitutes.

Outstanding in this field of legislation is a British parliamentary act of 1959 (based on the Wolfenden Report) that treats the entire problem of prostitution and other forms of sexual conduct between consenting adults. It forbids open solicitation by prostitutes, but it permits prostitutes to practice their trade in their own homes. For those wishing to give up prostitution, the teaching of commercial or technical skills at rehabilitation centers is provided. The act also removes voluntary sexual acts between adults from the category of a punishable crime.

Other countries, e.g., the Netherlands, Germany, and New Zealand, have emphasized the hygienic aspect in their legislation by rigidly enforcing periodic medical examination of prostitutes and by providing free compulsory hospitalization for those found infected. This emphasis on regulation rather than suppression has resulted in a marked decline in the incidence of sexually transmitted disease and has removed an important cause of the bribery of law enforcement officers.

Prostitution in Asia

Prostitution in Asia has been a serious problem for many years, mainly due to economic factors (i.e., poverty and unemployment) and custom. In countries such as Thailand, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia, the problem is largely confined to urban areas. In India and Japan prostitution is fairly widespread in rural areas as well. In recent years most of these countries have made efforts to control prostitution by enacting legislative measures. Prostitution has been legally abolished in the People's Republic of China since 1949; however, it has had a resurgence in the special economic zones.

Bibliography

See F. Henriques, Prostitution and Society (3 vol., 1962–68); G. R. Scott, Ladies of Vice (rev. ed. 1968); A. Snitow, ed., Powers of Desire (1983); C. Stansell, City of Women (1986); T. Gilfoyle, City of Eros (1987).

prostitution

(common usage) a practice involving sexual services for payment or other reward.
(legalistic usage) a sex-specific offence; although in England and Wales prostitution has technically been regarded as behaviour open to both women and men, in practice only women have been legally defined as common prostitutes and only women are prosecuted for the offences of loitering and soliciting related to prostitution. Legalistic definitions of prostitution, however, are culturally and historically relative. Prostitution is not always subject to criminalization and in some cultures the practice may be regarded as a sacred rite. In those societies where prostitution and related behaviours are criminalized it is typically the prostitute rather than the client whose behaviour is regulated, reflecting double standards of sexual morality
(extralegal usage) an economic contract intrinsically equal to the practice of a man and woman contracting marriage primarily for economic reasons (see ENGELS, 1884). Such attempts to go beyond the legal definitions of prostitution have been influential in feminist theory. Marx drew parallels between the economic prostitution of the worker and that of the prostitute. In doing so he neglected to consider the specific sexual exploitation and oppression experienced by women. Feminist theorists have also likened prostitution to marriage. Millet (1970) maintains that prostitution should be defined as the granting of sexual access on a relatively indiscriminate basis for payment. These approaches, however, fail to account for the particular stigmatization encountered by those women who work as prostitutes.

Traditionally, the sociological study of prostitution has taken place within the context of the sociology of crime and deviance (see CRIMINOLOGY and DEVIANCE). Thus sociologists have often uncritically accepted that prostitution should be regarded as primarily an example of rule-breaking behaviour or female deviancy. More recently, the impact of feminism has led to prostitution being examined within the context of wider gender relations and the socioeconomic position of women, particularly working-class and minority women. Sociologists have increasingly acknowledged accounts of prostitution given by prostitutes themselves, particularly those which present prostitution as part of the sex trade or sex industry. Arguably, it may therefore, be as useful to examine prostitution in the context of the SOCIOLOGY OF WORK and occupations rather than in the context of deviant behaviour.

The rise of the prostitutes’ rights movement since the late 1970s and the contradictory relationship with feminism and the women's movement has led to a shift in the contexts in which prostitution is studied and enters the public imagination (Scwambler and Scwambler, 1995). Aided by feminists, the discourse on prostitution has moved out of a legal/deviance framework and into a feminist framework which focused initially upon pornography and violence and latterly upon health issues in the AIDS era and prostitution as work (see V. Jennes, 1993). The prostitutes’ rights movement emphasizes the profession of prostitute, and the rights, needs and civil liberties of adult women working in the sex industry including the need for grassroots movements organized and managed by prostitutes and supported by ‘experts’ and ‘professionals’.

Prostitution

a type of socially deviant behavior. Prostitution is a historically conditioned social phenomenon that arose in antagonistic class society and is organically inherent in it. It is known to have existed in slaveholding states as early as the third and second centuries B.C. It was widespread in ancient Greece and Rome, and brothels (lupanaria) were numerous. It also existed in the feudal period. Prostitution is widespread in the modern bourgeois states, despite formal measures to restrict it.

In the USSR, the Great October Socialist Revolution eliminated the fundamental causes of prostitution. In the very first years of its existence, the Soviet state initiated a purposeful program of educational, medical, and legal measures designed to provide social assistance for women who had previously engaged in prostitution and to eliminate the circumstances that led to prostitution. In late 1919 the Commission to Combat Prostitution was created under the People’s Commissariat of Public Health. Later the Interdepartmental Commission to Combat Prostitution was established under the People’s Commissariat of Social Security, with branches in the provinces. In the 1930’s prostitution as a widespread social phenomenon was liquidated. Individual instances of prostitution are of a local character and are regarded as a form of parasitism. Soviet legislation establishes criminal responsibility for drawing minors into prostitution, procuring, maintaining dens of vice, and spreading venereal disease.

Prostitution

See also Courtesanship, Mistresses.Adrianacomely girl becomes prostitute to support herself. [Ital. Lit.: The Woman of Rome]Brattle, Carriereturns home reconciled after life in gutter. [Br. Lit: The Vicar of Bullhampton]Celestinaold, evil procuress hired as go-between. [Span. Lit.: Celestina]Dolores and Faustineprovide Swinburne with masochistic pleasure. [Br. Poetry: Poems and Ballads in Magill IV, 704]Harlot’s Progress, TheHogarth engravings tracing a prostitute’s miserable career to its degraded end. [Br. Art: EB (1963) XI, 624]Hill, Fannyfrankly erotic heroine of frankly erotic novel. [Br. Lit.: Memoirs of Fanny Hill.]La Douce, Irmaleading French prostitute on Pigalle. [Am. Cinema: Halliwell, 460]Lulukeeper of two others on her earnings. [Aust. Opera: Berg, Lulu, Westerman, 484]Maggieinnocent girl, corrupted by slum environment, becomes a prostitute. [Am. Lit.: Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, Hart, 514]Mary Magdalenerepentant prostitute who anointed Jesus’s feet. [N.T.: Luke 7:36–50]Nanabeautiful lady who thrived on a troop of men. [Fr. Lit.: Nana, Magill I, 638–640]Overdone, Mistress“a bawd of eleven years’ continuance.” [Br. Lit.: Measure for Measure]Rahabharlot of Jericho who protected Joshua’s two spies. [O.T.: Joshua 2]Tearsheet, Dollviolent-tempered prostitute, an acquaintance of Falstaff. [Br. Lit.: Shakespeare II Henry IV]Thaisnotorious harlot in Malebolge, Hell’s eighth circle. [Ital. Lit.: Inferno]Toast, Joana most saintly whore. [Am. Lit.: The Sot-Weed Factor]Warren, Mrs.raises daughter in comfort and refinement on her bedside earnings. [Br. Lit.: Mrs. Warren’s Profession in Plays Unpleasant]

Prostitution

Note: This page may contain terms or definitions that are offensive or inappropriate for some readers.

Prostitution

The act of offering one's self for hire to engage in sexual relations.

Prostitution is illegal in all states except Nevada, where it is strictly regulated. Some state statutes punish the act of prostitution, and other state statutes criminalize the acts of soliciting prostitution, arranging for prostitution, and operating a house of prostitution. On the federal level, the Mann Act (18 U.S.C.A. § 2421 [as amended 1986] makes it a crime to transport a person in interstate or foreign commerce for the purpose of prostitution or for any other immoral purpose.

Prostitution, historically and currently a trade largely practiced by women, was not a distinct offense in colonial America. A prostitute could be arrested for Vagrancy if she were loitering on the streets, but generally, the act of engaging in sex for money was not itself a crime.

The first prostitution statutes were enacted during the so-called Progressive political movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Urban areas experienced unprecedented growth during this period. Cities became the centers of industrial manufacturing and production, and they were quickly ravaged by disease and poverty. The Progressive movement emphasized education and instituted new government controls over the activities of the general population. The movement introduced the Prohibition of alcohol, which was banned from 1919 to 1933, vested government with increased power over the lives of poor persons, and created a host of new criminal laws, including laws on prostitution. Prostitution increased during this period, and it was seen as one of the biggest threats to public health because of its potential to spread debilitating venereal diseases such as syphilis and gonorrhea. Prostitutes were viewed as moral failures. The male customers of prostitutes were not held up to scorn, but the women who practiced prostitution were seen as responsible for increases in crime and the general decay of social morals.

Commercial Sex: Repression or Legalization?

In the United States, 49 states make prostitution a crime. The only exception is Nevada, which permits brothels to operate in specific areas of the state. Since the 1970s, advocates of reform have called for either the legalization or the decriminalization of prostitution. Proponents see these approaches as a way of preventing women from being punished for making a choice on how they want to earn an income. Opponents of these changes dismiss the idea that women voluntarily choose this type of work and claim that prostitution is yet another part of the U.S. commercial sex industry, which systematically subordinates women.

Proponents of decriminalization argue that it would remove the stigma associated with prostitution and increase profits. They contend that decriminalization would also relieve the police of the costly and futile effort to stop an unstoppable practice.

Legalizing prostitution would mean regulating it. Supporters contend that this would allow the government to collect millions of dollars annually in taxes, reduce collateral crime, and protect the public from sexually transmitted diseases. Proponents point to Nevada, where the use of brothels facilitates testing for diseases and reduces the number of street prostitutes.

Other supporters of decriminalization and regulation challenge what they see as the paternalistic argument that women need to be protected from sexual exploitation. This argument, they claim, is nonsensical because it means that to protect women from exploitation, society must imprison them for engaging in prostitution.

In addition, those who favor decriminalization note that the worst form of exploitation suffered by prostitutes is from pimps. If prostitution were legal, women would generally conduct business on their own, free from the parasitic and abusive conduct of pimps.

Decriminalization supporters also cite the difference between the lax policing of off-street prostitutes and the harsh treatment of street prostitutes. These observers argue that the enforcement disparity is a matter of race and class: most street prostitutes are members of historically oppressed groups, whereas off-street prostitutes generally have middle-class backgrounds. They argue that it is unfair for society to tolerate and even promote escort services while regularly jailing street prostitutes.

Opponents of legalization of prostitution have traditionally based their opposition on the immorality of commercial sex. However, modern feminist thought has developed other arguments against the removal of legal barriers to selling sex.

Many feminists have attacked the "career-choice" argument. They see it as a corruption of feminist values that otherwise favor the economic liberty of women. They contend that, from a limited range of options constrained by economics, education, sexual harass- ment, and abuse, the decision to sell one's body cannot be deemed a choice. Even if a woman makes a conscious decision to enter prostitution, this does not redeem the trade from being the worst form of gender-based exploitation.

The "choice" argument is also undercut, argue the opponents of legalization, by the fact that the average prostitute starts working at the age of fourteen and suffers Sexual Abuse, drug dependency, violence at the hands of customers, and emotional control by pimps. From this point of view, women are victims of commercial sex work.

More radical feminist critics of legalization argue that prostitution, like Pornography, is an example of the unequal status of women in the United States. The right to privacy arguments advanced by legalization proponents may sound reasonable, contend critics, but they mask the systematic subordination of women. Noted feminist legal scholar catharine a. mackinnon has defined pornography as "the graphic sexually explicit subordination of women, whether in pictures or words," especially in a violent or degrading context. Prostitution is worse than pornography, contend these critics, because women are subjected to sex in violent and degrading contexts.

For these more radical critics of legalization and decriminalization, making commercial sex legal would legitimize the subordinated position of women in U.S. society. Just as the legalization of casino gambling has caused a dramatic increase in the number of people gambling and the amount of money wagered, the legalization of prostitution would give the commercial sex industry the opportunity to legitimately expand. Critics argue that in a consumer culture already permeated with sexual imagery, legalization is not the answer.

Legalization critics have acknowledged, however, that prostitutes are prosecuted for their acts while their male customers usually are not. In the 1980s and 1990s, many state and local governments have sought to end this double standard by enacting laws that target customers of prostitutes. This legislation has also been triggered by residents of local communities who have grown tired of enduring the presence of customers who visit their neighborhoods. These so-called anti-john laws seek to discourage customers by impounding their cars, and, in some cases, notifying their spouses of their arrest.

Many police departments have also increased their use of police decoys—officers disguised as prostitutes who lure unsuspecting customers into arrest. In addition, customers who have been arrested may find their names listed in the local newspaper or photographs broadcast on a local Cable Television station.

It is unlikely that prostitution will be legalized or decriminalized because few politicians would relish being associated with so morally explosive an issue as commercial sex. It is also unlikely, given prostitution's persistence throughout history, that efforts by law enforcement to prosecute prostitutes and their customers will bring an end to prostitution.

Cross-references

Feminist Jurisprudence; MacKinnon, Catharine.

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, states began to encourage the arrest of prostitutes for such crimes as vagrancy and loitering. Congress passed the Mann Act in 1910, which criminalized interstate prostitution, and state legislatures made prostitution a distinct criminal offense. The prostitute, not the customer, was the first to be penalized on the state and local levels; statutes that criminalized the solicitation of prostitution were passed later.

Historically, the enforcement of prostitution laws focused on apprehension of the prostitute. In the 1960s and 1970s, perhaps as a result of heightened social discourse on the issue of prostitution, police departments became more vigilant in their pursuit of customers. Local police in urban areas now regularly conduct "sting" operations designed to catch solicitors through the use of undercover agents posing as prostitutes. Many states have Forfeiture statutes that give law enforcement agencies the power to seize and gain ownership of vehicles used by customers of prostitutes, and alleged customers may find their pictures published in the local newspaper.

All jurisdictions have made their prostitution statutes gender-neutral, but the prostitution relationship still usually consists of a man paying a woman for sex. There are occasional variations of the sexual identities of the participants in contemporary society, but, by and large, a prostitute is still more likely to be a woman or a girl. An increasing amount of prostitution occurs off the street by organized escort services, and prostitutes from these services have some measure of control over their lives. However, many prostitutes still work on the street, living a desperate, brutal, dangerous life at the mercy of a promoter, or pimp. Because the prostitute usually is a woman or a girl, and because prostitution can wreak havoc on the life of the prostitute, the issue of prostitution has become a matter of concern for Women's Rights advocates.

Hollywood Madam

The Los Angeles prostitution prosecution and conviction of Heidi Fleiss, dubbed the Hollywood Madam by the press, raised issues that went beyond the sensational elements of the case. Feminist groups criticized Los Angeles prosecutors for continuing the familiar pattern of targeting female prostitutes while ignoring their male customers.

Heidi Fleiss, the daughter of a prominent California pediatrician and a schoolteacher, was arrested in June 1993 for running an expensive call-girl business. Fleiss was charged with pandering, or providing prostitutes to customers. It was alleged that seventy women worked for her and that her clients included Hollywood actors, U.S. politicians, and rich foreign businessmen.

The tabloid press had made Fleiss a minor celebrity before her arrest by occasionally discussing her and publishing photographs of her. Her notoriety led the Los Angeles police to conduct a "sting" operation, in which an officer posed as a customer, hiring prostitutes at a rate of $1,500 each for a supposed party. When the women arrived for the party, they and Fleiss were arrested.

In the months that followed, titillating details emerged about Fleiss and her alleged customers. At one point Fleiss offered to reveal the names of the wealthy men who used her services if she was paid $1 million. As the case neared trial, her attorney alleged that Fleiss had been selectively prosecuted and that her male customers, whose names were in her address book, would not be charged with any crimes.

The judge dismissed Fleiss's arguments, and she was convicted of pandering on December 2, 1994. The Los Angeles chapter of the National Organization for Women and some feminists charged that the failure to prosecute the rich and powerful customers demonstrated the double standard at work in the criminal justice system regarding prostitution offenses.

Cross-references

Sex Offenses; Vice Crimes.

prostitution

n. the profession of performing sexual acts for money. Prostitution is a crime throughout the United States, except for a few counties in the State of Nevada, where it is allowed in licensed houses of prostitution. Soliciting acts of prostitution is also a crime, called pandering or simply, soliciting. Pandering on behalf of a prostitute is called pimping. (See: prostitute, pander, panderer, pimp)

PROSTITUTION. The common lewdness of a woman for gain.
2. In all well regulated communities this has been considered a heinous offence, for which the woman may be punished, and the keeper of a house of prostitution may be indicted for keeping a common nuisance.
3. So much does the law abhor this offence, that a landlord cannot recover for the use and occupation of a house let for the purpose of prostitution. 1 Esp. Cas. 13; 1 Bos. & Pull. 340, n.
4. In a figurative sense, it signifies the bad use which a corrupt judge makes of the law, by making it subservient to his interest; as, the prostitution of the law, the prostitution of justice.

prostitution

pros·ti·tu·tion

pros•ti•tu•tion

prostitution

prostitute

prostitution

prostitution,

Early History

Attempts at Control

In Europe

Internationally

In the United States

Movement toward Regulation

Prostitution in Asia

Bibliography

prostitution

Prostitution

Prostitution

prostitution

prostitution

prostitution

prostitution

Prostitution

Prostitution

Commercial Sex: Repression or Legalization?

Further readings

Cross-references

Hollywood Madam

Further readings

Cross-references

prostitution

prostitution

Synonyms for prostitution

noun harlotry

Synonyms

Synonyms for prostitution

noun offering sexual intercourse for pay

Synonyms

Related Words