Should prostitution be legal?

[Kat817 19]

At that rate of pay Patty without taxes etc. coming out, that is over $8.00 an hour. Where I am from they do not pay that BEFORE taxes! It is minimum wage all the way and no more than 28 hours per week. Same story with Walmart. I know, I too have a DIL working in the stores.

Whether it is to support a drug habit, or to support a couple of kids at home, a prosititute is supporting herself, NOT on welfare!

It is a means to an end. It allows her to put food in her kids bellies, or drugs in her veins, but she is not relying on YOU and I to do so.

In YOUR mind, and in that of the bible you believe in it might well be a sin. But in that bible it also states that the Lord helps those who help themselves. It does not support sitting back doing nothing and expecting to be cared for......as so many do.

Yes legalizing prostitution might well lead us onto a slippery slope. BUT it has been done in many places, and without problem. It makes it safer for both the seller and the buyer, and they pay taxes just like you and I at our jobs.

The way it is now is not eliminating prostitution, nor is is making it any safer for anyone involved, the most is does is revenue enhancement, as they arrest the hooker and the john. It changes nothing. And that is proven....in order to change something, you have to change SOMETHING!!!!

[pattygreen 5]

LOL! And exactly HOW would they pay for it out of their own pockets?! I used to be poor and I lived in a very bad part of town. I knew a lot of prostitutes. My aunt was one. From what I have seen, most prostitutes (not all) are drug addicts and they are prostituting to make money for drugs. So prostitution doesn't have the easy answer of just making them get other jobs. Most of these women (again, not all) have mental problems, were sexually and physically abused, are drug addicts, etc. So the problem is much deeper. So according to patty, we should just make them pay for their medical care out of their own pocket?! ROFL!!!!

Oh yea, since I'm guessing that most of us on here have (or had) the sin of being fat, I guess if we fall on hard times, lose our jobs and our houses, I guess we should all be turned away from the food banks because we are all too fat. Afterall, we can live for a little while on all the fat we have stored....

Those prostitutes that have mental problems or are drug addicted certainly can't help themselves. They need someone to intervene in their lives to get them into rehab. I'm speaking of the prostitutes who do it for a living simply because they can make alot of money quickly. They can afford to pay for their own STD medical care, but they work under the table and usually don't have medical insurance because there is no employer to provide it.

The whole point that I am trying to make is this:Enabling people is not the answer. When a person is not living right, they don't deserve to receive a handout, or to have the laws work in their favor.

Another thought: You've heard of the Craigs list killer? He would meet the women that posted their bodies for sale on craigs list because it was free advertising for their prostitution. They DIED. He KILLED them when they showed up to the hotel room. If these girls weren't committing such an atrocity by selling sex, and abided by God's law which states that sexual relations are to be between a man and a wife only, they would still be alive today. Point is, if you do what's right, there are usually no problems. No death, no STDs, no AIDS, no unwanted pregnancies. This world would be a better place if everyone lived according to their own creators will for them.

[pattygreen 5]

At that rate of pay Patty without taxes etc. coming out, that is over $8.00 an hour. Where I am from they do not pay that BEFORE taxes! It is minimum wage all the way and no more than 28 hours per week. Same story with Walmart. I know, I too have a DIL working in the stores.

Whether it is to support a drug habit, or to support a couple of kids at home, a prosititute is supporting herself, NOT on welfare!

It is a means to an end. It allows her to put food in her kids bellies, or drugs in her veins, but she is not relying on YOU and I to do so.

In YOUR mind, and in that of the bible you believe in it might well be a sin. But in that bible it also states that the Lord helps those who help themselves. It does not support sitting back doing nothing and expecting to be cared for......as so many do.

Yes legalizing prostitution might well lead us onto a slippery slope. BUT it has been done in many places, and without problem. It makes it safer for both the seller and the buyer, and they pay taxes just like you and I at our jobs.

The way it is now is not eliminating prostitution, nor is is making it any safer for anyone involved, the most is does is revenue enhancement, as they arrest the hooker and the john. It changes nothing. And that is proven....in order to change something, you have to change SOMETHING!!!!

Here in CT the minimum wage is $8.00/hr. If we can live on it here where everything else is priced higher than any other state in the nation, then you can live on your minimum wage in your state. And if your walmart only gives you 28 hrs. a week, then work there and at mcDonalds. Noone said you'd be well off, but many people just 'get by' in life. It beats prostituting your body.

You're right when you say the bible doesn't support people sitting back and expecting to be cared for. AND the bible also doesn't support the sexual sin of prostitution! It's funny how you will accept one thing the bible tells you, but not the other. Could it be because you agree with the one and not with the other? If we pick and choose the things we wish to live by in scripture, instead of living by ALL of it, we end up with differing views on what's right and what's wrong.

BTW, nowhere in the bible does it state that "the Lord helps those who help themselves."

[pattygreen 5]

What does a mother say to her child when they ask her what kind of Job she does? "Oh, honey, I have sex with many different men all day long, and they pay me for it. Don't you want to grow up to be just like me?" How could she do that to her children? Set such a horrible example for them. It would be better to get on welfare or to live in a shelter if needed than to have your children find out how she makes the money to feed them. I would rather my child went without shoes or toys or anything than to let him or her grow up with such an immoral example of a parent. Children can understand poverty, and are accepting of it, but sexual immorality is another thing! That can scar a child for life. And Kat, I find it hard to believe that you would be for it since you are so protective of children and all. go figure.

Edited May 17, 2009 by pattygreen

[BJean 16]

Wait a minute. Wasn't there a famous character in the Bible who was a prostitute? And didn't Jesus embrace her? And what about not "casting the first stone" eh?

[BJean 16]

I am not at all sure that Kat is posting what she is because she supports prostitues. I think she is trying very hard to understand women who might be lured by the money that they cannot make by working in conventional jobs that they are qualified for.

There's a difference, for instance, in wanting to legalize prostitution and supporting prostitution. Religious fanatics don't see it that way. But their way only serves to keep those women categorized as "criminals" and yet their work is victimless.

I don't see many people who consider prostitution a sin lobbying for the men's names to be made public and for them to be thrown into jail and prosecuted if they pay for the services of a prostitute. Why is it always the women who have to be punished and not the men? Why it is far more acceptable for men to only be looked down on for going to a prostitute for sex, but the women need to be punished by being prosecuted and jailed?

[BJean 16]

I'm still reeling from the confession that one supposedly "good" person would turn away a supposedly "bad" person from being given food because they are smoking a cigarette.

Judgement: what one superior person decides is right or wrong activity committed by another person.

[Kat817 19]

TY BJean, there is a HUGE difference in supporting prostitution and legalizing it.

And Patty you are right, I DO support children, and want for their well being. And part of that is the simple fact that prostitution exists, it is currently illegal, and it exists. If a woman is working the streets that way to support her kids, I have never said she should be proud of it. I DO BELIEVE however, it would be a safer environment for Her and the customer for it to be in a legal setting, with some form of a law protecting them both.

Does that mean I think any of it is "right"---------no! I am thankful beyond words, I have never been in a situation that ever made me even think in the direction of that being my only way to survive. I have worked 2 jobs. I HATED every second of it! I did it for a year following my divorce, in which I was given half the debt----that was his. I worked in a medical lab from 7:30 AM to 4PM then rushed down the road to a communications center and worked until just after midnight for an answering service. My days off varied, but I went for a year without a 24 hour period off, as I worked at one job or the other every day that year. Because answering services work holidays. I hated it because it left me 6-7 hours a day after my commute to be with my child, and they were sleeping hours. I did get weekend days off and 2 nights a week from the Communications office. So I did get to see her, and do laundry, pay bills, buy groceries, etc. BUT the only way I could do this was with family help. I paid my Mom to keep my DD. I count myself lucky that I had some help with her, that I trusted implicitly, and that I had a vehicle to get back and forth to work in, and that I had a phone that allowed me to get the calls to land the jobs, and that I did not have any mental issues preventing me from having an upstanding job.

I believe many prostitutes do not have the advantages I did. I am honest enough to see that without some of those 'things'------mainly the family support, but, the home, the car, even the phone----that my circumstances could have been totally different. I believe very few of the women who are prostitutes actually do it by choice. I doubt seriously they wrote any reports in school that, that is what they want to be when they grow up. But life happens, and sometimes the things it hands out are not pretty.

I would also bet many of them have suffered sexual abuse themselves.

You can work 2 jobs, making minimum wage Patty, and still not be able to get the things you need and move ahead-------and if they have children, what are they supposed to do with them during the odd hours etc.? Daycare here costs an average of $125.00 a week. And they only accept kids M-F 6AM to 6PM. So any odd hours, you have to find alternate care. And I am in a rural area, where that can be really hard to find.....I know I provided it for several years.

I am not saying being a prostitute is the answer to being poor. I am saying they are already there! It was happening back in biblical times, and has been happening ever since. Maybe the time to protect is now. The women would still be free to change their ways.

And as for picking and choosing which scriptures to live by and believe, I am sure I am guilty-----I do not deny that. And of course we all end up with differing views of what is right and what is wrong!

We could all sit down in a circle with the same version of the bible, and read it front to back, and each of us take away a differing view on it. Meaning that while you may disagree with how I feel on a subject, it does not make you any more right than me.....and the same in reverse. I am not saying you are wrong in your belief. I am saying you are showing it very poorly, in my opinion, by saying it is the ONLY way.

Yes a mother telling her child that she sells her body for money would be traumatic, of that there is no arguement. In other countries, she could have kept herself in tact and sold the child. She could be answering other sexual questions---of "why do I have 2 mommies and no daddy like the other kids" or "daddy how come you used to be a girl in all of the pictures at Grandmas house?"

They are all traumatic, and all go against the bible you tout so freely, but they are all happening every day, and making them illegal, and punishing them is not changing anything at all. There are preachers spreading the word in every jail in America---and it is not changing.

My support is simply to make the lifestyle safer, and allow them to pay into the system same as I do.

It is not a moral decision. My morals, are mine, I do not have to force them down anyone elses throat. Nor do I need to defend them. At least not to anyone here on LBT....

[Carrie_C 9]

I'm still reeling from the confession that one supposedly "good" person would turn away a supposedly "bad" person from being given food because they are smoking a cigarette.

So am I!! Especially since she is supposed to be a christian! If Jesus were here, he wouldn't keep food from anyone, no matter that they had done.

patty, sin is sin. God doesn't see one sin as any better or worse than another sin. God sees gluttony and prostitution the same. Just because we may want to believe that one sin is better than another doesn't make it so. That is why he says "Judge not fot you shall also be judged." I think you decided to leave that part of the bible out.

[pattygreen 5]

Wait a minute. Wasn't there a famous character in the Bible who was a prostitute? And didn't Jesus embrace her? And what about not "casting the first stone" eh?

Actually, the story was about a woman caught in adultry, not a prostitute. (John Chapter 8)

After Jesus told those who were condemning her to cast the first stone at her if you have never sinned, they all dropped their stones and left. He said noone is condemning you now and neither do I. But he also said "Go now and LEAVE your life of sin."

Mary Magdalene was a prostitute that was a friend of Jesus. I believe maybe you are refering to her. Like I've said before, Jesus loves evryone, but hates their sin. After this Mary got to know Jesus, she turned from prostitution.

[pattygreen 5]

[quote name=BJean;1227426}

There's a difference' date=' for instance, in wanting to legalize prostitution and supporting prostitution. [/quote]

Really? What's the difference? To me, if you are ok with legalizing it, you are also accepting of it.

[pattygreen 5]

[quote name=BJean;}

I don't see many people who consider prostitution a sin lobbying for the men's names to be made public and for them to be thrown into jail and prosecuted if they pay for the services of a prostitute. Why is it always the women who have to be punished and not the men? Why it is far more acceptable for men to only be looked down on for going to a prostitute for sex' date=' but the women need to be punished by being prosecuted and jailed?[/quote]

If the woman wouldn't give it up, there would be no men going to them. Even so, it is just as wrong for a man to buy a womans body for sex. And just as wrong for a man to prostitute himself.

[pattygreen 5]

I'm still reeling from the confession that one supposedly "good" person would turn away a supposedly "bad" person from being given food because they are smoking a cigarette.

Judgement: what one superior person decides is right or wrong activity committed by another person.

Hey! I may have donated that food and intended it to be for a person who is having financial difficulty. Not for someone who has the finances but chooses to spend her money on 'Other' unnecessary things instead of food!

Your definition of judgment is wrong.

[Kat817 19]

Websters.........

judg·ment

judg·ment [jújmənt]

(plural judg·ments) or judge·ment [jújmənt] (plural judge·ments)

n

1. legal verdict: the decision arrived at and pronounced by a court of law 2. obligation resulting from verdict: an obligation, e.g. a debt, that arises as a result of a court's verdict, or a document setting out an obligation of this kind 3. decision of judge: the decision reached by one or more judges in a contest The judgment of the panel must be regarded as final.

4. decision on disputed matter: an opinion formed or a decision reached in the case of a disputed, controversial, or doubtful matter 5. discernment or good sense: the ability to form sound opinions and make sensible decisions or reliable guesses someone with shrewd commercial judgment

6. opinion: an opinion formed or given after consideration a snap judgment

7. estimate based on observation: an estimate of something such as speed or distance, made with the help of the eye or some other sense 8. judging of something: the judging of a case or a contest 9. divine punishment: a misfortune regarded as a divine punishment for folly or sin (archaic or humorous) The defeat was regarded as a judgment from God on the leader's pride.

10. act of making statement: in logic, the mental act of making or understanding a positive or negative proposition about something, e.g. in "a chihuahua is a dog" or "a lobster is not an insect"

[13th century. < Old French jugement < jugier "to judge" < Latin judicare (see judicature)]

Edited May 17, 2009 by Kat817
edited to add where the info come from.

[pattygreen 5]

So am I!! Especially since she is supposed to be a christian! If Jesus were here, he wouldn't keep food from anyone, no matter that they had done.

patty, sin is sin. God doesn't see one sin as any better or worse than another sin. God sees gluttony and prostitution the same. Just because we may want to believe that one sin is better than another doesn't make it so. That is why he says "Judge not fot you shall also be judged." I think you decided to leave that part of the bible out.

You're right. Sin is sin. I've always said that. All sin is the same in God's eyes. You're right about that also. I have always said that, too. I don't judge anyone, BTW. I only tell others what God has to say on an issue. If you want to say that I am casting a final judgement on their soul, I can't stop you. But I have NEVER told anyone that they would be going to Hell. Only God can make that call. People who don't like what they hear for whatever reason tend to tell the one doing the talking that they are judgmental. It's not that they are judgmental, it's that they just don't agree with them. And that's okay. We can agree to disagree.