Prostitution

I

Introduction

Prostitution, the performance of sexual acts solely for the purpose of material gain. Often motivated by poverty, people prostitute themselves when they grant sexual favours to others in exchange for money, gifts, or other payment, and, in so doing, use their bodies as commodities. In legal terms, the word prostitute refers only to those who engage overtly in such sexual-economic transactions, usually for a specified sum of money. Prostitutes may be of either sex, and may perform either heterosexual or homosexual services, but throughout history the majority have been women (servicing male clients), reflecting both the traditional socio-economic dependence of women and the tendency to exploit female sexuality. Although prostitution has often been characterized as the “world's oldest profession”, the concept of women as property, which prevailed in most cultures until the end of the 19th century, continuing still in many, meant that the profits of the profession most often accrued to the men who controlled it. Men have traditionally been characterized as procurers and customers, but they are also increasingly being identified as prostitutes. Male prostitutes generally serve male customers and sometimes impersonate women. Increasingly children are being involved in sexual exploitation in the form of prostitution. Those children particularly at risk of being drawn into prostitution are child runaways, whose only source of income is the exchange of sexual favours for money. Although markets for child prostitution exist all around the world, consumers tend to be from richer nations, and suppliers from poorer ones.

Prostitution in various forms has existed from earliest times. It is dependent on the economic, social, and sexual values of a society. It has been secular or under the guise of religion. In some societies prostitution was believed to ensure the preservation of the family. Women have frequently entered prostitution through coercion or under economic stress. In most societies prostitutes have had low social status and restricted opportunities, because their sexual service was disapproved of and considered degrading to them. A few female prostitutes, however, have acquired wealth and power through marriage; one example is the Byzantine empress Theodora, wife of Justinian I.

II

Prostitution in Non-Industrial Societies

Prostitution was widespread in early non-industrial societies. The exchange of wives by their husbands was practised among many non-industrial peoples. In the ancient Middle East and India, temples maintained large numbers of prostitutes. These women were often highly educated and were skilled dancers, singers, composers, and poets, ironically possessing an access to the arts that was denied to other women. Sexual intercourse with them was said to facilitate communion with the gods.

In ancient Greece, prostitution flourished on all levels of society. Prostitutes of the lowest level worked in licensed brothels and were required to wear distinctive clothing as a badge of their vocation. Prostitutes of a higher level were usually skilled dancers and singers. Those of the highest level, the hetaerae, kept salons where politicians met, and they often attained power and influence themselves.

In ancient Rome prostitution was common despite severe legal restrictions. Female slaves, captured abroad by the Roman legions, were forced into urban brothels or exploited by owners in the households they served. The Roman authorities attempted to limit the spread of slave prostitution, and often resorted to harsh measures. Brothel inmates, called meretrices, were forced to register with the government for life, to wear garish, blonde wigs and other distinctive raiment, to forfeit all civil rights, and to pay a heavy tax.

In the Middle Ages the Christian Church, which purported to value chastity highly, attempted to convert or “rehabilitate” individual prostitutes, but refrained from campaigning against the institution itself. In so doing the Church followed the teaching of St Augustine, who held that the elimination of prostitution would breed more extreme forms of “immorality” and “perversion” because men would continue to seek sexual contact outside marriage. By the late Middle Ages, licensed brothels were flourishing throughout Europe, yielding enormous revenues to government officials and corrupt Church officials. In Asia, where women were held in low esteem and no religious deterrent to it existed, prostitution was commonly accepted.

During the 16th century, prostitution declined sharply in Europe, largely as the result of stern reprisals by Protestants and Roman Catholics. They condemned the “immorality” of brothels and their inmates, but they were also motivated by the perception of a connection between prostitution and the spread of syphilis, a previously unknown disease. Brothels in many cities were, therefore, closed by the authorities. Under a typical ordinance, enacted in Paris in 1635, prostitutes were flogged, shaved bald, and exiled for life without formal trial.

III

Prostitution in Industrial Societies

Harsh strictures did not eradicate prostitution and venereal disease, and it gradually became obvious that they were increasing, especially in the large, crowded cities that accompanied the industrialization of the West in the 18th and 19th centuries. Beginning with Prussia in 1700, most continental European governments shifted their tactics from suppression of prostitution and venereal disease to control through a system of compulsory registration, licensed brothels, and medical inspection of prostitutes. Great Britain, although it did not license brothels, passed Contagious Disease Prevention acts in the 1860s providing for medical inspection of prostitutes in certain naval and military districts. In Britain and the United States, prostitution flourished openly in urban red-light districts. City officials, viewing prostitutes as a “necessary evil”, allowed prostitutes to ply their trade as long as they refrained from annoying any “respectable” person who happened to be in the area. A lucrative white-slave trade developed, in which women and girls were shipped across international borders for the purposes of prostitution.

In time the ineffectuality and corruption of licensed prostitution stirred protests throughout Europe. Britain repealed the Contagious Disease Prevention acts, which were not proving to be a deterrent to venereal disease and were, moreover, regarded by many as a threat to the civil liberties of their subjects. Many governments sought to check prostitution by attacking the international traffic in women and children. Britain passed the Criminal Amendment Act (1885) forbidding such traffic, and 13 major powers signed a treaty (1904) outlawing it, and providing for an international exchange of data on the subject. In the United States, Congress passed the White Slave Traffic Act (Mann Act, 1910) forbidding the interstate transport of women and girls for “immoral” purposes.

Prostitution in the late 20th century takes various forms. Some prostitutes, or “call girls”, operate from their own addresses (or addresses they acquire specifically for their work), and maintain a list of regular customers. Others work in so-called massage parlours, a newer version of the old brothel. The majority, however, are “streetwalkers”, soliciting, or being solicited by, customers on city streets. Increasing numbers are young runaways to urban areas who turn to the streets for financial survival.

Some legal systems outlaw prostitution, while others make unlawful only certain associated activities, such as soliciting, keeping a brothel or “living off immoral earnings”. Where prostitution is partly or wholly criminalized, it is the prostitutes, in large part, who are subject to punitive and regulatory measures, not their clients.

Many prostitutes are managed by men known as pimps, who occasionally act as procurers and who usually take much of the money earned by the women in their “stables”. For the prostitute, the pimp may provide some measure of protection and arrange for bail when necessary. The pimp may also form emotional attachments with the women who work for him, but often the pimp-prostitute relationships are based solely on exploitation of the prostitute.

IV

Current Attitudes

Until the 1960s, attitudes in the West towards prostitution were based on the Judaeo-Christian view of immorality. Researchers have recently attempted, however, to separate moral issues from the reality of prostitution. The rationale for its continued illegal status in many countries rests on three assumptions: prostitution is linked to organized crime; prostitution is responsible for much ancillary crime; and prostitution is the cause of an increase in venereal disease. These assumptions are now in question.

Recognized experts have pointed out that prostitution is no longer an attractive investment for organized crime because it is difficult to control, is too visible, and affords too small a return compared to the severe penalties imposed for procuring. It is obvious that ancillary crime—theft, robbery, assault, and drug abuse—does occur in conjunction with prostitution, but whether it is rational to make one activity criminal in order to reduce or control another merits serious inquiry. Further, public-health officials indicate that prostitutes account for only a small percentage of venereal disease cases. Greater sexual freedom has made young people the major source of such cases.

Moreover, strong arguments, supported by some prostitutes, have been made in support of legalizing prostitution. Decriminalization would free the courts and police from handling victimless crime, allowing these forces more time to deal with serious and violent crimes. The constitutional question of violation of equal protection has also been raised, since broadly the law penalizes prostitutes but not their customers.