One of the biggest human rights insults around the world is making prostitution illegal.
1) It's not governments business what people do with their bodies.
2) People are going to do it anyway (even in countries where it is punished with a death penalty)
3) ...and therefore women and men working in this industry won't have access to unions, healthcare, safety etc.
I agree with your points, but consider reading TFA at least.
No. From the article:
> I found used condom wrappers under the bed, I found the bin was overflowing with tissues and condoms.
Not sure what "overflowing" means exactly in this context, but you can't read in the article that there were used condoms all over the apartment.
A condom wrapper is just a piece of clean plastic, very different from a used condom.
Also, what's the difference when people are having sex in your bed, whether they're married, friends, or engaged in pay-for-sex?
In the grand scheme of things there isn't but I suppose the plaintiff worried about being criminally associated with unlawful behaviour.
People aren't machines, they have feelings and sometimes they project those on their belongings. I consider it normal to feel something upon learning you have been deceived by people not coming upfront about what they really were going to use your home for.
I believe this has nothing to do with one's stance on prostitution.
This is a crime?
If a prostitute brings a john back to a hotel room, the police can arrest the hotel owner?
But you are misquoting me a little bit.
Probably best not to comment then?
This thread is already full of people making the inaccurate assumption that prostitution is illegal in the UK.
> Probably best not to comment then?
Quite the contrary.
Yes, most places where either prostitution or brothel-keeping is a crime, the owner of a property used in it is potentially (mental state is an issue) committing a crime as well.
> If a prostitute brings a john back to a hotel room, the police can arrest the hotel owner?
In the US, Aside from that risk (which is real but attenuated by the low probability of a conviction because of the high criminal burden of proof) prostitution-related offenses are second only to drug-related offenses in the eagerness of law enforcement to use civil asset forfeiture against properties, including real property, used in the offense.
For a regular commercial hotel, law enforcement would probably just use the possibility of such action as one among many tools to get the owner to actively cooperate with law enforcement, and it probably wouldn't get to actual seizure in a normal case.
Whether similar technically noncriminal consequences associated with criminal activity apply to this situation (in the UK), I'm not sure, though I wouldn't be surprised.
Seems odd that they wouldn't have made an effort to clean-up since having a good profile is more or less essential to being able to rent another airbnb appt?
Why don't you throw them into the trash bin that every hotel room has?
Given the enthusiastic response I got from my last host when my partner and I took the time to give the apartment a once-over when we left, I'm guessing that this is a persistent problem where guests just leave a place trashed. Some cleaning is obviously anticipated by the cleaning fees; you wash the linens, still give the place a good scrubbing between guests, etc., but I think it's fair to expect the guests to tidy up a little if you're upfront that this is part of the agreement on the listing.
Likewise, even hotels will charge for outrageous damage or messes to their properties. Security deposits in the US for even really cheap hotels are pretty common, usually requiring a credit card with a $100 charge that is cancelled/returned later.
It's not just about the initial money - really bad messes can affect more than just the host and cause problems you can't just solve with money. Too high of a deposit and no one will rent, but if someone's mess disrupts, then the deposit isn't enough to cover losses.
1) Hire a professional cleaner, set cleaning fee, lose some short-term customers.
2) Do not set the cleaning fee, expect to do cleaning yourself, complain loudly in public when this turns up to be the case.
Elaborating: If there is sufficient /convenient/, legal, not over-priced, service for the clients that clearly do exist then underground (criminal) fulfillment is much less profitable. Making onerous (for no good reason) regulations are one form of increasing the price of legal services and thus making it more profitable for unwanted fulfillment to occur.
It's located at Harvard Kennedy School of Government which is basically an "elite factory" for the (re-)production of the US political elite -- just look at their alumni [2] and faculty [1]. The US's official policy is extremely anti legalisation of prostitution. In this context, "journalistsresource.org" looks like an instrument of projecting soft power [3], a mechanism to communicate US government policy, but obscuring the origin. I recommend being a little bit more reflective on the nature of your sources.
I also recommend to be suspicious of the term "trafficking" in this context. It's an attack term that is intended to appeal to your emotions, you are expected to think of 7 year old girls being 'stolen' from some destitute 3rd world country and being 'sold' into prostitution in a country where prostitution is legal (eg. Holland). However to a pretty good approximation this doesn't happen. Where prostitution is legal, essentially all (to a pretty good approximation) women who work in prostituion are adults and choose their job, in the same way that others become lorry drivers or carpenters.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_School_of_Gove...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_School_of_Gove...
The problem is, just like with markets like room sharing and car sharing, is that you have pimps.
you have pimps.
1. What do you mean by "pimp"? Is it the same as a co-worker, or is it the same as "boss" or something else?
2. For your chosen concept of "pimp", could you explain which of the following you belive to be true, and what the credible, methodologically controlled evidence you have for your belief:
- All prostitutes in all legislations have one or more "pimps"?
- Some but not all prostitutes in all legislations have one or more "pimps"?
- All prostitutes in some but not all legislations have one or more "pimps"?
- Some but not all prostitutes in some but not all legislations have one or more "pimps"?
For all the "some"s, I'd appreciate quantitative data, are we talking about 99.9% or 0.1%. And: is there a systemic difference w.r.t. "pimping" between legal systems where prostitution is legal, and those where it is not?
Finally, I'd be interested to learn why -- for your chosen notion of "pimp", having one or more "pimps" is good/bad.
I've learned what I need to learn. Moving on.
The rhetorical device you've used in the last reply include "argumentum ad auctoritatem" and "non sequitur".
And it's perfectly rational and advisable for prostitutes to move from legal systems where prostitution is illegal (hence dangerous) to legal systems where it is legal (hence safe).
Whenever something can be done legally, someone will try to provide/supply the service/good illegally for his own profit.
All the rest - the fact that people had sex in the apartment (not exactly out of the normal unless one rents exclusively to monastic orders) or that money may have been exchanged (totally not owner's business) - sounds completely irrelevant and an attempt to foment moral panic.
The legal issue is that his apartment became a brothel illegally, but it seems the fault is with the prostitutes, since he did not run the business himself.
While the brothel example might not be distinguishable from a couple on vacation having a party, except for the money-changing-hands angle.
Lets admit, its the moral angle at issue. The rest is after-the-fact arguments pasted on to make it seem like an objective thing.
As to wear and tear... it's a brothel... and not in a movie; you might be surprised at the turnover.
Edit: I realize that "have no patience for" sounds pretty snotty... I've been a little sleep deprived lately and it isn't bringing out the best in me, sorry.
Edit 2: I also realize that the issue of the brothel, totally aside from the homeowner's feelings, might represent a property value issue, in the same way as a previous murder. It doesn't have to sensible for it to hit him in the pocket; obviously sex work doesn't leave some kind of "spiritual residue" anymore than violent death, but people are often irrational.
The problem is that you can disagree with laws, yet refuse to be lured into infringing them. Personally there are plenty of laws I disagree with, yet I comply because I don't want to go to jail.
I mean, could I rent an Airbnb for a month and run an auto repair shop out of the garage? It's in violation of the zoning.
So is renting your apartment by the day, in many places.
Freedom means turning any apartment anywhere into a brothel.
Why would the government decide what job you can and can't accept ?
I definitely want to live in a world where someone's body can't be monetized for any reason. It's the buyer who should be punished though, not the seller.
The article says:
> I found the bin was overflowing with tissues and condoms. And basically what I had to do was pick all that up with my hands.
The sex workers probably have regular testing for STIs, but the clients may not have this testing.
Yes, and the article mentions that he was surprised by the mess, and that they would have had repeat bookings if they hadn't left a mess.