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Comment by GaryNumanVevo | Hacker News Reader

Sex work is work all the same. From a normative standpoint, we ought to support sex workers directly, rather than the studios and production companies that are often exploitative.

OnlyFans seems to get rid of the middlemen in the porn / cam girl industry, I think that's a massive benefit for sex workers today.

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My question to most people on this forum are: would you really be ok if your daughter was best friends with a sex worker? Everybody says "of course!" in theory... but in reality I think it falls apart. Lots of blurred moral lines.

Any blurring of moral lines likely comes down to hangups W.R.T Body Autonomy. At the end of the day, if you one believes that everyone is allowed to make their own choices about their body, that would have to include their daughter, their spouse, their mother even.

Exactly! You get it. I find it so hard to believe that there is supposedly zero overlap between HackerNews comment posters claiming "there is nothing morally wrong with sex work" and people who in reality when pressed with the exact situation would say "I am against my little sister performing sexual acts for money"

I think most drugs should be legalized, but I would still be against my little sister doing meth. That's how I see this situation too. People obviously should be allowed to do sex work, but I think that there are hidden costs that are difficult to understand beforehand. I wouldn't bar her from it but I would discourage it.

Sex work is ok if the situation isn't coercive. A situation where the only reasonably available alternative choices are homelessness or starvation is coercive. Sex work is fine but a system that provides it as "last ditch employment" or as a means of survival in absence of alternatives is no different than rape. This applies to a lot more than sex work though :/

Are many of these women coerced into prostituting themselves? Do you have a similar moral problem with people doing other jobs out of desperation, like back breaking labor?

> Are many of these women coerced into prostituting themselves?

We lack studies on this in the US. I'd argue that most people who are involved in an illegal profession (in the US at least) often doing so for lack of viable alternatives.

In other countries where prostitution is legal and regulated, it seems is less likely to be a profession of last resort.

> Do you have a similar moral problem with people doing other jobs out of desperation, like back breaking labor?

Very much so.

And yet, we are not allowed freedom during a coronavirus lockdown.

As much as I would like to believe that Joe McRando is going to keep a six foot distance from me and where a mask, I've seen enough to make me believe he wouldn't.

Therefore, it stands to reason that it be, maybe not illegal, but definitely very heavily encouraged for people to stay home. It's one of the few cases where I am pro-government power (as much as it kills me inside to say).

When the government tries to prevent measures to limit this overreach (as in the LA mayor not allowing petitions to circulate for his recall) then I have to beg to differ.

Obviously limiting free speech is absolutely not okay.

If I came across as overly combative in my last comment I'd like to apologize, that was not my intention.

>My question to most people on this forum are: would you really be ok if your daughter was best friends with a sex worker? Everybody says "of course!" in theory... but in reality I think it falls apart. Lots of blurred moral lines.

I have more respect for a sex worker than someone who builds unconstitutional mass surveillance tools. At least most sex work is legal.

I think the only "blurred moral line" wrt sex work is that folks who were supportive of gay rights, marijuana legalization, and other individual freedoms then pump the brakes on their social libertarianism as soon as the chance to support a vulnerable population appears that may actually require politely but firmly disagreeing with folks they personally know.

> but firmly disagreeing with folks they personally know.

That's what I'm trying to poke at here in these comments. It's almost as if you do not support sex work/aren't ok with the theory of having it in your household, you're the enemy. You aren't cool, you're behind the curve, and you need to work on yourself to get your views more in line with the rest of the more liberal folk. That's how it reads to me anyway.

Well to be frank, you do seem rigid in your thinking. For example, I pointed you at a noted libertarian think tank earlier in the thread, and you basically ignored my post and continue to describe being for the decriminalization of sex work as a "liberal" mindset.

Most political scientists reject the left right dichotomy altogether and use a "political compass" instead. You seem to be posting from the "authoritarian right" quadrant:

https://www.politicalcompass.org

Maybe if you adjusted your attitudes based on data, rather than insist your views are right because they are your views, you'd feel less uncool or "behind the curve".

I just don't get how you can't abstract away the fact that:

1. the right have their political compass point to Christianity, guns, less government, anti-homosexuality, anti-abortion

2. the left have their compass point to redistributing wealth from the rich to the poor for social programs through taxes, support for transgenders, democratic socialism, etc.

I just feel like the 'compass' thing is saying what is already obvious in a different fashion. Am I missing something?

Yeah I think a lot of people like to pretend on the internet that they're super accepting and liberal, but if their daughter told them she was a whore, they wouldn't be so accepting behind close doors.

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