Hello gentle readers! Apologies for the long absence--I haven't abandoned you! Just trying to kill myself with work is all.
I'm posting this entire article because it is utterly riveting....so much to say about this...yet I'm paralyzed by my inability to develop a cohesive stance on prostitution. I need to have a cocktail party so we can all discuss every angle. Who's bringing the dip?
Off the AP newswire:
BUDAPEST Hungary,
New permits allow prostitutes to give receipts to customers and become part
of the legal economy in
Human rights groups often have criticized European Union member
The permits allow prostitutes to give receipts to customers and become part
of the legal economy by paying taxes and making social security contributions,
said Agnes Foldi, head of the Hungarian Prostitutes' Interest Protection
Association.
Hungary's sex industry --
including prostitution and the production of pornographic materials -- generates
an estimated $1 billion annually, said Agnes Bakonyi, the spokeswoman of
"It is one of the leading sectors of the shadow economy," Bakonyi
said. "With this project, APEH is trying to help a group of professionals,
in what is called the world's oldest profession, who have never paid taxes in
their life."
Prostitutes in
Foldi said about 20 prostitutes already had been issued permits and more
than 500 had applied to attend counseling sessions organized around the country
with the help of APEH on issues such as financial planning and accounting, as
well as legal matters.
"Our aim is to make sex work become accepted as any other job,"
Foldi said. "Prostitutes come from the poorest sectors of society ... and
it's very hard for them to, for example, get a loan to buy their own
home."
Foldi's group received a grant of $86,000 from the government's National
Development Plan, which includes EU funds, to advise prostitutes on the
licenses.
"It is important for us to have as many participants as possible,"
Foldi said, adding that there are about 7,000-9,000 full-time prostitutes in
One of the prostitutes who already has been granted a permit said she
applied for it in an effort to improve her future and self-image.
"From now on, no one will be able to ask me where I got the money to
buy my house or my car," said Rebeka, who would not give her last name.
"Now we are also part of a taxpaying group and we too are making a
contribution to society."
Hungary is a signatory of the 1950 United Nations convention for the suppression of
human trafficking and prostitution. But officials claimed the program did not
go against the spirit of the convention because even though prostitutes would
now be able to get licenses, the government would not keep a separate registry
of them.
Critics say many prostitutes in western Europe are foreigners often lured
there under false pretenses. They link prostitution to human trafficking.
Human Rights groups have said legalization and decriminalization of
prostitution and the sex industry does nothing to address the violence of
prostitution and does not help prostitutes.
Janice Raymond of the U.S.-based Coalition Against Trafficking in Women said
by issuing entrepreneurial permits to prostitutes,
Hungary is violating its
international treaty obligations under the U.N. convention. She said countries
such as Hungary
that have ratified the convention agree not to regulate prostitution or subject
women to any administrative controls such as registration and taxation.
"Hungary is not issuing entrepreneurial permits to aid the women in
prostitution but rather to increase the state coffers with the additional taxes
to be gained," Raymond told The Associated Press by e-mail.
Its good to see that you're actively blogging again. I really liked your posts about porn from last year, but I feared I'd discovered your blog after it was "dead".
Related news to the story above – Bulgaria took the opposite stance to Hungary and decided not to legalize. Story here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/06/world/europe/06bulgaria.html
You may have noticed that over the last month, prostitution and sex work in general have been a hot topic, especially with the publication of Melissa Farley's scathing (and rather biased) report on Nevada brothels. The publicity around it has been so successful, though, that I've seen a bit part of the liberal and feminist blogosphere (even people who consider themselves "sex positive") suddenly "get religion" and embrace the idea of Swedish-style criminalization of buying sex.
I, of course, see the "penalize demand" push as just as wrong-headed as the push to penalize drug demand in the 1980s. That was a spectacular failure that was driven by a sense of moral panic and this is very much the same.
Posted by: Iamcuriousblue | October 12, 2007 at 01:44 AM