(AP Photo/Franka Bruns)
Today's Providence Journal has a column by Ed Achorn that is so misguided, that it is difficult to figure out where to start. The column criticizes the loophole in Rhode Island law which makes prostitution legal, if it occurs indoors. For a multitude of reason, the current law is effective and should remain unchanged. It makes prostitution on the streets illegal, yet doesn't criminalize consensual sex between adults that occurs behind closed doors. Edward Achorn seems to get side-tracked, and confuses several issues. This particular passage is a good example:
By refusing to pass a good law specifically banning indoor prostitution, Rhode Island is saying yes to the brutal exploitation of teenage girls and young women, many of them foreigners who are held in this strange land as virtual slaves. Their pimps are experts at preying on young women, with the help of drugs, coercion and “protection,” to keep them in slavery, miserably toiling in the fields of prostitution — serving perhaps a dozen men a day to help earn pimps hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.
Mr. Achorn brings up crimes that are troubling and serious. What he doesn't seem to realize is that there are already laws on the books to address these issues. The state and federal government already have human trafficking laws on the books. If a prostitute is under the age of consent, statutory rape laws would apply. If she is being held against her will and assaulted, then charges of assault, sexual assault, and kidnapping could be brought against the perpetrator. Why does Edward Achorn want prostitution laws to apply? Is it so we can arrest the victims of human trafficking who have been assaulted and put them in jail? Of course not.
Those who want to make indoor prostitution illegal use human trafficking as an excuse to go after consensual activity. Their arguments are disingenuous and misinformed. They also seem to feel that criminalizing prostitution will make it go away. Prostitution is illegal in 48 states, yet it still occurs in all of those states. It isn't called the world's oldest profession for nothing.
There is one thing Edward Achorn was correct about. It does seem as though members of the General Assembly are intentionally trying to dodge the issue. It would be nice to see them vote against a bill that criminalizes consensual activity between adults, but that seems to be asking too much. After all, how often does the General Assembly actually do the right thing?
Comments
We have been told over and over again that we need a prostitution law to save the "slaves"? We have been told the police wanted a law so they could go in and interview the women and get to the pimps and human traffickers. When Senator Jabour introduced a law that would let the police go in, the police said that the law was not strong enough because the women would just be getting a ticket and not be put in prison. What?!?!
I call Shenanigans!!!
So you mean to tell me that for the past four years Gianinni and the Police said they could not go in and save the women from the pimps and human traffickers because they had no law to go in and talk to the women, and then when they got a bill from Senator Jabour, they all came out and said that the bill was not strong enough because the women would not be sent to prison!!! It is obvious that Gianinni and the police do not want to help the women.
Especially when the police say giving a ticket is not good enough for this "reprehensible act
What a sham , whos minding the store while the boss is gone ,sounds to me like someone made a hell of alot money, to pass such a law to begin with , and the ladys suffer at the backs of police , and pimps , only the senator knows the real story.
It is sad that you seem to want to lump prostitution with those who are prostituted. Sex Trafficking is not a job, and those who are induced by forced, fraud, or coercion or induced to preform in an act not yet attaining the age of 18 are victims. They go thru a period of conditioning where they may be gang raped, starved, beat, threatened and or the life of friends and family. Some of the victims that have been saved out of Sex Trafficing have reached the ripe old age of 11. They certinaly have the ability to say no... I don't think so. Legalized prostitution Just gives the bad guys another layer to go through before police can help. Police are not happy partualy because there is no long term help for the victims. So when the bad guys go to jail the victims who may be victimized up to 25 times in a 24 hr period, get up to 60 days average assistance. Just so you know the new number 1 organized crime World Wide Human Trafficking.
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