HUGE WIN for prostitution in Canada!!

 Canada’s Supreme Court ruled unanimously (!!!) as to the unconstitutional status of many of the seeming ‘loopholes’ which keep most sex work illegal in Canada even though prostitution, at its core, has for many decades been legal there.  Despite the legality of prostitution itself, Canada has for many decades curtailed actual sex work by making it illegal to communicate in public for the purposes OF prostitution, making it illegal to live off the ‘avails’ OF prostitution, and making it illegal to run a ‘bawdy house’ (or brothel).

It has long been perfectly legal for someone to get a room at a hotel in Canada, dial an advertised prostitute, and invite her to said hotel room to pay her for sex.  Something not legal was calling that same woman, and arranging to travel to HER home/location to pay her for sex.  (her location, presumably the setting for multiple sex-for-hire transactions, was defined as a ‘bawdy house’)

Also illegal there had been any sort of interaction on the streets or highways in order to negotiate for paid sexual services.  (that mostly in the interest of keeping various neighborhoods from having to endure repeated instances of such interactions and the ‘nuisance’ that tends to come with them, which I can understand, in general – nobody wants it to be their neighborhood).

The government already delayed this sort of a ruling by a year or more, and now the effective dates of these latest reversals isn’t for a whole additional year.  But with a 9-0 Supreme Court vote, the issues will likely prove very formidable for government bigwigs wanting to somehow get around these rulings of unconstitutionality while maintaining the status quo.

Yours truly had been very familiar with this battle, for it was nearly nine years ago that I wrote ‘anonymously’, and from the USA, in support of their cause, while directing my statements toward the government committee which was scheduled to review prostitution laws while taking testimony from the public – even anonymous testimony.

I feel quite elated (and a bit surprised, honestly) at the overwhelming victory.

At this link:   http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-s-prostitution-laws-what-the-court-said-1.2471834

… the main points to the ruling were said to be the following: 

1. Safety of sex workers

"Parliament has the power to regulate against nuisances, but not at the cost of the health, safety and lives of prostitutes."

2. ‘Parasitic’ pimps vs. ‘legitimate’ bodyguards

"The purpose of the living on the avails of prostitution prohibition … is to target pimps and the parasitic, exploitative conduct in which they engage. The law, however, punishes everyone who lives on the avails of prostitution without distinguishing between those who exploit prostitutes and those who could increase the safety and security of prostitutes, for example, legitimate drivers, managers, or bodyguards. The living on the avails provision is consequently overbroad."

3. Negative impact of public communication ban ‘grossly disproportionate’

"The purpose of the communicating prohibition … is not to eliminate street prostitution for its own sake, but to take prostitution off the streets and out of public view in order to prevent the nuisances that street prostitution can cause. The provision’s negative impact on the safety and lives of street prostitutes, who are prevented by the communicating prohibition from screening potential clients for intoxication and propensity to violence, is a grossly disproportionate response to the possibility of nuisance caused by street prostitution."

and here are some excerpts from the message I wrote to the government subcommittee nearly nine years ago:

(first of all – this was a subcommittee responsible for reviewing solicitation laws and improving the safety of sex-trade workers and to recommend changes that would reduce the exploitation of and violence against sex-trade workers")

So I wrote the following:

"… Today many participants in the sex trade can exist well beneath the radar and far from the public eye, and those are the people who are seldom seized upon by law enforcement agencies.

It stands to reason, in my eyes, that there is considerable economic discrimination against those who cannot afford the set-up costs and the additional safety measures that a prostitution presence on the internet requires and provides. That is to say that those women who own or have access to a computer can participate in the sex trade somewhat beneath the watchful eye of law enforcement and out of sight of neighborhood watch groups who dislike the street scene. I guess that is a form of discrimination that is unfair and unchecked in much the same way as how discrimination based on physical appearance affects me and will never be outlawed.

Furthermore, it is also economically unfair that the routine customers of the street prostitutes are repeatedly in the sights of law enforcement while those who use only the internet to make prostitution dates are not so often policed. This impacts the ability for the street workers to make their living and thus it should be of some concern to those attempting to be fair and equal to all sides of the i

ndustry. From what I’ve read, I understand that the actual act of prostitution is legal in Canada only in such cases where a person phones a prostitute on her land phone line and arranges for that person to come to his home or hotel room. I believe that in addition to the economic unfairness, street workers are in a sense discriminated against in terms of safety as well. Clearly it is safer (though far from "safe") to make prostitution arrangements via computers and telephone lines, which can be traced, than it is through a car window on the outskirts of town, where there is nobody to track who communicated with whom. "

"… One aspect of the street scene that continues to irritate me is the multitude of vehicle stops in front of women that don’t result in the prostitute getting into the car after a short chat. It is one thing to just drive past and slow down considerably to train your eyes on the girl there at the curb, but quite another to actually stop and make inquiries. I deduce that the scores of drivers simply can’t all be asking for sexual favors beyond as far as the working woman is willing to go, so I suspect strongly that the men in question are attempting to bargain downward in terms of price.

I suspect that many of you draw a clear line at a point where to put any price on an act of sex is completely wrong, but once you step past that barrier then I’m sure you’ll agree that the sex trade as practiced on the streets has one of the most flowing free markets on earth. That is to say that sex is traded at whatever rate that two parties agree to. My perception is, from simply watching the high number of men who drive up, roll down the window, chat for a few moments or minutes, and then drive off without the girl, that many of the prices they offer are downright insulting even to the most desperate of women.

My belief is that it is in areas such as these (meaning subjects and thought processes, not geography) that studies like yours can have the greatest positive impact on the women mired in prostitution. There has been talk about creating actual "red light districts" in some Canadian cities, and I believe that such an idea would have the impact of reducing the free-flowing street corner business which now has a tendency to pop up in whatever area that law enforcement has yet to discover. Because women are presently more spread out over a much larger geographic area, they are made more vulnerable not only in terms of safety, but in terms of being preyed upon by men who would try to get what they can for the paltry sum of $10 or $20, or maybe even less.

The concentration of most street-working prostitutes within certain geographic bounds would result in more people being nearby to any interaction which would generally offer more safety to any and all. Furthermore, in such a concentrated area, the desperation that might cause some women to jump in the car with the man offering $10 for a "date", wouldn’t be so great when she could depend on more and more cars to continuously pass through her area. Today she works a street in the shadows on the outskirts of the known prostitution strolls and she feels somewhat lucky when any vehicle bothers to turn down her street, let alone stop to consider picking her up."

and finally:

"On few occasions I have encountered prostitutes on the streets who have seemed like godsends to me, and that is mainly in the form of the close physical intimacy that they offer, for a price. I cannot even remember the last time I attempted to negotiate downward from the amount stated by a prostitute I picked up. At times I have even paid more when the initial price they stated was simply far beneath what I expected to pay. The last woman I picked up never even spoke about money until I myself offered an amount for her time, well after we arrived back at the hotel. My most successful encounters with prostitutes have been with the occasional street walker who was faced with immediate financial need and who might have been semi out of character in going out to work the streets one night, or one week.

I enjoy the company of women who haven’t completely lost faith in society, and who still possess an instinct to gently reciprocate sincerity and trustworthiness sent their way by a man paying them for sex. Sure they probably wouldn’t be there without the economic boost, but if the money is what it takes to effect the balance and bring me the small taste of intimacy that I so desire, then it is better than the nothing that the rest of my life offers.

I could write for years on this topic, and all the while I would try to express more personal regard for the women out there than your committee members can imagine. The availability of each and every one of those women has a value to me, even if I don’t ever get to speak to a certain individual myself. For the record, I perceive the turn-over among prostitutes where I drive to be quite significant in time. I seldom see women that I recognize from as long as two years ago, etc. So I don’t think that you are studying a finite set of women, and your policies should reflect the underlying desperation that tends to draw some females to that arena, and not so much certain individuals that you have been trying to entice off of the street for many years now.

In closing, I applaud the fact that you seem to have your ears and minds open to making alterations to some of the peripheral laws that guide the free-flowing waters of prostitution. I know that from where I sit, it is a sure bet that if the general population of street prostitutes is safer, then the female personalities I will encounter as I drive the streets late at night will be far more likely to share the small amount

of intimacy and closeness for which I yearn.

Thank you for accepting my statements."

Now I certainly didn’t believe that it would be upward of eight years before I could identify any impact of my effort, and I definitely didn’t expect that the result would be such a resounding eye-opener dealt by the Supreme Court of Canada.  Yet I can’t miss their solid logic in the way the rulings are worded.

I’m sure the various governments will come up with other backhanded ways to implement the same amount of discouragement during the next year, yet with each successive rejection by the courts, I suspect that the various government officials will eventually reduce the furor with which they continue to victimize people who their societies have already victimized in the past.

Given the same task of writing such encouragement now, I’d be far better versed in making additional points to support Canada being fair across the entire breadth of prostitution rather than allowing the more affluent prostitutes to thrive in stealth fashion while at the same time disproportionately preventing the downtrodden and occasional sex workers from doing the same, very legal profession.

The news from the north is being talked-about on all of the U.S. online locations but nobody can really let themselves feel confident that governments south of the border will ever evolve to be so liberal about prostitution.  It can’t hurt to have a significant example in a parallel society on the same continent if U.S. governing bodies need an example of how things might evolve…

Someday…