www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 VOLUME 2 : ISSUE 6 || January 2021 || Email: [email protected] Website: www.whiteblacklegal.co.in 1 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 DISCLAIMER No part of this publication may be reproduced or copied in any form by any means without prior written permission of Editor-in-chief of White Black Legal – The Law Journal. The Editorial Team of White Black Legal holds the copyright to all articles contributed to this publication. The views expressed in this publication are purely personal opinions of the authors and do not reflect the views of the Editorial Team of White Black Legal. Though all efforts are made to ensure the accuracy and correctness of the information published, White Black Legal shall not be responsible for any errors caused due to oversight or otherwise. 2 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 EDITORIAL TEAM EDITOR IN CHIEF Name - Mr. Varun Agrawal Consultant || SUMEG FINANCIAL SERVICES PVT.LTD. 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The erudite response of legal luminaries shall be solicited to enable readers to explore challenges that lie before law makers, lawyers and the society at large, in the event of the ever changing social, economic and technological scenario. With this thought, we hereby present to you WHITE BLACK LEGAL: THE LAW JOURNAL 4 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 LEGALISING PROSTITUTION: AN AGE-OLD CONTROVERSY -By Sofia Dash Table of Contents: 1.Abstract 2.Introduction 3.Analysis 4.Conclusion 5.Bibliography 5 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 ABSTRACT Prostitution is the business or routine with regards to taking part in sexual action in return for payment. Prostitution is now and again depicted as sexual administrations, business sex or, casually, snaring. It is in some cases alluded to metaphorically as "the world's most established calling" in the English-talking world. An individual who works in this field is known as a whore, and is a sort of sex labourer. Feminists worked for 50 years, mostly through the Trafficking in Persons committee of the League of Nations between the World Wars to stop the traffic in women into prostitution.1 The result of their work was the 1949 Convention Against Trafficking in Persons and the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others which is an anti-prostitution convention. It states that prostitution is against the dignity and worth of the human person. The convention requires states parties to penalise pimping and brothel keeping. However, in the decades following the ’sexual revolution’ of the 1960/70s a rather different understanding of prostitution was developed. Some prostitutes’ rights organisations and sex industry entrepreneurs argued that prostitution should be seen as work, women’s choice and agency. This paper dwells on the subject of prostitution with reference to its criminalisation and decriminalisation. We shall also dive deep into the prostitution law of India and its rather vague definition. Towards the end, we shall analyse the different sides of this multifaceted case and draw a conclusion as to whether legalisation of prostitution is a pre-emptive step to securing the rights of sexual workers or simply a failed social experiment. INTRODUCTION Prostitution happens in an assortment of structures, and its legitimate status changes from nation to nation (now and again from area to locale inside a given nation), running from being admissible however unregulated, to an upheld or unenforced wrongdoing, or a directed calling. It is one part of the sex business, alongside sex entertainment, stripping, and suggestive moving. Houses of ill-repute are foundations explicitly devoted to prostitution. In escort prostitution, the demonstration may occur at the customer's living arrangement or lodging (alluded to as out-call), or at the escort's living arrangement or a lodging leased for 1 Jeffreys, Sheila. The Idea of Prostitution. 1997 6 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 the event by the escort (in-call). Another structure is road prostitution. In spite of the fact that most of whores are female and have male customers, a whore can be, and have customers of, any sex or sexual introduction. There are around 42 million whores on the planet, living everywhere throughout the world (however the greater part of Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa needs information, examined nations in that huge locale rank as best sex the travel industry destinations). Estimates place the yearly income produced by prostitution worldwide to be over $100 billion. Some view prostitution as a type of abuse of or viciousness against women, and children, that makes a supply of unfortunate casualties for human trafficking. Some faultfinders of prostitution as an organization are supporters of the Swedish methodology, which decriminalizes the demonstration of moving sex, yet makes the buy of sex illicit. This methodology has likewise been embraced by Canada, Iceland, the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Norway, and France. HERE ARE THE TYPES OF PROSTITUTION: Independent Escorts: Independent escorts work for themselves in hotels and private buildings like houses, charge high prices, and stay away from the public eye. They likely advertise their services online, and they get to keep their profits since they're self-employed. Escort Agency Employees: Like independent call girls, employees of escort agencies work in private locations or hotels and charge like relatively high prices. (Ex-New York Governor Eliot Spitzer slept with an escort agency employee, Ashley Dupré, for $4,300 a night.) Weitzer says these employees face "moderate exploitation" since they have to give a cut of their earnings to their agencies. Brothel Employees: Brothels are dedicated locations where people pay for sex and can include saunas and massage parlours, Weitzer writes. The prices they charge are "moderate," and brothel workers endure "moderate exploitation" since they have to give part of their earnings to the brothel owners, he said. Licensed brothels are legal in parts of Nevada. Window Workers: This type of prostitution is prevalent in Amsterdam, enticing passers-by to enter houses of prostitution by prominently displaying the women in windows. Here's Weitzer's excellent description of window work, which pays women a low-to-moderate wage. 7 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 Bar or Casino Workers: These sex workers make initial contact with men at a bar or casino and then have sex at a separate location. In bars in Thailand, the Philippines, and the Dominican Republic, guys pay "bar fees" to leave a club with a worker and spend several days with her, Weitzer writes. The guys (often foreigners) pay the women's expenses during that time, in an arrangement that often confers status on the prostitute. The women earn low- to-moderate salaries. HISTORY OF PROSTITUTION: 18th Century BCE: The Code of Hammurabi Refers to Prostitution The Code of Hammurabi was compiled at the start of the reign of the Babylonian king Hammurabi from 1792 to 750 B.C. It includes provisions to protect the inheritance rights of prostitutes. Except for widows, this was the only category of women who had no male providers. 6th Century BCE: Solon Establishes State-Funded Brothels According to tradition, Solon, an ancient Greek politician, established government-supported brothels in high-traffic urban areas of Greece. These brothels were staffed with inexpensive pornai that all men could afford to hire, regardless of income level. Prostitution remained legal throughout the Greek and Roman periods, although Christian Roman emperors strongly discouraged it later. AD 590 (ca.): Reccared Bans Prostitution The newly-converted Reccared I, Visigoth King of Spain in the early first century, banned prostitution as part of an effort to bring his country into alignment with Christian ideology. There was no punishment for men who hired or exploited prostitutes, but women found guilty of selling sexual favors were whipped 300 times and exiled. In most cases, this would have been tantamount to a death sentence. 1161: King Henry II Regulates but Does Not Ban Prostitution By the medieval era, prostitution was accepted as a fact of life in major cities. King Henry II discouraged but permitted it, although he mandated that prostitutes must be single and ordered weekly inspections of London's infamous brothels to ensure that other laws were not being broken. 8 www.whiteblacklegal.co.in ISSN: 2581-8503 1358: Italy Embraces Prostitution The Great Council of Venice declared prostitution to be "absolutely indispensable to the world" in 1358. Government-funded brothels were established in major Italian cities throughout the 14th and 15th centuries. 1586: Pope Sixtus V Mandates the Death Penalty for Prostitution Penalties for prostitution ranging from maiming to execution were technically in place in many European states by the 1500s, but they generally went unenforced. The newly-elected Pope Sixtus V grew frustrated and decided on a more direct approach, ordering that all women who participate in prostitution should be put to death. There is no evidence that his order was actually carried out on any large scale by Catholic nations of the period.