Jacqui Smith - criminalising the buying of sex

I can't understand the argument that calls for prostitution to be legalised except that it would make it easier ont he prostitute - if only that was the case however there is no praxis to the argument, where prostitution is legal - the sex industry goes through the roof.

And I am sick to death being called a ant-sex feminist. why am I anti-sex because I deplore men buying women's sexual consent - what's so sexy about that. I fully support shifting the responsibility of prostitution away from women and onto men - they should think before they randomly buy sex from a woman. It is estimated that 9 out of 10 prostitutes are trafficked, pimped or have chronic substance abuse problems for me that is abuse, why do men want to have sex with an abused woman? Is it a power and control thing, seems like it to me. The majority of men are having sex with women whose consent is negotiated by an abuser - now I understand the boring old "my wife does n't understand me" but I don't understand them. Perhaps if they had a better attitude about sex as opposed to power and control their wife/partner might be able to express herself sexually rather than be put on a pedastal as his lovely wife.

I do however agree with the English Collective of Prostitutes on women's poverty. Equal Pay for women in Britain is lagging way behind, and child care is extortionate. There are many more policies needed and especially money needed to make safe routes out on prostitution fopr those that want to make those routes.

From Observer, 16th November 2008

Home Secretary plans to crack down on vice trade on the streets, while lapdancing clubs will face a stringent licensing regime

• Gaby Hinsliff, political editor
• guardian.co.uk, Sunday November 16 2008 00.01 GMT
• The Observer, Sunday November 16 2008
• Article history

The Home Secretary has attacked the 'bizarre' practice of City firms entertaining clients in lapdancing clubs, on the eve of a government crackdown on the sex trade which is expected to criminalise most men who use prostitutes.

Jacqui Smith said she expected to see some lapdancing clubs, which have mushroomed in recent years, close and fewer new ones opened under reforms triggered by concerns over a seedy culture of sexual titillation creeping across city centres. She will outline plans this week to criminalise paying for sex with a woman 'controlled for another person's gain'. The new offence will carry a hefty fine and criminal record, which could prevent those caught from getting jobs in sensitive occupations.

The legislation will cover women who have pimps or drug addicts who work to pay off their dealers as well as the rarer cases of trafficked women. This is expected to include the majority of Britain's 80,000 sex workers. Ignorance of a woman's circumstances will not be a defence. Kerb crawlers will be 'named and shamed', while those who pay a prostitute knowing she has been forcibly trafficked could face rape charges.

The measures are highly controversial, with critics arguing that men will seek other outlets if prostitution is driven off the streets. Smith said it was 'not mine or the government's responsibility to ensure that the demand is satisfied', adding: 'Is this something about which people have a choice with respect to their demands? Yes, they do. Basically, if it means fewer people are able to go out and pay for sex I think that would be a good thing.'

The prostitution review will be published this week, followed later this month by new licensing arrangements that are expected to see lapdancing clubs, currently licensed in the same way as pubs, subjected to the same stringent regime as sex shops, allowing local residents more opportunities to object.

Smith said she believed the law had been 'left behind' by the explosion in lapdancing clubs, which were seen as acceptable entertainment for a corporate night out. 'If I were a business person and I were wanting to make the best impression on clients, who presumably are female as well as male, I do think it's a bit bizarre that you would take them to a lapdancing club,' she said.

The new regime would make it more difficult to open them. 'It's not a complete ban on lapdancing clubs, but it's saying you don't operate in a vacuum, you have an impact on the community around you. I would hope it would make it harder for them to open, certainly in residential areas, and I would suspect that some of them will be closed when the licences come up for renewal.'

The English Collective of Prostitutes (ECP), which has vigorously opposed the clampdown, says outlawing paid-for sex between consenting adults will punish women who find this more lucrative than menial jobs. Forcing the trade underground would mean that 'the risks they are forced to take will be greater', said a spokeswoman.

One anonymous lapdancer who provided a statement for the ECP said she could earn £250 in four hours of dancing. 'Nine out of 10 women turn to prostitution or lapdancing because there's not enough money to survive. Recently my mum couldn't afford a pair of school shoes for my brother and sister. When I worked a day job I couldn't help her, but now I can.

'If the government is offended by the work we do, then give us the financial means to get out.' She said that there was 'no pressure to have sex with men, only opportunities', in her job.

The ECP's argument has been fuelled by the glamorisation of sex work at the hands of bloggers such as Belle de Jour, the call girl whose memoir became a bestselling book and then a TV film: she claimed to love sex and regarded working as an escort for £300 as a better option than temping.

Smith said that she did not believe that was true of most sex workers. Under the new offence, men would not be able to claim in court that they had not known the prostitute had a pimp or a drug habit. 'It won't be enough to say, "I didn't know",' she said. 'What I hope people will say is, "I am not actually going to take the risk if there is any concern that this woman hasn't made a free choice." It would be quite difficult for a man paying for sex in the majority of cases not to fall under this particular offence.'

She had ruled out a universal ban on paid sex because some women argued they did it out of choice 'and it's not my job to criminalise the demand for that'.

Katherine Rake, director of the Fawcett Society pressure group, which has campaigned for a clampdown on lapdancing clubs, welcomed the planned curbs. 'People have suddenly woken up to the fact that our city centres have changed very dramatically and that has an impact on us all, it being part of the culture of sexualisation. It has been a silent creep, but a deadly one in terms of what it meant for social attitudes and how women feel in public spaces.'

Man jailed for bride murder bid

Muhammed Rashad, narrowly missed being one of the 120 men who kill their partners or ex-partners every year in Britain, he strangled, battered and tried to suffocate his wife Zahida, at their home in Glasgow, in October 2007, luckily she survived.

The attack happened after she had failed to answer the phone.

Report from BBC News

Rashad was told that he could be deported after his sentence

A man who tried to kill his new bride weeks after their wedding in Pakistan has been jailed for seven years at the High Court in Edinburgh.

Muhammed Rashad, 29, strangled, battered and tried to suffocate his cousin, Zahida, at their home in Kings Park, Glasgow, last October.

The attack happened after she had failed to answer the phone.

Rashad was convicted of attempted murder in September. He was told he could be deported after his sentence.

The court heard how Rashad attacked his wife after demanding to know where she was when he tried to phone her.

She told him she had been in the house but had not heard the phone.

Rashad called her stupid before repeatedly punching her, slapping her with his hands and hitting her with a wooden spoon until it broke.

The woman then ran to her father-in-law's room and begged for help.

You were found guilty of a prolonged, violent, dangerous and frightening attack on your young wife who was then in a particularly vulnerable position Lord Kingarth

The court was told that he did nothing while Rashad kicked her and wrapped a mobile phone charger cord around her neck.

Rashid then tried to strangle his wife with his hands and smother her with a pillow.

Jailing him, judge Lord Kingarth, said: "You were found guilty of a prolonged, violent, dangerous and frightening attack on your young wife who was then in a particularly vulnerable position, she having only recently come from Pakistan to live in the United Kingdom.

"This is a matter which this court has to take seriously.

"In all the circumstances I am satisfied that only a substantial custodial sentence is appropriate."

Lord Kingarth said he did not think it appropriate to recommend deporting Rashad because he had lived in the UK for years, had not offended before, and was deemed to be at low-risk of re-offending.

But he said that the Secretary of State had the power to send him back to his native Pakistan after his sentence.

Nagging and Infidelty is no defence

Good on Harriet Harmon, that bourgeois feminist that she is - she's taking on the judges and telling them to get with it! No longer will "provocation" be accepted in crimes of murder where female partners and ex-partners are the victims. No longer will the excuse of she was a "nag" or she humiliated me when she left me for the local train-spotter" be a defence! And quite right too. See the article in the Observer here

There is a lot written about "Honour Based Violence" usually focused on BME communities however in indigenous Britain the defence of provocation is accepted when a husband murders his cheating or nagging wife. His honour was lost when his property left him for another man or she was sleeping with his friends - so he murdered her. It seems to be accepted but it should not be. It is in fact a murder in the context of domestic abuse - it is a domestic abuse murder. Joseph McGrail was cleared of murder in 1991 when a judge said "her nagging would test the patients of a saint". 120 women are murdered in Britain every year by their partners or ex-partners.

Activists have fought for years for provocation to be used in the cases of women like Emma Humphries, Kiranjit Ahluwalia and Sara Thorton who killed their abusers - but they were found to be murders and their abuse, their rape and torture was dismissed and these women were seen to be evil.

And further legislation will be coming into place to criminalise buying sex from a woman who is being prostituted for another's gain. I am glad this is all coming to pass. Buying sex from a woman who is pimped, trafficked or prostituted by another is not consensual sex and should be deemed as rape. The woman cannot give her free consent because her safety and life is controlled by another. The sooner the better that we see such legislation.

There is no excuse for domestic abuse!

This isnot an invitation to rape me

Hope you have seen the fantastic campaign from Rape Crisis Scotland and the Scottish Government called "this is not an invitation to rape me"

Check out their website here

Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary are supporting the campaign - see here

Prostitution in Edinburgh

Prostitution has been rife in Edinburgh years and the Scottish Government built it's HQ very near to the old "red light district" of Coburg Street. Brothels in Edinburgh are getting busted read here

I really worry about the growth in prostitution and how women from around the world find themselves here selling their bodies and consent to Scottish men. Prostitution does not exist because it is the oldest profession in the world but because there is a demand for it. It saddens me that in the city I love so much that there is such a demand to buy sex

Murders that demand a radical shift in attitudes

The past week we have seen three men convicted and sentenced for horrific murders of women - Levi Bellfield, Steve Wright and Mark Dixie are now where they should be behind bars. There are calls for hanging and for everyone to hand over their DNA, two of the men were caught by historic DNA however we don't all have to hand over our DNA at all - there is something that is common between these three men and that is they had a history of violence towards women and girls and they bought sex from prostitutes. we need the DNA of men who are violent to women and from those who buy sex from prostitutes. Prostituted women are 18 times more likely to be murdered than women who are not prostitutes, the majority of those that kill, batter, rape, threaten and abuse prostitutes also buy sex from prostitutes.

Joan Smith had a thoughtful article in the Independent today.The online article is here

Thursday, 28 February 2008

Bring back hanging! I've heard it many times in the last week, following the convictions of three men for the murders of eight young women. On Tuesday, Levi Bellfield was sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison, the same sentence that Steve Wright was given at the end of last week. Mark Dixie will serve a minimum of 34 years after a trial in which, amazingly, he denied murder but admitted necrophilia.

In each case, the details which emerged in court were horrific, and phone-in shows resound with demands for capital punishment. Alternatively, because of the role played by DNA in identifying Dixie and Wright, there have been suggestions that the entire population should be on a DNA database.

The first impulse stems from a desire for revenge, the second from a feeling that "something must be done". Both should be resisted, and the fact that they are being made at all is evidence of a state of collective denial. Leaving aside the overwhelming moral case against the death penalty, the judicial murder of a few notorious offenders will not stop violence against women, and risks distorting public perceptions about the subject even further.

What is striking about Wright and Bellfield is that so many people were aware that they abused women but nobody felt able to do anything about it. In a society where domestic violence is commonplace and rape goes unpunished, what is someone to do when they suspect that a man is abusing girls and women?

I am not arguing that all men treat women badly. But a substantial minority do, and we refuse to read the signals or condemn their behaviour unequivocally. Bellfield had a reputation for picking up under-age girls and having sex with them in the back of his van, even offering to prostitute his 16-year-old "girlfriend" and her 14-year-old sister to an employee; a former partner recalled finding magazines in which he slashed photographs of blonde women, with whom he had a lethal obsession.

Wright had a series of violent relationships, attacking partners and abusing them as "slags" and "whores". The Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe, told a drinking friend he had attacked a woman with a stone hidden in a sock, but it took five years for the man to inform the police; while he was thinking about it, 13 women were murdered and half a dozen others attacked.

There is no need to put the entire country, including women and children, on a DNA database to discover the identity of men who pose a threat to women. Despite all the calls I've had from journalists over the past few days, asking me what motivates men like Wright, Dixie and Bellfield, there is no great mystery about it.

Men do not commit such crimes out of the blue; most of them don't even bother to hide their hatred of women. There is usually a childhood history of domestic violence, which means that they grow up in an atmosphere of physical fear and contempt for women, whom they regard both as victims and the cause of their fathers' violence.

I've heard a great deal about the role of absent mothers in the psychopathology of men who kill women, but cause and effect are being confused here; a misogynist culture inevitably overlooks the father's role and blames the mother, even when her reason for leaving the family is to escape violence.

When boys from such homes become men, they provide plenty of warnings in the form of abusive behaviour to wives and girlfriends and histories of sexual violence. Dixie had a lengthy criminal record, including five convictions for sexual offences, but served only brief prison sentences. With only one in 20 rapes reported to the police ending in a conviction, most rapists get away with their crimes; the Soham murderer, Ian Huntley, was accused of rape on five occasions but none of the cases got to court, leaving him free to kill two 10-year girls.

If we're serious about preventing more horrific murders, social attitudes have to change dramatically. That means reversing the popular assumption that most rapes aren't really rapes at all because the victim had been drinking or knew her attacker. The other thing that's needed is an acknowledgement of the inextricable link between prostitution and sexual violence.

It isn't a lack of licensed brothels that makes selling sex dangerous; it's the kind of men who buy it. Women who work as prostitutes are 18 times more likely to be murdered than the rest of us, for the simple reason that their "clients" include a high proportion of men who enjoy humiliating and hurting women. That's the group whose DNA detectives need to get their hands on; if we changed the law to allow the police to arrest men who try to buy sex, they could clear up a huge number of unsolved sexual attacks

Scottish Domestic Abuse Helpline reaches record levels.

Lets hope the helpline is reaching record levels because women are asking for help rather than men's violence against women is increasing.

The tel is 0800 027 1234, it is free, confidental and cannot be traced.

The helpline said more victims feel confident about coming forwardThe number of calls to a helpline for victims of domestic violence is at a record high.
More than 21,000 calls were made to the Scottish Domestic Abuse Helpline (SDAH) last year, an increase of 3% on 2006.
It is believed the rise is because more victims feel confident enough to come forward and ask for help.
The callers were mostly women but a significant number were men and children. Some of the youngsters wanted to get help for their mothers.
The helpline said the problem affected people from all parts of Scotland regardless of age, background and social class.
The calls are not just about physical abuse, many were in relation to psychological or emotional abuse

The Communities Minister Stewart Maxwell is now calling for more to be done to tackle domestic abuse.
He said: "While we have made progress in changing attitudes and encouraging women to report domestic abuse, there is still a lot more work to do in tackling this problem.
"The helpline is an important partner for us in tackling domestic abuse and their help has transformed the lives of many women and their children.
He said it was important that people were encouraged to seek help and report incidents to the police so the true extent of the problem could be discovered and perpetrators properly punished.
Helpline number
Liz Kelly, head of training at the SDAH, said: "We have had calls that range from people looking for immediate help to get out of a relationship because of domestic abuse, women looking for refuge accommodation, women who need urgent medical attention or who want to report incidents of domestic abuse to the police.
"The calls are not just about physical abuse, many were in relation to psychological or emotional abuse, which was highlighted by the Scottish Government's awareness campaign."
The Scottish Domestic Abuse Helpline number is 0800 027 1234 and lines are open 24 hours and calls are free, confidential and cannot be traced.