Should Prostitution Be Legalized Canada - 1379 Words

Sexual services have been part of societies for millennia. They date back to as early as ancient Mesopotamia, in which females were spiritually obligated to demonstrate Babylonian hospitality by engaging foreigner in sexual intercourse. Over time, the subject of prostitution has surfaced in spiritual and social discussion, and more recently into legal and moral discourses with an emphasis on the rights of sex workers. Since the recent phenomenon of advanced women’s rights through rigorous activist groups in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century, propelling the advancement of women’s rights movements began to immerge in the first world. At its core, prostitution is not an individual issue, but rather, a societal issue, and†¦show more content†¦Such statistics demonstrate the urgent need for increased protection of these sex workers while on the job. Lack of legal recognition of prostitution as an industry only leaves sex workers vulnerable to abuse in a n unregulated system without safety standards. Prostitutes do not report most assaults to police due to fear of further abuse or being charged for soliciting. Therefore, decriminalization is necessary in order to detach the social stigma from being employed in the sex industry, as it is only then that police will be able to take the cases of these victims seriously, and allow them to experience the full benefits of the justice system. According to the Network of Sex Work Projects, â€Å"historically, anti-trafficking measures have been more concerned with protecting women’s ‘purity’ than with ensuring [sex workers’] human rights.† Therefore, it is essential to decriminalize prostitution should sex workers receive adequate working and human rights. The 2010 case of Bedford v. Canada, Terri Bedford, along with several other prostitutes, argued to the courts that the criminalization of prostitution placed their lives and safety at risk. Criminalizati on of prostitution impartially prosecutes exploiters and protectors, such as bodyguards, further intercepting prostitute’s attempts to