Tuesday, August 02, 2005

How To Legally Hire a Prostitute

Kaimi Wenger gives us this indispensable information. Further discussion by Christine Hurt at The Conglomerate, as well as elsewhere on PrawfsBlawg.

The story which sparked the discussion can be found here. It comes in the wake of a New York court ruling that seeks to differentiate prostitution (basically, paying someone to have sex with you) and pornography (paying someone to have sex with someone else on film). Our noble pursuers of truth and wisdom wisely have noted that it would be incredibly easy to take your run-of-the-mill contract with a prostitute (illegal) and turn it into a pornography deal (legal). All you'd need to do, in theory, is have a buddy solicit the deal ("hey, want to be in a movie with my friend for $X dollars?") and record it somehow. Easy as pie.

And for the record, I agree with Ms. Hurt. While cases like this certainly provide ammo for feminist cases against legal pornography, I think it does just as good a job showing the irrationality of prostitution laws. To wit:
To continue to say that two people having sex with money changing hands is something to be criminalized but fifty people having sex in one room is freedom of association is quite a stretch. Not to mention two or three or four people on salary having sex in front of a camera is a first amendment right.

God Bless America!

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