NY Times debate: Is Prostitution Safer when It's Legal?

The debate Is Prostitution Safer When It’s Legal? mirrors in many ways the debate over whether legalizing compensation for kidney donors (and bone marrow donors, etc.) would be better or worse than the illegal markets that currently exist...

DEBATERS

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  Labor Laws, Not Criminal Laws, Are the Solution

  CAROL LEIGH, BAY AREA SEX WORKERS ADVOCACY NETWORK
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  Legality Leads to More Trafficking

  RACHEL LLOYD, AUTHOR, "GIRLS LIKE US"
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  Criminalize Only the Buying of Sex

  MAX WALTMAN, UNIVERSITY OF STOCKHOLM
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  Ignore the Stigma and Focus on the Need

  MARTHA C. NUSSBAUM, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
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  Nevada’s Legal Brothels Make Workers Feel Safer

  BARBARA G. BRENTS, UNIVERSITY OF NEVADA, LAS VEGAS
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  Legality Brings Protection and Better Care

  CHIKA UNIGWE, AUTHOR, "ON BLACK SISTERS STREET"
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  Such Oppression Can Never Be Safe

  NORMA RAMOS, COALITION AGAINST TRAFFICKING IN WOMEN

INTRODUCTION

Jim Wilson/The New York TimesProstitutes wait for customers at a legal brothel in Nevada.

Some say laws against prostitution unfairly victimize women. A Canadian court recently ruled that laws preventing brothels endangered prostitutes by forcing them to work on the streets. And as the recent Secret Service scandal makes clear, in Colombia, prostitution is legal in “tolerance zones.” But in Spain, prostitution is essentially legal, and the nation has become a magnet for sex trafficking. Can legalized prostitution ever be safe and free of exploitation? Or should laws against prostitution remain?