In The duty on Friday May 31, a text was published about a conference in which I will have the honor of participating on issues related to prostitution. Many people who have experiences related to prostitution will be present to talk about their experiences, their aspirations and prevention, among other topics.
In the published text, the authors portray the participants in this conference and the organizing committee as prohibitionists. As a doctoral student who works on legislative frameworks regarding prostitution, I am deeply concerned by the malicious and repetitive use of this term.
With the artist Véronique Côté, I signed a short essay in which we wanted to describe the two ideological positions that oppose feminists on the question of prostitution. To briefly summarize our point, we can consider that, on the one hand, there are those who believe that prostitution is legitimate work, which should moreover be called sex work, and all aspects of which should be decriminalized (purchase, sale, third parties). On the other are those who consider that prostitution is both the cause and the consequence of inequality between women and men and that, as such, we must work towards its abolition. Everything divides these two camps. Everything except an idea, that is, people in prostitution should never, under any circumstances, be criminalized for their activities.
The prohibitionism of which my colleagues, my comrades and my friends find ourselves accused today, is one of the four legislative frameworks in force in the world, alongside complete decriminalization, regulation (legalization) and the Swedish model. Prohibitionism consists of criminalizing all aspects of prostitution. The unfortunate consequence of this is that it is mainly women who are targeted and rarely men.
The model that we, gathered at this conference, advocate is the Swedish model, which aims to reduce the demand for prostitution by targeting those who create it, that is to say the buyers and the pimps. This model, implemented in Sweden in 1999 and adopted in Canada for ten years, seems to us to be the least bad solution since it allows us to focus on those who make this industry prosper and it makes it possible to offer services to women who wish to leave this industry.
Canada is far from being a champion among all the countries that have adopted this model. France is much more active in putting in place means to support women in the exit process. But I am still proud to live in a place where we choose to no longer criminalize people in prostitution.
Brandished in this way, the term prohibitionist is not only false, but also insulting to all people who are or have been in a situation of prostitution and come together in congress to work to ensure that others do not experience what they consider to be a experience which was difficult.