Legalize Prostitution

I'll start off on my case and hopefully address as much of my opponents case as possible in my cases. If I fail to mention any of it, I will address it separately. My opponent mentions the "government" yet he never specifies the house. Therefore, to promote a fair and interesting debate, I hope my opponent will agree with me to specify the house as the United States of America. 1) One would be hard pressed to prove that prostitution does not fall within the realm of immoral activity, after all, we would be justifying the objectification of women and other heinous activity, and the legalization of this act would be a path of moral decay that normally follows such actions. Really? Rating women? Like "restaurants?" That introduces a whole new level of disregard for them and objectification of human beings. One cannot just rate a person on how well they sell their body. Clearly, my opponent's fourth point should be given more thought. If you study history, you see that the moral bankruptcy of a civilization most often leads to its complete downfall (the Roman Empire, the Jewish Kingdoms--on several occasions, etc.) 2)Legalization of prostitution increases clandestine, hidden, illegal and street prostitution. Legalization was supposed to get prostituted women off the street. Many women don't want to register and undergo health checks, as required by law in certain countries legalizing prostitution, and as my opponent said, tubectomies or vasectomies, we see my opponent's first and third point's flaw here, so legalization often drives them into street prostitution. And many women choose street prostitution because they want to avoid being controlled and exploited by the new sex businessmen. 3) As we can see in the Netherlands, a country that legalized prostitution, the legalization actually causes a boom in child prostitution.The Amsterdam-based ChildRight organization estimates that the number has gone from 4,000 children in 1996 to 15,000 in 2001 [after legalizing prostitution]. The group estimates that at least 5,000 of the children in prostitution are from other countries, with a large segment being Nigerian girls (Tiggeloven: 2001). 4) Legalization would not protect the women. The Coalition Against Trafficking in Women International (CATW) has conducted 2 major studies on sex trafficking and prostitution, interviewing almost 200 victims of commercial sexual exploitation. In these studies, women in prostitution indicated that prostitution establishments did little to protect them, regardless of whether they were in legal or illegal establishments. The only time they protect anyone is to protect the customers. Therefore, we can see why my opponent's fifth point is wrong. Now, directly referring to my opponent's cases: His third point. (I believe it is worded incorrectly and should be "Legal prostitution...." However, I will not take advantage of this.) A legalized system of prostitution that mandates health checks and certification only for women and not for clients is blatantly discriminatory to women. Women only health checks make no public health sense because monitoring prostituted women does not protect them from HIV/AIDS or STDs, since male clients can and do originally transmit disease to the women. Again, this goes back to my first point and third point. What's more, if women are being exploited like this, what will keep them in the "business?" They will soon realize that they are as well of by themselves. And if they are by themselves, they will not have to pay any taxes and will be making a 100% profit, of course this will appeal to them. Further, many people would have joined because of the legalization and through this realization, many people will end up prostituting illegally. His second point. Obviously, legalizing something doesn't mean that there will be illegal forms of that activity somewhere out there. So, why would someone want to pay tax and do something when he can get it tax free? If we do stimulate the economy, not that it will, would we want to be the country who saved themselves by selling their women to prostitution? America is a very proud country, and they have all the reason to be. We are probably one of the most liberal and the most influential. How would other countries support or work with one that allows something as immoral as prostitution. Going on that point, we would be breaking ties with many countries openly against prostitution, some even punishing it with the death penalty. Those countries include: Algeria, Angola, Botswana, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Comoros, Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Gabon, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Liberia, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Burma, Brunei, China, Iraq, Iran, Japan, Jordan, Kuwait, Laos, Maldives, Mongolia, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Syria, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Yemen, Albania, Andorra, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia, Croatia, Georgia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Norway, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Serbia, Sweden, Ukraine, Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Haiti, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago, Fiji, Samoa, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, The Federated States of Micronesia, Guyana, and Suriname. In an attempt to restore our economy through prostitution, we would be breaking valuable ties, South Korea, Russia, China, Japan, Taiwan to name a few, that would ultimately crush any chance of recovery. Also angering some dangerous countries such as North Korea and Iraq. Countries on the verge of war with Israel and the only thing preventing them is US involvement. If Israel declines US aid because of this, there will be war. If they do not decline, we will have to mobilize our troops to further protect them, as they are now considered a country that receives help from an immoral one and become even more endangered. Of course, mobilization will be detrimental to our already weak economy. Prostitution to increase our economy is counterproductive. Therefore, I stand that we should not legalize prostitution.