DDO Official Tournament 2: That prostitution should be legalised

In this final round, I'm going to summarise why I think I've won. Prostitution will still happenMy opponent's arguments have all been that prostitution is bad. The presumption here is that banning prostitution will actually stop prostitution. The fact that my opponent keeps bringing up statistics and sources from the United States is proof that simply making it illegal does not solve the problem. Prostitution will still happen whether it's illegal or not. My opponent never engaged with any of my other analysis on this point. The most important issue in the debate is therefore. .. SafetyI said earlier that prostitution is the most dangerous profession in the world. This was not an understatement. Indeed, my opponent has several times proved exactly this point, such as in saying that prostitutes are often illegally trafficked and vulnerable to STDs. What my opponent missed is that it's easier to regulate an industry and minimise these kinds of harms when the industry is legal. My opponent failed to say anything about more than half of my impacts, such as underage prostitution, pregnancy risks, the incentives on clients to rape, the lack of recourse on the part of prostitutes if crimes are committed against them, the relativity of safety, and so on. My opponent argues that just because his source says the private sector is safe, prostitutes must be safe. First, sorry to break it to you, but your source could be wrong - no source is divine truth. Second, as I explained last round, prostitutes are not working in the private sector under the status quo - they're working illegally. Third, the private sector can still be the private sector if it's regulated, so you're misreading "regulated" as "not private sector". Fourth, as I explained last round, the paper and I have a different understanding of "safety". Which brings me to my other point. .. Role of the StateWe agreed not to debate this as it pertains to any specific jurisdiction, as my opponent originally wanted to limit it to only the United States Federal government. The question of what an arbitrary state's role is is quite distinct, however, from what a specific state's role is - this debate is not, for instance, about the constitutionality of prostitution, and I think that's fair. This is why I must also object to the use of US-specific statutes to attack my privacy point, which was somewhat more universal. PIPA and the Patriot Act are also pieces of US-specific legislation I oppose, but this debate really isn't about that. My opponent's counter-argument is that prostitutes never get pleasure from their work while pornographers always do. There are two problems with this. First, few people enjoy working as rubbish collectors, but that's no reason to outlaw rubbish collecting. They do it to earn a living which makes them happy, as they can feed their families and live well. The same is true of prostitutes. Second, prostitutes often do enjoy their work, meeting new people and having fun with their clients. There is simply no evidence for this blanket assumption. TraffickingWhile this may have been my opponent's main point, I have already conceded that it's bad and that it's a problem. What my opponent assumed, however, is that it's a problem because prostitution is legal. No empirical evidence did he present for this - only a few opinions from the opinion columns of minor newspapers like the Washington Times. I said that most people who are trafficked are not prostitutes. I'll bet that in the US, most of them are coming over the border from Mexico for a better job. I also said that most prostitutes are not trafficked, and provided empirical evidence of this from New Zealand's legalisation experience. My opponent states prostitutes would not be better off if they had government protection because government is not protecting them from traffickers right now. This was actually one of my points under safety - government has the wrong attitude to prostitution, and should be putting traffickers in jail - not prostitutes. Criminalising prostitutes in fact undermines their ability to catch traffickers, and my model delivers this. STDsThis was the most minor point in the debate, because thanks to my opponent's framing it was premised on the point above. Not only does it fail because that point fails, but because the reason why STDs are sometimes prevalent is that unsafe sex happens. Why? Because prostitutes can't get government or medical help! I explained this in round two. Furthermore, prostitutes don't contribute more than anyone else to STDs right now. My opponent's source merely says that trafficking spreads STDs, but recall that trafficking is more than just prostitutes - my evidence shows that among prostitutes, this problem usually does not exist. I don't want to debate whether AIDs is the apocalypse causer because even if it is, prostitutes don't cause it - but I hope my opponent understands stuff like that it can be completely repressed with medication and that there are genetic immunities to AIDs. That's another debate though. ConclusionWe need to protect the vulnerable in our society. Prostitutes are vulnerable, and thus worthy of our protection - not our condemnation. We feel sorry for those who are trafficked, but the prostitutes are the victims here, not the criminals! And yes, STDs are a problem, but they're not a problem with prostitutes. My opponent's whole case was based on trafficking, which is not a problem with prostitution. What this debate was instead about was, given that prostitution will still happen either way, who can best protect prostitutes - government legislation and assistance if required, or gangsters and criminals? Even if you're like me - somebody who would never hire a prostitute in their lives - there are many good reasons to legalise prostitution. It's about taking a stand against all the negative consequences of prostitution and being able to better fight those consequences - from giving prostitutes the ability to testify in court against these criminals, to giving them medical support to prevent them from contracting an STD like AIDs. We need to understand that most of these problems came about because of the legislation to criminalise prostitution in the first place. I'm proud to have proposed this motion. Thank you all very much for your time.