Prostitution do more harm than good

In round 2, Pro has claimed that "Subjective value is not a valid argument for a national debate" because we must help people make decisions that are "constructive". In economics, there are other theories of value such as the labor theory of value proposed by Karl Marx. It doesn't seem Pro is proposing an economic theory, but is simply saying some people can make wiser choices for others. Pro wants to impose his/her system of value on others. I reject such a system outright as being unnecessary and tyrannical. By what right does Pro, or anyone, have to make subjective value decisions for others? This is not the kind system that the United States of America was founded on. In the last round Pro attempts to sort through a list of activities, choosing those where one would be allowed to make economic choices on their own: rock climbing, yes. Gambling and prostitution, no. Pro says: "I believe such dangerous sports still objectively do more good than harm." The key words in that statement are "I believe". But it isn't Pro who is presented with the choice. How can Pro make the decision? Pro claims my analogy of a receiving a lemon when purchasing a used car is flawed because: "a failure of service in prostitution activities is irreversible. and sometimes deadly" I'm not sure how many used cars Pro has purchased, but there are many dealers that will laugh at you if you try to return a lemon. And it is conceivable that said car could result in injury or even death. But none of this matters, because in both cases, the purchaser of either the car or the prostitute is entitled to the freedom to weigh these risks and make the purchase anyway. And of course the customer of the prostitute has an easy way to guarantee that there will be no transmission of STD - simply wear a condom. This decision can be made by either or both parties. Next Pro claims there is a correlation between prostitution and drug use based on two studies referenced. Regarding the 1978 study, the full text is not available online, so I have no way refute any of it's details. However, I did find some information from it's abstract: "THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PROSTITUTION AND DRUG USE IS EXPLORED IN THIS DESCRIPTIVE STUDY OF 60 WOMEN WHO WERE OR HAD BEEN PROSTITUTES IN NEW YORK CITY." (2) This study was of both "low level" and "high level" prostitutes, so we'd likely have 30 prostitutes in each group. I find it hard to believe that much useful information can be gained from a 37 year old study of such a small number in just one city. The information here only raises more questions: 1) what control group did they use to compare to, if any, to determine that drug use among prostitutes was higher than "normal"?2) how did they select the prostitutes? Were they careful to ensure the population chosen reflects all types of prostitutes thru out the U.S.?3) how do they know that these women wouldn't be more likely to use drugs even if they were not prostituting? It appears this paper only shows correlation, not causation.4) is it valid to use a high crime and drug use city like New York in order to establish information on prostitution in general? The second study (3) also has similar issues. In this case, the study was of 51 women in London. So in addition to my points above, I'll call out the following text: "Almost two-thirds reported that they only worked as a prostitute in order to fund their use of drugs (predominantly heroin), and that they would not continue working as a prostitute if they were not still using drugs." (3) So it appears that drug use causes prostitution, not the other way around. Pro next continues to believe that degradation is a harm but concedes that it's not the case for the client. Pro admits that prostitutes are "well aware that the activities will danger their health" and "But they still do it anyway because of being paid". This is an admission that prostitutes make a rational economic decision. Either they disagree that the job is degrading or they've weighed that cost and chosen to do it anyway. Either way, both the prostitute and the client come out ahead as is the case with all voluntary trade. The key words in Pro's text is "I think". Pro wants to decide for the prostitute. Pro next contends that prostitution increases violence citing a 2004 study by Melissa Farley, PhD. (4). One thing jumped out at me in the abstract was the claim that prostitution was "paid rape". This figure of speech is a dead give away of bias. Melissa is executive director of Prostitution Research and Education (5), whose mission is: "to abolish the institution of prostitution" (6) Lets look at the "voilence" of prostitution from another angle. Studies show that prostitution reduces rape, which is clearly a significant harm to it's victims: "In the multiple regression model the rape rate was shown to be correlated with the homicide rate and anti-correlated with the availability of prostitution. Both relationships were at above the 95% confidence level. It is estimated that if prostitution were legalized in the United States, the rape rate would decrease by roughly 25% for a decrease of approximately 25,000 rapes per year." (8) This was a macro-study that looked at data in 22 countries so it does not suffer from the issue of looking at a small population of prostitutes. The author is an Associate Professor of Finance at Northeastern State University, not an anti-prostitution activist. Why is prostitution, in and of itself, violence provoking? Pro seems to think it's because it's because women become "commodities". I'd ask how this is different than models who sell their bodies images? I don't think there's much violence between models and the crew working around them. It seems clear to me that there is something else going on here (see below). Remember that Pro must show causation in order to fulfill the harm claimed in the resolution. I would suggest that in many cases it is not prostitution that causes violence, but rather the criminalization of it. A client engaging a prostitutes service is not an act of violence, but a police officer who arrests a prostitute (who has harmed no one) surely is an act of violence. In fact, I would argue that violence against prostitutes, not just from uniformed officers, but from all perpetrators is the fault of the inflictor, not the victim. It may very well be that, in some cases, prostitutes attract clients with violent tendencies, but how is that the fault of prostitution? In fact, prisons and shady drinking establishments seem to have this same problem. This does not prove that these establishments cause harm. At this time, I would like to introduce some anecdotal information from a call girl. Rather than go on an on without their voice, I think it is important to hear from them: " But the truth these would-be social engineers don’t want you to know is that the majority of violence against whores is inflicted by the police, either with the blessings of the state (in the name of “fighting prostitution” or “rescuing victims”) or in the shadow created by the state’s definition of harlots as creatures outside the bounds of humane treatment. The state, Western religions, and carceral “feminists” teach that a woman who has sex for practical reasons rather than emotional ones is robbed of her “purity”, and that an “impure” woman would be better off dead." (7) So where is the origin of violence? In the hooker or in the puritanism of those they come into contact with? 1) https://en.wikipedia.org...2) https://www.ncjrs.gov...3) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov...4) http://www.psychiatrictimes.com...5) http://prostitutionresearch.com...6) http://prostitutionresearch.com...7) https://maggiemcneill.wordpress.com...8) http://www.independent.org...