All these middle aged women who have no skills due to raising children would be able to support themselves by giving old men handjobs.
Keeping prostitution illegal helps save marriages . also has the added benefit of making it harder for the husband to cheat on payday.
I don’t really agree or disagree, but think the argument is completely pointless.
Typically things are made legal or illegal based on “societal harm”. What is the value in keeping around marriages that would be lost if prostitution were legal? There are many arguments that could be made for or against legalizing prostitution, but “marriage rate” seems irrelevant.
What is the value in keeping around marriages that would be lost if prostitution were legal?
So that children grow up with their parents together.
You’re assuming the married people have kids, and that the kids would be better off if their parents stayed together. It’s perfectly plausible that legalization would prevent these fragile marriages and then in turn raise the rate of children raised with both parents.
I’m arguing specifically that middle aged women can always give handjobs if it were legal. It’s doesn’t take any skill to slide your hand up and down on a dick. Preventing marriages from originally forming is not the argument. It’s for already established marriages with children.
It’s no secret that marriages stay together our of necessity. Rich people always get divorced. we could argue whether it’s good or bad to have that divorce but i’m not making that argument. I’m arguing legalizing it will increase divorces.
It’s for already established marriages with children.
You can ignore the back side of a coin, but it doesn’t make it go away.
I’m arguing legalizing it will increase divorces.
You’re speculating that it will increase divorces, and that it’s a bad thing, but not bringing any facts to the table.
Prostitution is legal in Germany but they have a very similar divorce rate to the U.S.
rates in germany - rates in USNevada has traditionally had a much higher divorce rate than the rest of the US, but in recent years it has come down to below that of more traditionally conservative states. This seems to suggest there is more to the issue than you’re speculating. divorce rates by state
Because Germany and the US have different cultures you would have to show that before prostitution was legal the divorce rate did not change after is was legal and within the same demographics.
for example religious Muslims are probably less likely to participate in prostitution. So if there was a influx of Muslim immigrants in Germany you would have to take that into account.
The divorce rate has in fact increased in Germany since prostitution became legal in 2002. So Germany’s data actually supports my theory and not yours. Even without taking into account demographic differences which would surely make it support my claim even more so.
The divorce rate has in fact increased in Germany since prostitution became legal in 2002.
Where do you see this? Both the divorce rate per capita and the the divorce rate per marriage has gone down dramatically since 2002… It was over 50% then and is around 39% now.
EDIT: but there is some merit to changing demographics. we would need a study that accounts for that.
Legalizing prostitution might kill prostitution, to be honest.
Looking at legalized marijuana where I live, a couple things happened. It used to be you’d go to the sketchiest guy you knew and he’d go “this is really good stuff!” And you’d pay top dollar for it. Afterwards, you’d go to a clean, safe building and choose from a wide assortment of options, at really excellent prices.
So the first of two big things that would happen would be that companies would try to get girls who could hold down a job, and they’d have to abide by work standards. A lot of women doing that kind of work would find themselves out of a job because they couldn’t get hired at the legal brothel.
The second of two would be that the price would go way down. The fact that it’s a black market service is priced in, so once it’s not, both prices and wages would go down.
At that point, it’s a normal job with normal wages, I suspect in that environment a lot of the women who would be interested quickly get bored of the concept.
I expect that when regulated the service becomes a lot less “fun”. Hiring a hooker to snort coke off your dick probably not kosher in a legit business. Probably not at parties or bars either, just a guarded monitored building for health and safety.
Not to mention they’d add modern nonsense on top of everything.
As for effects on marriage, I really wouldn’t be surprised if it further drove marriage rates down. Just look at all onlyfans. Lots of women making decent money on there only to discover and nobody wants to marry them. Unfortunately, I think it’s going to take a generation or two for society to react to all of the things that are being made normal, and by thin a lot of people will be harmed beyond just marriage…
There are many countries where prostitution is perfectly legal.
Huh, so it is.
And some of my predictions are wrong. Looks like legal and regulated Germany has higher marriage rates than illegal austria, and similar divorce rates.
All these middle aged women who have no skills due to raising children would be able to support themselves by giving old men handjobs.
I might just be dumb, but I have no idea what you mean by “no skills due to raising children,” or why the lack of sex work would make it so they couldn’t support themselves, given there are single parents right now that have jobs that don’t involve sex work. Are you just saying a lower legal barrier to entry would make more child-rearing single parents seek employment as sex workers because it would pay more than the lower paid work they otherwise typically get compared to non- child rearing parents? Also, if these single parents are married and tend the house, that they have lower paid work is moot if their partner makes up the difference for the household. It’s not clear to me whether you are referring to single parents here or not tbh.
It seems to me, even if people in general were more likely to engage in sex work when it’s legal, this would have more of a chance of affecting the marriage rate itself rather than the divorce rate. And even that not necessarily.
making it harder for the husband to cheat on payday
Most people who cheat are not opportunistic cheaters, i.e. are not people who were simply waiting for an opportunity to cheat to come along. Getting paid creates an opportunity to go to a brothel, but it doesn’t induce a motivation to cheat the way, say, meeting a cute coworker that you really get along with might. Which I think is more common.
The three scenarios that would have one pay for sex is (1) a desire to fulfill specific sex acts that most people would not or which are socially stigmatized, (2) a need to recuperate sexual confidence, or (3) simply having a more short-term hedonistic sexuality while also being lazy about dating (though in that case, they would be more likely to just propose a different relationship model upfront as opposed to straight-up cheating through paid sex, if different relationship models weren’t stigmatized). A lot of these are also potential reasons for relationship counseling or break-up independent of whether sex is paid for.
My own hypothesis is that, at best, legalizing sex work would lead to higher incidence of payment for sex as a reason for break-ups or divorce due to it allowing ease of access to sex, but would have no effect on break-up or divorce rates themselves.
