Ontario Appeal Court strikes down ban on brothels
Two sex-trade laws ruled unconstitutional
Ontario’s Court of Appeal agrees that sex workers should be permitted to work in safer locations and pay others to help protect them, but not that they should be able to communicate with their clients in public places.
It struck down two laws Monday, calling them unconstitutional, but upheld the ban on solicitation, saying that prostitutes should not be able to communicate with their clients in public places.
The court released a decision on an appeal of Superior Court Judge Susan G. Himel's high-profile ruling that three provisions of the Criminal Code pertaining to prostitution should be struck down on the grounds that they are unconstitutional.
The Ontario appeal court agreed with two-thirds of Himel's ruling, namely that the provisions prohibiting common bawdy-houses and living off the avails of prostitution, are both unconstitutional in their current form.
But the court disagreed that the communicating provision must be struck down, meaning that it "remains in full force."
The court said it will strike the word “prostitution” from the definition of "common bawdy-house," as it applies to Section 210 of the Criminal Code, which otherwise prevents prostitutes from offering services out of fixed indoor locations such as brothels or their homes.
12-month delay
However, the court said the bawdy-house provisions would not be declared invalid for 12 months, so that Parliament can have a chance to draft Charter-compliant provisions to replace them, if it chooses to do so.
The court will also clarify that the prohibition of living off the avails of prostitution – as spelled out in Section 212(1)(j) of the Criminal Code – should pertain only to those who do so “in circumstances of exploitation.”
The changes to the "living-off-the-avails" provision will not come into effect for 30 days.
Lawyer Alan Young, who represented three women who brought forward the application to have the provisions declared unconstitutional, said the appeal court’s decision had ushered in a "new era" for sex workers.
"I am thrilled that the Court of Appeal has done the right thing," Young told reporters after the court released its judgment Monday.
"They may not have gone as far as the Superior Court judge, but when you actually look at the result, they’ve done the right thing in terms of modifying the law so that sex workers will not face the same risks they face on a daily basis."
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/03/26/ontario-appeal-court-sex-trade-laws-monday.html
The court said it will strike the word “prostitution” from the definition of "common bawdy-house,"
what remains i wonder
Groulxsmith posted:
why should prostitution exist in a society of any type
if women want to do it
(not thinking of actually existing prostitution here, because I think the number there is small to the point of irrelevancy.. but in the case of pornography and maybe some of those high priced call girls you hear about, i think there are women who legitimately would rather have sex on camera or whatever for a few hours a week rather work the equivalent 60 hours a week at walmart etc, and that this is a reasonable and sane position for them to take. this doesn't redeem porn imo because people just shouldn't have to spend 2/3 of their waking hours as slaves to capital in the first fucking place, but that's part of a larger quasi-marxist critique that i am genuinely not sure all critics of sex work share)
Edited by thirdplace ()
discipline posted:
johns should be forced to admit their sins to their mother before castration imo, something they'd probably be "into"
lot of aggression here.
discipline posted:
johns should be forced to admit their sins to their mother before castration imo, something they'd probably be "into"
stop Kinkshameing
thirdplace posted:Groulxsmith posted:
why should prostitution exist in a society of any typeif women want to do it
(not thinking of actually existing prostitution here, because I think the number there is small to the point of irrelevancy.. but in the case of pornography and maybe some of those high priced call girls you hear about, i think there are women who legitimately would rather have sex on camera or whatever for a few hours a week rather work the equivalent 60 hours a week at walmart etc, and that this is a reasonable and sane position for them to take. this doesn't redeem porn imo because people just shouldn't have to spend 2/3 of their waking hours as slaves to capital in the first fucking place, but that's part of a larger quasi-marxist critique that i am genuinely not sure all critics of sex work share)
i don't see how it can be separated from issues of exploitation and coercion; is there that much of a difference prohibiting prostitution and prohibiting people from selling their organs or genetic material?
Groulxsmith posted:
i don't see how it can be separated from issues of exploitation and coercion; is there that much of a difference prohibiting prostitution and prohibiting people from selling their organs or genetic material?
if i thought capitalism was moral, i'd say "reversibility"
thirdplace posted:Groulxsmith posted:
i don't see how it can be separated from issues of exploitation and coercion; is there that much of a difference prohibiting prostitution and prohibiting people from selling their organs or genetic material?if i thought capitalism was moral, i'd say "reversibility"
i think there are largely irreversible personal problems as well as costs to society as a whole resulting from prostitution pretty much any way you organize society
gyrofry posted:The court said it will strike the word “prostitution” from the definition of "common bawdy-house,"what remains i wonder
iirc a crackhouse is a bawdy house
e: nope im wrong
Section 197(1) defines the relevant terms. “Common bawdy-house” means a place that is kept or occupied, or resorted to by one or more persons, for the purpose of prostitution or to practise acts of indecency. Courts have interpreted this to mean that any defined space is capable of being a bawdy-house, from a hotel, to a house, to a parking lot – provided that there is frequent or habitual use of it for the purposes of prostitution or for the practice of acts of indecency,(18) and the premises are controlled or managed by prostitutes or individuals with a right or interest in that space.(19) Further, the test used to determine whether an act is indecent is a community standard of tolerance.(20) Within this framework, the interpretation of indecency will depend on context, taking into account factors such as consent, the composition of any audience and the level of privacy of the room, community reputation of the place, and any harm caused.(21) For example, if the room is private, or if there is no actual physical contact between a client and an entertainer, then an act is less likely to be labelled “indecent.”(22)
so a bawdy house is now a premise kept for the purposes of conducting indecent acts excluding prostitution i guess
Edited by shennong ()
Groulxsmith posted:
i think there are largely irreversible personal problems as well as costs to society as a whole resulting from prostitution pretty much any way you organize society
you could say the same thing about professional football or coltan mining, tho
i don't really wanna get too far into this because i think that people should have a right to exist without having their minds and bodies exploited for another person's pleasure or profit, and i doubt anyone would chose any sort of sex work if they already had a guarantee of basic sustenance, so it's all sort of a moot argument that i probably wouldn't have started if that rad woman had wanted to go on a second date with me... but if you've got nothing better to do, i would be down to hear you expand on the "costs to society" thang
Crow posted:
Wtf don't speak ill of imppy, he barely evenposts ffs
thank you. i really need some advocates on this site before my confidence is restored to post again
Impper posted:Crow posted:
Wtf don't speak ill of imppy, he barely evenposts ffsthank you. i really need some advocates on this site before my confidence is restored to post again
Great post, Impper!
Upvoted!
Impper posted:Crow posted:
Wtf don't speak ill of imppy, he barely evenposts ffsthank you. i really need some advocates on this site before my confidence is restored to post again
impper wheres that story you wrote about the marquis de sade. i need it to back up my constant assertions that you are a good writer in the face of the abject failure that was "Fuck and Destroy"
i realize that this argument is used by false allies of feminism who want to legitimize prostitution, such as mark ames, who uses it to deter debate about his unrepentant serial rape of prostitutes while living in russia. but i do not think their particular disingenuous use of the argument invalidates it, because the argument is not inherently pro-prostitution. i think the only way the argument could be invalidated would be if someone could show that the legal regime against prostitution was effective in prosecuting the pimps and johns, caused appreciable damage to global sex trafficking, and helped women escape the social and material circumstances that drove them to prostitution.
*just kidding i dont really know anyone. but they keep existing all over my facebook
discipline posted:
glad to know it's easier for johns to rape women in toronto
dude cool it my name is john and i dont appreciate you semiotically contributing to my oppression of being associated with prosititue users
littlegreenpills posted:
there's a lot of people i know*, egregiously female and patently non prostitute using people, who are celebrating this like crazy and bill themselves as radical feminists
i think there are a lot of people who think you can have the sex industry in a sanitized and tolerable way but i dunno if that's reasonable.
Crow posted:
While tom is anti-communist due to various fat-related reasons, noavbazzer is anti-communist simply by virtue of his general rapey demeanor
why are you anti-communist Crow
GoldenLionTamarin posted:Crow posted:
While tom is anti-communist due to various fat-related reasons, noavbazzer is anti-communist simply by virtue of his general rapey demeanorwhy are you anti-communist Crow
I'm anti-communist because I'm a fuckin Idiot!
Impper posted:
a little-known law of communism is when idiots and morons are outlawed, only idiots and morons are the outlaws
yeah? what about the people who broke the other laws? are you simultaneously annulling every other law? please clarify
Meursault posted:
John can also be used to refer to a toilet.
you would know that, wouldnt you.