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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 15, 1999)
e Battalion o PINION Page 9 • Monday, February 15, 1999 J-’Wother spin on sex and the government ^legalization Prostitution bad for country’s (prostitution moral fabric, societal values oodfor nation 1 Brendan GUY ,a H iresp HJSTON (AP. ey undenve: ay for a left; vill keep him the Houstoncannot ext three to:. :1 fathom a brief news A how the afterno e could physician : ok that said the king anoth- ve damaged auman be- exactly as pit feel good oming into a fee could ;ood) shape :’ degrading , to help treir,: demeaning, ■hab," Lower ess it is degrading to make other iple feel good.” — Norma Jean A'ay. nodovar, a former Los Angeles u Kukoc ledt ice officer turned prostitute, lints and 1 There is no rational reason for , vvhohadsti: existing laws against prostitu- revious losse; i. Such laws, like most laws was theoniv tinst consensual activity, are louble figure; ;ed on outdated moral ideas and ierally do far more harm than )d to both individuals and to so- ty.Bo why, in a society that ims to value freedom and capital- 1, is a simple economic transac- i that does not hurt anyone ille- 7 ^Malized prostitution would be ulated prostitution. It would fall der [the jurisdiction of zoning ight between l /s and health regulations. Licens- he winner ‘requirements would be able to on unbeatenli pBut the diseased, the addicted lix Trinidad 1 the under-aged, ker on Si.Regular medical examinations on Square C: uldjhelp keep brothels free of 'active. :ually transmitted diseases, and it V, uld be taxable. lost :Allbf this would help make prostitution (an dec - ustry that is going to exist no matter what La ’ government does to try and shut it down) 199' er, cleaner and a useful source of govern- chairnl revenue. James TM advantages of legalizing prostitution Seveiive Been successfully demonstrated in both supeifeiftch city of Amsterdam and. throughout weiglach pf Nevada, where a recent survey of 535 could al prostitutes found none of them infected to FK HIV. La ■ The disadvantages of criminalizing prostitu- Fjiil - wasting money and time on pointless Hoya orce ment efforts, giving millions of dollars ””“to deli sry rear to organized crime and making the arr. Carr wonkustry needlessly dangerous — have been ai over Frankie nonstrated pretty much everywhere else in ay-per-view caw United States. So again the question is, is & Mack CentffB possible justification can there be for he sixth-round' king prostitution illegal? irne alter Deb One main argument against prostitution is >d Quartey eafiit it is degrading to the people involved in it, De La Hoya argument that could just as easily be ap- tt, ‘Hey, I’m to working at a fast-food joint as to work- aack up and ;i|in|a brothel. Besides, most of what makes I’m not aquittenstitution degrading is a direct consequence ' showed iitit being illegal. ’ said Gil Claulf prostitution was legal, prostitutes would co-trainer. “It fall under the control of abusive pimps, for him. He spat ey yvould not be forced to work in danger- ghting Quartey's s areas where they are easy targets for rape d other violence, and they might even be a Hoya iuartey able to call upon the police for help if they were attacked. Also they would not be subject to the hu miliation of arrest and having a police record that almost precludes finding other employ ment. Those factors make prostitution degrad ing, not the exchanging sex for money. Others attack prostitution for a different rea son: they see it as being immoral. Of course, since modern conservatives seem to think everything is immoral, the question has to be why single out prostitution for criminalization? Is it because prostitution is paying someone to pretend to care about their client? If that is the case, psychiatrists should be locked up in droves. Is it because prostitution causes people to have casual sex? Alcohol causes more casual sex than prostitution ever could — as spending any time among the drunken, horny hordes that descent upon Northgate every weekend demonstrates. Is it because prostitution vio lates some divine law? What is this, a theocracy? The First Amend ment to the Constitution is specifically de signed to keep religious laws from becoming secular ones. Besides, some of the early pagan religions believed prostitutes were sacred; if they had only been better warriors than their Judeo-Christian counterparts there might still be temple prostitutes to this day. Morality is obviously an extremely subjec tive thing that is going to vary from person to ROBERT HYNECEK/The Battalion person. Therefore, the only rational way for a free society to behave is to only criminalize ac tivities that cause direct harm to other people or their property. Since prostitution does neither of these things, or at least it would not if it was decrim inalized, it should not be illegal. Obviqusly people have the right to believe that prostitution is immoral or degrading, but they shopld not have the right to enforce their own beliefs on other people through the legal system. By passing laws against prostitution, much harm l]as been done to both society as a whole and to many individuals. Prostitution is a business like any other, pro viding a service in exchange for money. It has existed for all of recorded history, and as long as humans are sexual beings, it will probably continue to exist. Almost all of the negative effects of prostitu tion come not from the activity itself but from it being illegal. Since legalizing it would enable the government to regulate it (making it safer for both the prostitutes and their clients) there can be no possible justification for the contin ued criminalization of prostitution. As for the people that truly believe prostitu tion is immoral, they should remember that Je sus treated prostitutes as friends not as crimi nals. Brendan Guy is a senior political science and history major. oposed parking permit fee increases need loser examination before implementation ie parking permit [fee increases that are currently before ? Campus Access and Game 1 (FriF ki f§ Task Force are at) - ^1-5 _ Arizcrrrent, amoral and out- WMilo(2-B eOUS ’ , ff - I Fossiim llB 0 weeksa8 °’ offl ' 1 '' 1 iis in the Office of the ^ LEN taxttt^ , . , ice President of Adminis- JANIK 'ame 1 (Sap 1 ^^ anc j p ar i<ing, Traf- “ Anzp arK ) Transportation Services unveiled their W 1 earce 1 Q p 0sa ] to raise parking fees on faculty and L Caplefi’ Jden ts. With increases so dramatic and un- irranted, it is time for the campus bureau- lame 2 (SahF ts lo explain why such an increase is 18-9-AOd. W Russ(l' First, the sheer magnitude of the increase L DigginsO abhorrent. Student garage spaces will in- ea si $144 — a staggering 60 percent hike. Fident-resident and student-commuter per- iree runs in sis its kHI increase $50 — a jump of two- af starter Matt 1 i r ds. Yellow lots will increase by a third, t e d lots will nearly double in price and eI1 notorcycle passes will go up 37 per- • nt. fU If|h° se proposed fee hikes are not enough 1 t? DO an ger Aggies, they only need to be told TUp filPie listurbing fact: According to the task I lie LU this would be the first of three sched- 1EE POOL Hed h' kes - w/student^ students who receive scholarships and purchase of3 f 3 IlS wil1 Quickly see a decrease in the value InesdavNiqht-l! their education as funds previously re- v/ frpo In ninrrved for books now go towards the privi- V y ge of parking on campus. College-acrossfrC 822-079' ■Northgate tradiW As for faculty members, some will have no problem forking over the extra cash, but what about the scores of staff members who make just enough to feed their families? Money will be transferred from groceries to parking permits. It is inevitable for fees to increase. Some have even suggested parking permits deserve to be increased because they have remained constant for several years. However, with such a large increase, some questions must be answered. First, look at the proposed West Campus garage. Are there currently a lack of spaces on West Campus? With shuttle buses running to and from Olson Field and Reed Arena, there are currently more spaces than needed on West Campus. Perhaps then, this garage is for somebody other than the students. To fig ure out why this garage is being built, simply look across Wellborn Road to the football sta dium. The new West Campus garage is nothing more than another football perk for the 12th Man Association, and the proposed Wellborn Road underpass/tunnel a means of ferrying the fat-cat fans to the stadium. Students know more parking is needed on Southside and at Zachry, but this University would rather please its fans than serve its students. There are no classes or dorms near the Student Rec; only a football stadium. To force students to pay for fan parking is simply amoral. To not tell the students about the true nature of the garage is immoral. Despite all the deception this University is T he citi zens of the Unit ed States of America enjoy many free doms: the free dom of speech, free- Brandon dom of religion MULLEN and the right to form militias. But there is a group of people who wish to add the right to legal prostitution to the list. If prostitution were legal ized it would hurt society, as well as the prostitutes themselves. Those in favor of prostitution have a number of seemingly posi tive reasons for its legalization and regulation. Some argue by de criminalizing prostitution, the government could mandate test ing for sexually-transmitted dis eases. It would also save the tax payers money by eliminating the cost of enforcing the current laws. And they point out that if prosti tution were made legal, it — like everything else — could be taxed. The most positive of all these arguments is the ability to test for sexually transmitted diseases. But the U.S. Department of Health re ported that of all cases of STD’s in a year, only 3 to 5 percent are contracted through prostitution. This is a low percentage. It would seem that the majority of prosti tutes and their clients are taking the necessary precautions against infection. Even if the government could test prostitutes, how would they do it? The gestation period for many of these diseases can cause them to go undetected for long periods of time. Would every prostitute be required to be tested every month, week or day? More time allowed between tests would endanger more people with infec tion. Testing could become expen sive if the testing were done fre quently on every prostitute. The cost of testing challenges the pro legalization argument that legal prostitution would be cheaper. In addition to the tests, the bureau cratic costs that would come with the licensing and regulation of prostitution are inestimable. Those in favor of legalization also point to the tax revenue that could be raised by taxing prostitu tion. Prostitution is estimated to be a $14.5 billion a year industry. A great deal of money could be raised by taxing this market, but would it be worth all the negative, that surround prostitutes? The one group of people that is carefully being ignored are the prostitutes themselves. Prostitu tion is not a career choice. More often than not it is a woman’s last choice. And the majority of these women have suffered some type of mental or physical abuse in there lifetime. A survey of prosti tutes in the San Francisco area showed that 75 percent had been physically or sexually abused as children. The women who be come prostitutes have mental scares which blind them from re ality. Legalization would not help these women it would only en courage their self-destructive be havior. In addition, the abuse many prostitutes suffered early in life is also found in their profession. An other survey of prostitutes found that 82 percent had been physical ly assaulted, 83 percent were threatened with a weapon and 68 percent had been raped. There is no amount of regulation that can protect these women when they are alone with their clients. They are putting themselves in the most vulnerable position imagin able. This can be seen by the mental state of prostitutes. It is not a hap py life. The same study revealed that 76 percent of all prostitutes have considered suicide. The peo ple in favor of legalizing prostitu tion give little consideration to the women they are talking about. By keeping prostitution illegal, society has a better chance at re forming these misguided youth. Legalization is not the answer, so ciety can not continue to turn its back on its problems by simply making them legal. The damage legalizing prosti tution would do to society is re flected by the ideas found in Robert Bork’s book, Slouching To ward Gomorrah. Bork points to Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who called this trend “defining deviancy down.” In short, this means that as a society reaches the limit of deviant behavior it can accept, it will redefine what is deviant. In the case of prostitu tion, the practice has become so ingrained in society, those in fa vor of legalization believe it would be easier to legalize it than to continue to persecute it. But Bork finds another trend in our society, “defining deviancy up.” This trend results from the morally upright citizens creating increasingly strict moral codes. Thus, while one side of society is making their standard more re laxed, the other side is tightening theirs. The legalization of prostitution would continue the polarization of American society. As more sins are made acceptable, more people will be drawn to them. Converse ly, an equal number of people will go the opposite direction recog nizing the direction society is go ing. American society would be left with two ideologically op posed sides. Any benefits from le galizing prostitution would not be worth the effect it would have on society. Brandon Mullen is a senior history and English major attempting to pass by the students and facul ty, only one thing can be more outrageous than the fee increase scam — student and faculty apathy. Someone must ask the tough questions. If Aggies are being asked to pay hundreds of extra dollars, the officials who proposed the increases have an obligation to answer every question from the concerned public. How much does the PTTS currently have in reserve funds? Why can the school not sell bonds to raise the funds? How much will the next two increases be? Have any other op tions been explored including not building the facilities? Who is demanding a West Campus parking garage? How will the dorm parking shortages be addressed in light of the fee increases? Until Aggies get answers to these ques tions, all faculty and students have an obliga tion to oppose these increases. With each fee increase, A&M is becoming more unaffordable. Increased economic barri ers to this institution build a wall poor stu dent will not be able to climb. Is parking so important that the University is willing to further the economic segregation of campus? If only white upper-middle class parents can afford A&M, our school will become even further homogenized. What a pleasant vision for 2020 at a “world-class” university — a school valuing the amount of parking for football fans over affordable education for the citizens of Texas. Glenn Janik is a senior political science major. MAIL CALL Greek system not elite “ivory towers” In response to Pablo White’s Feb. 10 mail call. When an Aggie suggests that another group of Texas A&M stu dents are less than Aggies, it is a sad state of affairs. If Pablo White truly believes this, then he needs to seriously reconsider whether he is worthy of being called an Aggie. I was disappointed in White’s opinions concerning our communi ty service efforts. The Greek sys tem donates thousands of dollars each year to worthy charities that benefit many people. It is apparent that White has not spent enough time outside his dorm room. I think it is ludicrous that he thinks Aggie Greeks live in “ivory towers.” Greeks are some of the nicest and friendliest peo ple I know. It is quite obvious that White and his friends have not spent much time around Greeks of A&M. Despite his claims, Greeks respect and participate in many of the rich traditions on A&M. We don’t “rent friends” as some people believe. I have made lasting friendships in my fraternal experience, as I am sure men and women in other Greek organiza tions at Texas A&M have as well. It is true that the Greek system at Texas A&M has not been here since 1876. However, we have been quite productive student or ganizations for over 20 years. We successfully coexist with the rest of the student body at our beloved University. If White and his small group of friends fail to see that, then they need to go back to the Northside dorms and watch their reruns of Star Trek. Andrew C. Davis Class of '98 The Battalion encourages letters to the ed itor. Letters must be 300 words or less and in clude the author’s name, class and phone number. The opinion editor reserves the right to edit letters for length, style and accuracy. Letters may be submitted in person at 013 Reed Mc Donald with a valid student ID. Letters may also be mailed to: The Battalion - Mail Call 013 Reed McDonald Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-1111. Campus Mail: 1111 Fax: (409) 845-2647 E-mail: batt@tamvml.tamu.edu
