What should the legal status of prostitution be?

Decriminalisation would relieve prostitution's stigma

Question: What should the legal status of prostitution be?
Position‹2 of 4›: Prostitution should be decriminalised
Argument‹7 of 7: Decriminalisation would relieve prostitution's stigma

By decriminalising prostitution, we can eliminate the stigma attached to prostitution.

The argument

The argument turns on what criminal law communicates rather than on what it enforces. The stigma attached to sex work, proponents argue, is not an incidental attitude but an active cause of harm: it perpetuates the marginalisation of sex workers and in doing so increases their vulnerability, because a person held in public contempt is a person less able to seek protection, report violence or be believed when they do. Stigma also has a severe negative impact on sex workers' dignity and self-respect, which is a harm in its own right and not only through its consequences. Making sex work illegal, on this account, gives credence to those attitudes. A prohibition is not a neutral instrument; it is an official statement that the conduct it forbids is unacceptable, and the public reads it as confirmation that the contempt is warranted. By keeping prostitution illegal, the state is therefore signalling that this stigma is necessary and legitimate, and every other institution that deals with sex workers takes its cue from that signal. The second step is the claim that the prohibition does not deliver what would justify this cost. The stigma attached to prostitution does not discourage people from entering the profession, since the circumstances that lead people into sex work are not addressed by making it shameful. What it does instead is shame those who are already sex workers, which is to say that the burden falls entirely on the population the law is nominally intended to reduce. Decriminalisation is therefore presented as a change in what the state says as much as in what it permits. Removing the criminal designation would demonstrate that sex workers are considered as worthy of rights as any other person, and would withdraw the official endorsement on which their marginalisation currently rests.

Context

Stigmatisation has far reaching negative effects, leading to a loss of quality of life as well as declines in mental and physical health.

Premises

[P1]The stigma attached to sex work marginalises sex workers, increases their vulnerability, and harms their dignity—and keeping it illegal lends that stigma credence and legitimacy. [P2] Criminalisation does not discourage people from entering the profession; it only shames those already in it, whereas decriminalisation would signal that sex workers deserve rights like anyone else. [C] Therefore, because decriminalisation would relieve prostitution's stigma, prostitution should be decriminalised.

Counter-arguments

The stigma against prostitution is necessary if prostitution is to be eradicated. The stigma is important, not to shame sex workers, but so that young people do not view prostitution as a viable career choice.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P2] The stigma against sex workers does not have a negative impact; it is necessary to discourage women from entering prostitution and assuming the risks involved.