Sex work gets the green light

A judge has decided that Canada's anti-prostitution laws are unconstitutional. Here are some thoughts on the latest ruling on the oldest profession.

Thanks to an Ontario Superior Court ruling, somewhere between breakfast and bedtime yesterday prostitution, the profession both practiced and condemned since the dawn of civilization, became decriminalized. The crux of the ruling was that the harm criminalization does to prostitutes outweighs the harm prostitution does to society.

Justice Susan Himel’s ruling “struck a blow for sane legislation,” says a National Post editorial. Existing laws are completely contradictory, argues the Post, particularly the ban on communicating for the purposes of prostitution (aimed at eliminating streetwalking) and the ban on keeping a bawdy house (which forces hookers onto the streets). “Prostitution is not called the oldest profession for nothing,” say the Post editors, and “it’s vastly preferable that prostitution be conducted in safe, controlled, monitored and legal surroundings.”

The ink was barely dry on Himel’s ruling when the Post's Barbara Kay issued this condemnation of it. The ruling will have no effect on the safety of women, she says, because “high-end prostitutes already know how to look after themselves, while low-end prostitutes are usually just trying to get from one drug fix to another.” She says decriminalization will not lead the most vulnerable women to screen their clients or spend money renting a safe place to work because they are too desperate. And you can practically hear sex worker advocates across the country screaming at their computers after reading this statement: “Being a prostitute is a shameful, indecent activity … any sex worker who demands respect as a matter of course is fooling herself. She is not respectable.”

The Globe and Mail says “Canada should be prepared to liberalize its laws on prostitution, and to take into account the safety of (prostitutes). But that is a job for elected legislators, not a judge.” The government “is in a far better position to listen to all the evidence, including how Canadians think and feel about the issue” than Himel, who showed “arrogance … of a large order” in disregarding the harm done to by-standers, children, and neighbourhoods by the profession.