A Closer Look at Prostitution
Published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer
March 12, 2002
Editorial to the Philippine Daily Inquirer
Last week, Labor Secretary Patricio Sto.Tomas called for a review of the anti-prostitution provisions of the Revised Penal Code, a move that could pave the way for the legalization of the sex trade in the country.
She said it was time Congress reviewed the law to find out
“if we could be better off if the practice is out in the open and can be
regulated.” She added: “Women engaging in prostitution are victims
themselves. Many of them are forced into the job due to lack of
opportunities.”
Sto. Tomas’ objective is to bring the problem out into the
open so that commercial sex workers or prostituted women could be protected
from abuses. But like the legalization of divorce, the subject of the
legalization of prostitution is practically taboo in this predominantly
Roman catholic Country.
Prostitution has been with human kind since time
immemorial. It has been called the world’s oldest profession. Most societies
have tried to completely eradicate it, without any success. Prostitution
will exist for as long as men (and women) have a strong sexual urge and will
try to find ways to satisfy it outside the bounds of marriage.
But in some countries prostitution is a growing problem
because of poverty and collateral problems such as an inadequate educational
system, unemployment and lack of opportunities. Taiwan used to be such one
country until it became prosperous. In the 1950s and 1960s prostitution
flourished in a Taiwan that was just beginning from the economic devastation
of the Pacific War. Prostituted women were available almost everywhere- in
resorts, hotels, bars, restaurants, ”beauty salons” and “barber shops”.
Prostitution became less of a problem in Taiwan after
agrarian reform brought economic development to the countryside and
industrialization started in the urban areas. Progress reduced the incidence
of poverty, made possible the improvement of the educational system, reduced
unemployment, and opened a lot of opportunities for decent, well-paying jobs
to women, some of whom were formerly engaged in the sex trade.
A similar scenario could take place in the Philippines if
only its leaders would lay aside their preoccupation with politics and
concentrate on the task of economic and social development. In the meantime,
it would not harm anyone if Congress would study how prostituted women could
be given ample protection under the law.
Prostituted women are twice, and sometimes even thrice,
victimized. First, they are victims of the economic and educational
situation. Most of them have had very little education and training and
cannot qualify for decent, well-paying jobs. Second, in the course of their
work, they are victimized and exploited by their “customers” who subject
them to long hours of “use” and make them commit unnatural and perverted
acts. They are also exploited by policemen who require them to render free
services and extort money from them. And third, sometimes they become media
victims, exposed to public shame and humiliation when they are arrested and
bundled off by the police to the police station.
Sto.Tomas’ proposal should prompt the government to take a
closer look at the growing problem of prostitution. Dr. Maggie O’Neill,
writing in the Australian Journal of Sociology, said that “prostitution as
work must be understood alongside the feminization of poverty within the
context of the restructuring of national economies, unemployment and the
growth of a new and poorer underclass.” A wholistic solution to the problem
of poverty in our country should thus include measures that would bring down
the incidence of prostitution.
Prostitution should also be viewed as violence against
women and children, since the majority of commercial sex workers in our
country are women and children. To be sure, there is a very small fraction
of sex workers who are in this occupation by choice. But for a great many of
them, prostitution is one of the very few choices open to them because of
the peculiar circumstances of inadequacy of education, poverty,
unemployment, and lack of opportunities in our country. If Sto.Tomas’
controversial proposal would result in focusing more attention on these
problems, then it would have achieved some good. [END]
