Sex Worker Safety and Craigslist
» Sex Workers
In Chicago the police study Craiglist’s Adult Services ads and see what the masseur or escort is actually offering:
“We’ve never gone away from the meet that we’ve engaged a person in without an arrest because it’s never been just a massage or a legitimate escort service all the ads we’ve done on the computer on Craigslist have been for prostitution.”
Despite the name recognition and media attention Craiglist is only one website:
“We could put people here doing this 24 hours a day seven days a week… this is just one site, and there are many, many other sites that provide escorts for people.”
Web Site’s Promises To Eliminate Prostitution Advertisements Fall Short
In the greater Washington DC metropolitan area:
“Life is expensive,” said Amy, who like hundreds of other women in the Washington area moved ads from Craigslist’s defunct erotic services section to its new “adult services” listings in the past week. “In this economy, you have no idea what it takes. We’re all single mothers, struggling beyond belief.”
Online Sex Connections Linked to False Sense of Security
Trying to stop sex workers from selling their services will never succeed. Lecturing them on safety is no real help. The only way to make a prostitute’s life safer is to legalize sex work. That way the trade can be practiced more safely in the open.