Teenagers offer cheap sex (New Zealand prostitution)

New Zealand Herald ^ | 7/10/04 | STEPHEN COOK

[wagglebee]

A year after a law change designed to get prostitutes off the street, a price war driven by teenage sex workers has flared up on the streets of South Auckland.

Market forces appear to be driving street prostitution as teenagers, some as young as 12, compete alongside seasoned sex workers - with tumbling prices the result.

Rather than pushing sex workers into legalised brothels, a Weekend Herald inquiry has found the new legislation has done little to discourage street prostitution.

This is especially true in pockets of South Auckland, where the Manukau City Council has been forced to shelve plans to ban sex workers from the street because of legal advice that the move might breach the Bill of Rights and the one-year-old Prostitution Reform Act.

While there is no hard evidence of an explosion of child prostitution since the decriminalisation of the industry a year ago, there have been reports of teenagers selling themselves for as little as $20.

"We can't expect to get $100 when these young things are offering it for much less just around the corner," said South Auckland prostitute, Cindy, who has been working the streets for 15 years.

Prostitutes spoken to by the Weekend Herald on the streets of South Auckland this week say that young streetworkers are muscling in on their patch and undercutting the competition by offering sex at less than a quarter of the usual price.

Where once a sex worker could expect $100 for her services, many were having to settle for $20 - or even less for oral sex.

Mama Tere Strickland, a transgender former sex worker who runs social agency Te Aronga Hou, said the streets of South Auckland had become "a highway of cheap love" with girls being coerced into the business by "pimp" boyfriends.

"These kids know there is a demand out there so they see themselves as prized possessions," Strickland said. "I am not exaggerating. It's a virtual free-for-all in South Auckland. These kids have no hope and no futures."

Many came from backgrounds of abuse and were out there to escape domineering parents and make a few bucks to feed their habits.

Decriminalisation had done nothing to deter young sex workers. Although soliciting was still illegal for anyone under the age of 18, it was nearly impossible to know who was of age, Strickland said.

Teri, a South Auckland prostitute who has been plying her trade for 20 years, said the street scene had changed dramatically in the past 12 months. The streets were now predominantly occupied by teenagers eager to make fast money.

But Auckland Prostitutes Collective head Kate Dickie was sceptical of suggestions that decriminalisation of the industry had led to aggressive competition on the streets. "Charging less does not mean more work. It just means you work harder for the same money."

Her colleague, Annah Pickering, a spokesperson for the collective's Outreach programme, said streetworkers made up only 8 per cent of the Auckland sex trade.

However, she often saw 14 and 15-year-old girls on the streets. Most were Maori and Pacific Islanders and came from homes where there was mental, physical and sexual abuse.

"For them it is about survival. It can be safer on the streets for these kids than it is in their own homes."

Inspector Bruce Bird of the South Auckland police said there were possibly slightly more prostitutes on the streets since the industry was decriminalised a year ago. But from a policing perspective there were the same issues in terms of dealing with crime and disorder.

"Unfortunately, prostitution does attract undesirables, which in turn creates more crime and disorder," he said.

[Southack]

"The leftist in America should understand that this is what will happen if their plans to legalize prostitution in an effort to make it "safer" succeed."

Prostitution has been legal here in Alabama for the last 200 years, yet you'd be hard-pressed to find a single hooker if you drove around all night.

It's not the law. It's what is in your heart.

The boom in prostitution hasn't come *because* of the change in laws, but rather, becuase the liberal culture is convincing children to pursue paths that are dangerous to them.

Even in this article, if you read between the lines, you can see that what they are complaining about is that *children* are now charging for sex.

Forget laws. When should parents ever let *children* do such things? No sane parent would...which means that the parents are either missing or not sane.

So focusing on the *law* itself takes your eye off of the ball. The law isn't the problem...society (or the breakdown of it) is. Thus, the problem is far deeper than merely some new change in a law.

There has been a change in society, and not for the better.

[weegee]

It's not that children are being sexually exploited that bothers them, it is that capitalism is thriving in a nation that is trying its hardest to go socialist.

The Sex Positive Agenda seeks to have people sexually active at every age (abstinence is "unhealthy" in their eyes because it is a suppression of desires).

[wagglebee]

I agree completely. The "sexual" revolution, sex education in schools and biggest of all, eight grueling years of Clinton has taught young people that sex is merely a part of life. Kids are taught to experiment with all types of sex (especially homosexuality), in order to establish a sexual "identity." It's sickening, and without a real attitudinal change in society, it is likely to get worse.

[Bonaparte]

"Charging less does not mean more work. It just means you work harder for the same money."

If a prostitute charges $40 for a BJ and can serve up as many as 36 of them in a 6 hour period, she potentially makes $1440 in a 6-hour period of time.

36 customers X $40 = $1440

If another prostitute charges only $20 for a BJ and also works a "6-hour shift," she must serve twice as many customers per hour in order to make the same money.

72 customers X $20 = $1440

The second prostitute has worked harder for the same money.

[Willie Green]

The second prostitute has worked harder for the same money.

But the quality of the service has diminished from 10 minutes each to only 5.

[Texas Eagle]

Sex workers? Are you kidding me?

[xm177e2]

The leftist in America should understand that this is what will happen if their plans to legalize prostitution in an effort to make it "safer" succeed.

Bulls---.

The problem is that the police have decided not to crack down on streetwalkers. A combination of legalizing prostitution in registered brothels and a hard-line approach to streetwalkers would work fine (and it is working well in Nevada).

[weegee]

She's going to find more "Johns" at $20 than she will at $40 (actually $100). She may have had to stand on the corner for 8 hours to make that kind of money (how many hours were spent just waiting for a John with money to come by?).

You also forget that quite often they are addicts. They work long enough to get a fix and maybe some food. They don't do this because it is a glamorous lifestyle or because they are nymphos.

I doubt that they are pulling thousands in a day on the street. Likely, they used to be able to get enough money after 2 or 3 tricks and now they must work longer to get the same money for a fix/rent/etc.

[Alas Babylon!]

Prostitution has been legal here in Alabama for the last 200 years, yet you'd be hard-pressed to find a single hooker if you drove around all night.

Really? Try driving down South Boulevard tonight in Montgomery. And I believe it is illegal. They showed cops busting hookers and pimps on MPD (like the show Cops, but featuring the Montgomery PD) recently.

[weegee]

When I've gone to Vegas (1999-2003) I've seen prostitutes walking the strip (they won't speak first but they will eye you) and I've seen the silent men handing out escorts cards and publications.

I've also heard that many of the casino dance clubs (which charge upwards of $20 for men to enter) have a large number of prostitutes who come in (ladies are permitted free at these bars). I didn't visit any of them (big name dance clubs too) so I did not personally observe them. My friends and I did see some women who seemed to be prostitutes at the hotel bar.

I doubt that all prostitution occurs outside of the Vegas city limits (as required by law). It is also not the perception I got from the locals I talked to.

[antiRepublicrat]

Looks like the market is picking its price.

[cyborg]

That's exactly what it is, something like the UN 'Sex for Food' program.

[jocon307]

LOL, that is a good old joke!

[DannyTN]

The Liberal Delimma......

Right to Privacy = Whore Free Trade

[k2blader]

Prostitution has been legal here in Alabama for the last 200 years

This link indicates otherwise: Alabama Prostitution Law. Please do correct me if I'm wrong.

It's not the law. It's what is in your heart.

Exactly.

[antiRepublicrat]

On the other hand, when it is really tried (as Guiliani did with Times Square), prostitution can be reduced.

Or when it is really tried, as in Holland, legalized prostitution can be pretty safe. Pimping, underage and slave-trade prostitution is still illegal, and all enforcement concentrates on those, leaving the regular working girls alone.

[William Tell]

Southack said: "Prostitution has been legal here in Alabama for the last 200 years..."

I didn't know that.

Is it only legal in licensed brothels? That seems unlikely if it has been legal for 200 years.

Is it similarly legal in any neighboring states or is Alabama unique in this respect? If unique, is there some history that would explain this?

[Southack]

Pimps are illegal in Alabama, and several cities (plus at least one county) outlaw prostitution itself here, but statewide it's legal.

Always has been.

Always will be.

But the great irony is that you'll find the hookers in those few areas where it is against the law. Again, it isn't the law that has anything to do with it; it's what is in hearts and minds. Those are the areas where society has broken down...the law is merely a band-aid attempt to patch up something more *fundamental* that is already broken.

[crz]

GOOD! Do they keep ALL prostitutes off the streets?

[Southack]

Yeah, I had heard something about that bill (which passed the legislature in some form). Don't recall if the Governor signed it back in 2001 or if it got bottled up in parliamentary procedures or what, though. There was some talk that it's final version only applied to one county, anyway.