Eric Shaw Quinn

The good folks at Craig’s List are shuttering their Adult Services section. They have apparently come under a great deal of pressure over the potential issue of prostitution in their pages suborning the hideous human trafficking prostitution fosters.
So, that’s the solution? The way to end human trafficking is to cut a $36 million revenue stream from a website? Really? And if we don’t teach sex education in schools there’ll be no more teen pregnancy ’cause the kids just won’t know what to do.
Is anyone else sick of letting the world be run by morons?
Prostitution is only illegal because it’s against the law. That’s it. All of the ills of prostitution stem from the fact that it is illegal. If you want to end human trafficking, make prostitution legal, license it and tax it. We could use the income to pay for the schools we’re closing and perhaps teach a few future prostitutes some other career options.
The problem with legislating morality is that it creates crime.
The hideous drug cartels, the destruction of Colombia, the growing fissures in Mexico’s stability, the gang violence on our own streets, are all bought and paid for with our tax dollars. No one has stopped doing drugs. Prostitution is booming. And we’re spending zillions fighting a war to enforce unenforceable laws.
Sure murder is out. Stealing, still not okay. There’s plenty of stuff that needs to be against the law. But when people are making a choice about their own lives, what business is it of mine?
With all this talk of smaller government and getting Washington out of our lives, this seems like the perfect place to start. Not only does it eliminate a whole class of criminals, it takes away their funding. Plus, regulating and licensing the trade like any other business could create much needed tax revenue and might just limit the access of younger people.
Would drugs be the same kind of problem in our culture if we couldn’t get them until we were 21? There’d still be addicts, but maybe a few would be spared by making a somewhat more informed choice. As it stands now, no one is spared and only our prisons are thriving.
I think the reason we have these silly antiquated laws is that they create the illusion of control in a world spinning into chaos.
Unemployment: 20%. Banks robbing the country blind with usurious interest and fees while refusing to loan money to restart the economy they destroyed. Oil wells in the gulf popping like firecrackers on the fourth while corrupt politicians cry out against a moratorium on drilling until we can do it safely. Two endless and pointless wars that have bankrupted the country and damaged the lives of the thousands of young men and women we’ve sent to fight them. A national spirit of selfishness so intense that we’d let the poor go without medical care and destroy public education rather than pay our taxes.
Yeah, end human trafficking by closing the adult page on Craig’s List, that should fix it.

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