Title: Why is prostitution illegal? - The Straight Dope
Headings: Why is prostitution illegal?
Why is prostitution illegal?
Content: Well, maybe Bill Gates isn’t.) The legacy of the antiprostitution campaign is perhaps a little less positive. In the 19th century prostitution, while not always legal, was tolerated in most of the world as a necessary evil. Enlightened opinion — enlightened male opinion, anyway — held that hey, boys will be boys, and men will be animals. The best we can do is regulate prostitution, including health inspections, licensing of brothels, etc. But in English-speaking countries the regulatory impulse was countered by growing sentiment that prostitution was evil, period, and ought to be suppressed. Middle-class women played a leading role in the antiprostitution movement, arguing that prostitution threatened family life. Sympathetic journalists suggested that prostitutes were the principal carriers of venereal disease, then thought to be rampant. ( Prior to the advent of effective treatment in the early 20th century, VD was certainly no trivial matter.) The abolitionists ultimately carried the day.