Help us with the Turn off the Blue Lights Campaign - Your comments required urgently

[sterotypicalusername]

Hi.
While I may have points in opinion to legalising or non criminalisation of clients i'm sure they've already been put on this thread already far more eloquently than I could. Thusly I shall try keep this succint.

As for myself if it were criminalised then it's possible I would stop using escorts but most likely I'd just become more sporadic in my usage. Without the safety of at least some organisation such as ei to give me any warnings of who i would be picking up, their affiliations (if any) with organised crime, girls with known, possibly dangerous veneral diseases. By criminalising the modicum of regulations that have arisen, through the goodwill and work or regulators and moderators on ei, you are effectively handing the industry to illegal organisation. An industry, by the by, which is as old as civilisation.

As for the safety of the women/male sex workers? I can only surmise to this but would not a place where escorts can indulge in herd safety be a good thing. Where they can congregate freely without judgement or prejudice and discuss the dangers.( I believe the escorts do indeed have private forums where they discuss time wasters/dangerous or threatening clients and possible doctors/ money management etc etc et al. To drive this underground is to effectively disband it.
It's like....I used work as a security guard in a retail chain when younger. Now we had walky talkys to other guards for the same company in my town which we used to call for help if needed or ask for advice if suspicious of certain individuals. Also there was certain characters who travelled shop to shop with the sole purpose of shop lifting. If one person who was aware of them saw these 'characters' they called and warned everyone in the company in different shops. Even those in rival companies. What you essentially propose is to take away the walky talkies and yet you don't see any downside?
Maybe not so succint

[Liberty Love]

I did not even start touring Norway or Sweden until after the law was changed there... I love working up there as clients nice , clean, polite and pay well. I think I will be booking flights soon..

[trugent]

Criminalising the purchase of sex will do nothing for the safety of escorts, nothing for the safety of women who are not escorts and nothing to deter the very small number of evil men in our society who set out to harm women.

My own experience is that I am a middle aged man with a good job. I spend time with escorts to enjoy adult escapism - a short time when I can remove myself from the pressures of the real world and live in a world of relaxation and enjoyment. With the internet available to arrange these meetings, I can do this with absolute discretion - the only people who know about my meetings are myself and the escort. I take my responsibilities in these arrangements very seriously. I would not stay with an escort who I felt was in any way uncomfortable with my being there. I would not stay with an escort who I thought had not been personally involved in arranging the meeting. I would not stay with an escort who was not the lady in the photographs I had seen on the website. If I felt an escort was in any way scared or unhappy I would look to give her support (though I would be wary of the Garda responding sympathetically to her or me).

I will stop meeting escorts if I am to be treated as a criminal.

But would those men less balanced and less responsible than myself see this as a disincentive - those who may end up in certain circumstances harming women. I think not.

Protection of women starts with enabling them to take care of themselves discreetly, such as being able to work in groups of two or three and enabling them to set up a self managed and self regulated registration and safety monitoring system. It involves discreet and sympathetic policing that is aimed at their protection.

This law is based purely on poorly thought out morality. What makes my meetings with escorts more morally reprehensible than me touring bars trying to intoxicate married womed with alcohol and lure them into adultery. What makes my meetings with escorts less morally responsible than me finding a naive and innocent young lady - wining and dining her with an aim of luring her into my bed.

This law is a proposal based on lazy thinking and unwillingness to do the right thing instead of the easy thing. It will be counter productive.

[scatlover]

If you can get your hands on yesterday's Sunday Independent, go to page 22 in Life magazine - "red light alert."
I've used escorts in Amsterdam, the U.S., Thailand, the U.K. Hungary and Ireland. I only encountered one, (in London,) who seemed very uncomfortable with what she was (going) to do. I just made my excuses and left. Any escort I encountered was doing it for her own ends/variation on an existing career/was highly sexed/curious. Some operated from virtual cupboard size premises and some had the luxury of 5 star accomodation. Some were loving, charming, adventurous, real g.f.e. and you'd want to run away with them. Some were cold and indifferent (particularly those in those high rise "purpose built" blocks in Cologne, Germany. The most natural (and cheapest) operated from government controlled facilities in Bangkok. It felt more like a spa/health club than a brothel. This latter option is obviously the way to go. All up front and, in your face, so to speak. So there would be no more photoshop camera lies, or lies about services offered/favourites which curiously become withdrawn as soon as you've parted with your hard-earned readies. I've been robbed, cheated, lied to and deceived by escorts, in the MAIN in Ireland. Or they have been cold, indifferent or downright rude, just wanting to get my money. I have no desire to abuse any of them and I look forward to meeting more of the loving engaging nurturing and exciting type. The only way is to legalise and, Ireland inc., "DO IT PROPERLY!". Unfortunately the dominance of organised religion and the stuffed shirts that go with it will attempt to criminalise/drive it underground which will be followed by the predictable hand-wringing when it all goes pear shaped. BLOODY PURITANS!! Think we're an advanced and progressive society....think again. Ireland was always a mess morally, now it's a financial mess as well.
A couple of weeks ago, Tony Bates writing for the health supplement of the Irish Times wrote a piece entitled "Turn off the red light." Same old puritanical and backward thinking - but hey what the hell would he know as a "mental health" specialist...? When he gets stressed he claims the best relief is for him to pack his bags and "head for my log cabin in Colorado, U. S." Well that's handy advice....now if everyone had one of those...

[espresso]

First off may I say well done to the publicity TOTBL has gotten over the last week. Condradulations all involved put in a lot of hard work.

May I recommend contacting the Heaving Herald either as part of TOTBL or as individual sexworkers

In the last two days they have printed two anti sexwork/escorting/prostitution stories
One dealing with trafficking and one today which is just a PR piece for Ruhama

http://www.herald.ie/national-news/t...e-2617992.html

I don't know if the paper like the irish Times has picked a side yet but we need to get our message accruals

[vampir]

We need escorts and the escorts need us.
We can not live without escort,and the escort can not live/work without us
We need each other

[Jack in the Box]

If the people on the Turn off the red light side are emailing TD's and senators then we need to do the same. The more of us that do this the better.