But I have seen the difference in the sleaze factor between legalized and outlawed prostitution. I just returned from Beatty, Nevada, where I was one of several curious reporters who visited a legal "cathouse." We had the opportunity to ask one of "the girls"--that's their term--lots of questions about what they do for a living and how Nevada regulates it.
brothel-still-publishable-smaller-1.JPG I grew up in New York in the 60's and 70's. Scantily-clad Times Square hookers were so bold as to solicit my father as our family of five walked by on the way to the theater. Somewhere in the background was a pimp putting the pressure on them for more "sales." When I moved to Washington, DC in the 1980s, the police seemed to be spending a lot of time and money raiding known prostitution areas.
In Beatty, the brothel is a member of the chamber of commerce. The girls get tested at the local clinic weekly for sexually transmitted diseases, and monthly for AIDS. They pay taxes. None of the prostitutes walks the streets, flaunting her wares where she is not invited. So children are not asking their parents, "Daddy, what did that lady want?"
There may never be another state that legalizes prostitution. But we all know that hookers work in every one of them. Nevada has faced that reality head on and made the "oldest profession" a far less dangerous one for both the girls and their customers. Is that such a bad thing?
photo: Ellen Perlman
