Guests are two major researchers and activists in the area of sex trade abolition:

Melissa Farley, the founder of Prostitution Research and Education (PRE), which she founded 25 years ago. PRE’s goal is to abolish the institution of prostitution while at the same time advocating for alternatives to trafficking and prostitution – including emotional and physical healthcare for women in prostitution.

Taina Bien-Aimé is the executive director of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW), one of the oldest international organizations dedicated to preventing the trafficking and sexual exploitation (online and off) of women and girls through legal advocacy, raising awareness and partnerships with sex trade survivors around the world.

We will be discussing the extensive research based on interviews with women around the world who work in, or have worked in, the sex trade and what they have to say about actual conditions of their lives and its effects on their well being and emotional health.

We'll address the claims of advocates for full decriminalization of the sex trade -- including pimps, managers and other profiteers -- vs what is known as the Nordic Model, which decriminalizes the women who, by and large, are forced to sell their bodies in order to survive -- but maintains criminalization/sanctions for those who buy women (johns) and those who are managers (pimps). My guests will challenge the contention that prostitution/sex work is a "job like any other".

Countries that have adopted the Nordic Model are: Norway, Iceland, Canada, Northern Ireland, France, Ireland, Israel (and the state of Maine in the U.S.A.)/ Countries that have adopted decriminalization are: New Zealand, Germany, the Netherlands and Thailand. We'll look at the results in countries adopting one or the other approach, specifically focusing on whether the sex trade has grown or shrunk as a result of either.

We'll also discuss the real history of the "oldest profession" myth in the context of prostitution having been introduced to many indigenous cultures, where it did not exist previously, by Western colonization.

And we'll also look at current pending legislation in New York State: Two different bills--the Stop the Violence in the Sex Trades Act and the Sex Trade Survivors Justice and Equality Act -- which decriminalizes the women in the sex industry, and offers concrete support for women who want to exit the sex industry (most women polled) and retains criminalization or sanctions on johns, pimps and other profiteers and managers and the Stop the Violence in the Sex Trades Act, which seeks to enact complete decriminalization including of pimps and johns.

We'll also look at the position of the up and coming Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and Mayor Zohran Mamdani which supports the position of complete decriminalization and compare it to earlier socialist approaches to prostitution.

The Equality Model advocates believe that prostitution causes damage to those in it and it can never be made safe and its existence makes women’s human right to equality with men a distant pipe dream. Vast sums of money are made from the heinous trade in (mostly) women’s and children’s bodies and this leads inexorably to sex trafficking.
And that it is time to make it clear that buying human beings for sex is unacceptable and to create criminal sanctions that discourage people from doing it. They further say: We do not want to criminalise people. We want to change behaviour. And for those who are in it, we want to provide support to help them make a new life outside it.

We will be taking your phone calls in the second half of the show at (212) 209-2877.