In the Business Insider article, Erin Fuchs suggests her arguments to support the idea of the legalization of prostitution. According to the author, decriminalization of sex work can benefit the safety of the women involved in prostitution as well as provide financial gain to the state and the local communities through legal taxation. The article illustrates the positive outcomes of the legalization in the example of Nevada, where prostitution is allowed and well-regulated. While some points made in the article seem plausible, for instance, the fact that women in prostitution who work in licensed brothels have the choice to perform safe sex and have easier access to health care, the issue of the origin of prostitution is not addressed at all.
From the perspective of the critical discourse analysis, the article presents a telling example of how the written text maintains the current people’s beliefs and expectations regarding gender inequality and its particular manifestation – prostitution. According to Norman Fairclough, “discourse is shaped by relations of power and ideologies”, and it has “constructive effects upon social identities, social relations and systems of knowledge and belief” (as cited in Mills, 2004, p. 133). The discussed article constructs and sustains the view, according to which prostitution is seen as a work just the same as any other profession and not as a result of economic and gender oppression. For that purpose, the author uses phrases like “the world’s oldest profession” (Fuchs, 2013, para. 1), “part of our culture in the United States” (Fuchs, 2013, para. 20), which persuade the reader to see the phenomenon of prostitution as something that is simply there and not as a consequence of the certain relations of power and hierarchies in the society.
I agree with the first response as it reasonably points out some defects of the article, for instance, its scarcity of credible sources. Adding more references to the results of researches carried out on the subject of prostitution would have benefited the reliability of the overall message of the article. The author of the first response rightfully indicates that while presenting the scary statistics on the cases of violence against women involved in illegal prostitution, the article fails to provide any statistics concerning those working in licensed brothels. Any actual data could have backed up the article’s arguments about the advantages of legalized prostitution. Finally, I agree with the statement made in the first response that legalization does not necessarily eliminate the violence and coercion from prostitution.
As for the second response, the author makes a good observation that the article is written with a certain audience in mind – those who already support the legalization of prostitution and just look for reinforcement of their beliefs. The author of the article doesn’t seem to bother with giving much thought to the arguments of those who oppose the legalization. Had the author chosen to present those arguments and suggest her counterarguments, the article could have possibly persuaded more people that legalization provides benefits to women involved in prostitution. The second response raises the issue of different views on prostitution in different countries. Yet, to support its claim the article only gives examples of countries where prostitution is legalized.
References
Fuchs, E. (2013). 7 reasons why America should legalize prostitution. Business Insider. Web.
Mills, S. (2004). Discourse. The new critical idiom (2nd ed.). London, England: Routledge.