John Stossel: 'Who Owns Your Body?'

Source:John Stossel- on prostitution.

"I confront a prostitute, a pimp, and an anti-prostitution crusader." 

Source:John Stossel

I'm going to paraphrase political humorist P.J. O'Rourke on this: I'm very conservative socially in the sense that I live a conservative lifestyle. I don't even smoke tobacco or drink alcohol, not even beer, for crying out loud. I don't gamble or even go to casinos. And no, I'm not even religious at all so its not because of some strong religious beliefs why I don't do these things. But instead I don't enjoy these activities and I don't like what tobacco and alcohol do to people, I don't want to become a gambling junky who either has collectors constantly on my ass (if not up my ass) or can't pay his bills because I'm out of money and looking for my next big score at some card game.

And no, I would never even contemplate selling by body for sex or buying sex. I rather listen to a Donald Trump marathon of speeches with him telling everybody how fabulous he is and perhaps end up in coma because of how boring those speeches are. But that is just me.

Again to paraphrase P.J. O'Rourke: just because someone is socially conservative as far as how they live, doesn't mean they believe they have the wisdom and knowledge to run everyone else's lives for them. And be in charge of a national adult day care center telling people when they should go to bed, wake up, eat their meals, what they can eat, who they can talk to and about what and how they talk to people.

Being a social conservative means someone who lives conservatively. Not someone who is so hardcore fundamentalist with their religious beliefs that they believe they know exactly how everyone else should live as well. Even to the point that they would force their religious and cultural beliefs on everyone else though government force. 

I might be a social conservative when it comes to lifestyle, but I'm a Liberal when it comes to my political beliefs, as someone who bases all his views not just on politics, but everyone else in life based on the best available facts and evidence. My views are based on reason, not faith.

Prostitution like every other activity in life that comes with risk and in prostitution's case a lot of risk as far as the people you work with, go to bed with and the clients you deal with, but like gambling, tobacco, alcohol, pornography, certain plastic surgeries, are things that have been around forever and are never going to disappear. They'll always be with us whether they're legal or not. So the question then becomes what should be done about them.

Do we put people in jail simply because they're personally involved in activities that aren't good for them and as a result create a gigantic nanny state that makes the Communist Republic of North Korea and the Islamic Republic of Iran, look like thriving first world liberal democracies, or do we legalize these activities so we can make them as safe as possible and no longer allow people who work in these activities avoid paying the taxes that everyone else hates to pay (except Socialists) but pays, because these workers are involved in illegal dangerous activities . And are obviously afraid to report their income. That is the question when it comes to prostitution or any other dangerous activity in America. 

You can also see this post at FreeState Now, on Blogger.