Scribd
Upload
159 views

Prostitution in Amsterdam

Prostitution is legal in the Netherlands and regulated at the municipal level. Prostitutes must obtain a license and abide by regulations regarding location, health, and business operations. The police and health services monitor the sex industry and support organizations provide assistance to prostitutes. While prostitution is controversial, some argue that legalizing it improves safety by allowing health checks, protection from abuse, and tax revenue. However, others view it as detrimental to society. In Amsterdam, most prostitution occurs in the Red Light District and includes options like window displays and escort services.

Uploaded by

YOURNIGHTMARES
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
159 views

Prostitution in Amsterdam

Prostitution is legal in the Netherlands and regulated at the municipal level. Prostitutes must obtain a license and abide by regulations regarding location, health, and business operations. The police and health services monitor the sex industry and support organizations provide assistance to prostitutes. While prostitution is controversial, some argue that legalizing it improves safety by allowing health checks, protection from abuse, and tax revenue. However, others view it as detrimental to society. In Amsterdam, most prostitution occurs in the Red Light District and includes options like window displays and escort services.

Uploaded by

YOURNIGHTMARES
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

Prostitution in Amsterdam

Dutch Prostitution Laws


Prostitution is legal in the Netherlands since 1830. Until 1980 there was a law (dating from 1911), forbidding taking profit from
prostitution. This was the law against people exploiting working girls. In practice the law has been rarely applied and prostitutes
were actually not protected. In 1988, prostitution has been recognized as a legal profession. The new law introduced in October
2000 clearly makes prostitution legal, subjecting it to the municipal regulations about the location, organization and the practice of
business. The authorities try to regulate prostitution, aiming at protecting minors, eliminating forced prostitution and combating the
new phenomena of human trafficking. Any sex business must obtain from a municipality a license, certifying that it has fulfilled the
legal requirements to operate.

Monitoring the regulations


The police, urban district council and municipal health authorities are the main bodies responsible for enforcing the existing laws.
Police controls sex establishments, to verify that minors or illegal aliens are not working as prostitutes. Also creating nuisance to the
surrounding area is seen as a reason to the eventual refusal of the license to lead a sex business. Infringements such as the presence
of illegal prostitutes or employment of the minors may be the reason for the business closure. In 2007 the municipality of
Amsterdam withdrew the licenses to as many as 30 different sex businesses, accusing them of breaking the existing laws.

Health care and support


The city health services inform the prostitutes about a free or low -cost clinic for sexually transmitted diseases, provide free or low
cost medical car. A number of or organizations, some of them established by the prostitutes themselves (often still active as working
girls), as the support group The Red Thread (Dutch: De Rode Draad) and the Prostitution Information Center (Prostitutie Informatie
Centrum), try to help prostitutes with their problems. Foundations AMOC and Rainbow (Regenboog) are helping the prostitutes with
drug problems.

Visiting the Prostitute – How it works


The Dutch do not see moral restraints in using services of the sex worker. How it works? Walking through the Red Light District you
might see the girl you would like to be with. All you have to do is to show your interest through a small gesture. Usually you are
immediately invited, after all girls wait for a client. You will have to talk with her at the door what kind of sexual pleasure did you
have in mind, and agree upon the price by forehand – usually around € 50,-. You step inside and the curtain on the window is tightly
closed and the door locked. The fee is to be paid in advance. You will have your 20 minutes of pleasure you paid for. The condom is a
must, whatever you both agreed upon, for your own safety.

Escort services
A more discrete option to visiting the Red Light District, is a to call an escort. There are many specialized escort agencies or
independent escorts offering a companship. This service may vary from a dinner with a model companion to a call-girl visiting a
client in the hotel room. The rates of a visiting escort starts at some 150 euros per hour. A company of an exclusive escort offering a
"full girl-friend experience" with a possibility staying overnight, would come obviously at a much higher cost.

Prostitution in Amsterdam
Prostitution is legal in Holland, and in Amsterdam most of it is concentrated in the Red Light District where it has enjoyed a long
tradition of tolerance. Since October 2000, window prostitutes have been allowed to legally ply their trade. Today, prostitutes in the
Netherlands are also taxpayers. Unfortunately, discrimination is still very much part and parcel in this trade as many prostitutes
report that some banks even refuse to grant mortgages for example. However, now as a legal profession, the government ensures
that all prostitutes are able to access medical care and work in better conditions by regulating and monitoring working practices and
standards. Help is also at hand in the district itself thanks to the Prostitution Information Center. Also, contrary to popular belief, the
RLD is actually the safest area in Amsterdam as clusters of policemen, and private bodyguards employed by the girls themselves are
always on duty.

As you know Amsterdam has legal prostitution, where you can go into a store and buy a woman for how many hours you would like,
it works for them. It keeps the aids virus at bay as everyone has to have health checks and proof, it keeps the abuse of women to a
minimal because its government regulated and there is no need for street walking. Whether or not is a social advantage I dont know,
in a sense it protects the women if you really think about it as for personal, most likely the advantage is for the patrons as they dont
have to worry about being arrested or that they are with a heroin dirty aids prostitute.

Now having said that, I still think prostitution is negative for society. I dont see an advantage at all but its as old as the human race
and it will never go away so it is most likely best to be regulated. I feel bad for any women who feels that all she can do is sell her
body to make a living (men too) but then again the high end prostitutes make anywhere from 1500 to 6000 dollars a night and most
likely can live with themselves.

For most, the idea that prostitution should be legalised creates many moral arguments. Some people have become irate with the
suggestion, many bringing religion into the debate. But this should not be about religion, or morals, or anything along those lines.
This is about something more important than those things. It is about safety.
This is my argument.

Prostitution is not a new thing. It has been an issue in society since Jesus' day. Back then, as it is nowadays, there is a taboo that
surrounds it, for obvious reasons. Two thousand years ago the price may not have been in US dollars or Pounds Sterling, instead in
livestock, but it was prostituting all the same.

So what does this say about society today? Shouldn't we ask ourselves why, after two thousand years nothing has changed, apart
from the payment? Does this not bring into question the role prostitution plays in society?

Basically, prostitution has been and will continue to permeate society, thrive in it, and women will continue to use their bodies as a
means to feed themselves.
Are we all agreed on that? Good. So why not legalise it, if we know it exists already?

By legalising prostitution, the government could provide a safe environment for women and men alike. Those soliciting could be
routinely health checked so all parties are kept free from disease. Sanctions could be introduced so that women no longer feel
threatened when they are doing their job.
As things stand, thousands of women are taking to the streets with no guaranteed safety, even though the government
acknowledges that such activities take place. Ignoring them will not make them go away. Prohibiting them will only heighten the
danger these women could be in.

Economically, if the government would recognise it as a real job, taxes could be collected, and this would evidently go back into the
community.

The question one must ask themselves is this: do the benefits outweigh the deficits?

Putting all your moral and ethical views aside, look at it from a different perspective. If women are going to do it regardless, and
continue to put themselves in danger, wouldn't it be better to legalise it than to allow it to fly under the radar, and hope and pray
that it will one day stop?

Let's face it, if Jesus couldn't stop it, what chance do us mere mortals have?

You might also like