we have seen the effects of the purchase ban in sweden. you are right, it drives some aspects underground. the indy workers there enjoyed increased business however as since clients knew them, they had reputations as sp's and were known to not be police, clients favour their services now causing a rise in income for the indy sector.
i am an indy, so would potneially benefit from a sex purchase ban.
as an advocate i cannot act in my own self centered interest however and so have been fighting this model for as long as its been around. i have appealed here many times to clients to add their voices and fight against this approach. many people have responded taking part in research, coming to rallies and events, donating to sex worker org's.....
also, i don't think its fair to say the charter challenge has caused the human trafficking panic. the "white slavery panic" and other prohibitive campaigns over the last century have long shown the moralists they can make money through creating moral panic. this is nothing new.
neither is sex worker organizing against them. there's a book called sins in the second city about madames organizing against prohibition of sex work in chicago in the 40's i believe....they lost the battle but fought none the less. as i said before, we are not prepared to face the effects/ harms any more.
the thing you seem to miss is we are aware of the risk, we feel its worth it. in sweden they have 1 sex worker organization in the whole country. in canada we have at least 15...maybe more....18 now i think about it.....
if we can fight and save the lives of workers facing risk and make our industry safe for all who participate, wouldn't it be worth it?
i feel that the swedish model would have come here with or without the charter challenge. the drivers behind that were well underway before the charter challenge began. and here in canada, there are 2 factions of feminism....probably more....but 2 obvious sides and one side hates the other. they are willing to comprimise the lives and safety of other women all in the name of bettering all women. that we, the under deserving disease ridden whores should repent and choose to to do sex work for the betterment of all women. that we should be greatful for our toilette cleaning job and be greatful that (as one feniazi said) that the "good" women don't shoot all of us sex workers for our betrayal of women....i am not kidding...
i feel like feminism has gone too far and that now some are working to "punish" men. advocating in family court can show you a glimsp of that but this implementation of the nordic model and the blaming/ shaming it is based on is sexist. it is sexist against men.
it paints all men as predator, rapist pedophiles....
blaming the chater challenge, the brave women who lead it and those of us who stood and gave evidence is pretty shallow thinking dude... no offense intended ok?
one last thing, not be an asshole but...
we are women....not girls......girls don't work in the sex industry, women do. when you say girls, you infantalize us, we are women and can make our own choices....make sense? just pointing it out....