Lisa L. Thompson, our VP of Policy and Research, recently appeared on Nevada Public Radio to debate whether Nevada’s legal brothels promote sexual exploitation (obviously yes!). Katy Hartley from Awaken Reno also joined Lisa in arguing against these brothels. Overall, Lisa and Katy had the opposition on their toes and did a great job arguing against exploitation. Click here to listen to the debate.
The following is an excerpt from an article originally published by KNPR
Nevada has legal brothels, racks of free newspapers line the streets of Las Vegas offering ‘women direct to your room,’ not to mention the topless shows, and strip clubs.
A week ago, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation put the entire state of Nevada on its “Dirty Dozen” list for sexual exploitation.
Lisa Thompson is with the center. She said Nevada is on the list in part because of legalized prostitution.
“We believe that legalization is actually enshrining in law male sexual entitlement,” she said, “In the age of MeToo this is completely incongruent with women’s empowerment.”
She said prostitution reduces women to sexual objects.
Further, Thompson and her group say that all forms of prostitution – both legal and illegal – are exploitative.
“Especially where you have systems of legal prostitution, I view them as just an elaborate supply chain,” she said, “It is an organized system of sexual exploitation whereby women are literally offered up as sexual commodities.”
According to Thompson, all paid sex is coerced sex. Plus, she said the industry is predatory on economically vulnerable women, whom she believes deserve better job opportunities than those in the sex industry.
