Editor’s note: This article was first published in May 2012, in the middle of the Spanish economic crisis and the Bankia bailout; its references to the crisis and to Bankia reflect that moment.
When we decide to start a business, we usually try to offer a product or service that is in demand and meets a customer need. That was the premise followed by a former sex worker living in Valencia (Spain), who is offering a course for people who have decided to go into prostitution. It didn’t take long for the alarm bells to ring over the brazenness this “entrepreneur” showed in leaving flyers near universities and on the street.
The organizer will probably face legal action for inciting prostitution. That said, a course to train professional prostitutes… only one question comes to mind. And the question is… why not? Whether the course is actually effective or useful, or how professional the instructor and their “syllabus” are, would be a different matter. Society still doesn’t want to see that prostitution exists all around us. It still doesn’t want to see that the crisis has increased the number of “amateur prostitutes”: women with families who, out of economic desperation, decide to take this path.
The same goes for university students whose parents can no longer pay for their studies. Could they find another way to make money? I imagine so, but we’re not going to get into an ethical and moral debate. Prostitution is usually associated with sex-trafficking rings. In this case, I’m sure the people who would take this course would have chosen to go into prostitution of their own free will.
The good side of this entrepreneur’s business idea
Let’s imagine for a moment that the person running the course is a professional with the right material. Many “new prostitutes” have no experience in the sector and probably even lack knowledge of sexual practices, so they’ll end up charging €20 or €30 per service.
We’re not going to put an end to prostitution. So a place where an inexperienced prostitute is taught to have safe sex, how to behave and how to dress, is warned about the dangers, learns to spot potentially problematic clients and picks up some self-defence techniques for extreme cases… I honestly think it could be a good idea for the profession in general, and a profitable business both for the entrepreneur running the course and for the prostitute, who will be able to charge a higher rate because she feels like a professional.
I’ll say it again: today we’re not going to open the debate on whether legalizing prostitution would be a good thing. I’ll just mention one figure: according to official estimates, legalizing prostitution would bring the government €5 billion in Spain alone, money that could go to healthcare, education, Bankia, or any other bank that needs rescuing in the future.
Featured image: Ввласенко, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
