Letters

Abolitionists are dishonest

To the editor:

"Vancouverites indifferent to plight of prostitutes," Dec. 12.

Why are abolitionists like Mark Hasiuk so inexplicably unwilling to criticize police for their obvious tolerance of large numbers of openly advertised prostitution operations in all large Canadian cities?

The law is not ambiguous. Sex trade businesses are outlawed by Criminal Code sections regarding common bawdy houses and living on the avails of prostitution, yet knowingly tolerated under the euphemistic labels of "massage parlours" and "escort agencies."

Two-faced police officials routinely argue against decriminalization, but make weak excuses and blame others when asked why they don't sincerely enforce these laws they claim are so important.

The status quo being preserved is clearly hypocritical and likely a corrupt arrangement.

When similar circumstances existed there, royal commissions in two Australian states found vice cops were being paid off by supposedly outlawed prostitution operations. This prompted New South Wales to decriminalize brothels in 1995 (coincidentally, five years prior to hosting the 2000 Olympics in Sydney).

In 2003, New Zealand also abandoned the dishonest system maintained in Canada, with an exhaustively researched government report issued in 2008 finding that the anti-decriminalization fear mongering had been completely unfounded.

– Keith Baxter,
Toronto, Ont.