Senators are preparing to examine the bill on prostitution in public. The penalization of customers, repealed this summer, could be reintroduced, to the chagrin of associations in the field.
” It makes no sense. We started the hearings again when we had already voted on the text. There is very strong pressure from the government since the DSK affair! The executive wants a display text, moralizing, it’s absurd and counterproductive … “
Resignation from the Senate
Esther Benbassa, Senator EELV, does not take offense. For some time, at the senatorial committee in charge of the law on prostitution, the atmosphere has been explosive. Its president, the socialist Jean-Pierre Godefroy, threw in the towel and presented his resignation on Wednesday, a few days before the Senate exam of the law.
And for good reason… Presented with great fanfare by Najat Vallaud Belkacem in 2013, the text was to be a “major social advance” in favor of the rights and protection of prostitutes. But above all, he could turn against them. At the heart of the legislative and political battle: the penalization of customers. “It is prostitutes who would be penalized, with effects that are certainly equivalent, or even more serious, than those caused by the offense of public soliciting. Will it take us another ten years to understand the error? », Deplores Jean-Pierre Godefroy in a post published on Mediapart.
This provision would have made it possible to distribute fines of 1,500 euros to any person resorting to prostitution. Voted in 2013 in the National Assembly, it should reflect the “abolitionist” position of France, which considers the prostitute as a victim and not guilty. At the time, the deputies also repealed the offense of passive soliciting, in order to place the criminal charge on the client.
But last summer the senatorial commission deleted article 16 on the penalization of customers. “Punishing the client has disastrous consequences on the health of prostitutes”, insists Esther Benbassa. Yet it is this device that the government is trying at all costs to reintroduce into the law by way of amendment.
Listen to Esther Benbassa, Senator EELV: “Parliament voted in favor of the text because men, in the majority, were afraid of being considered as clients. “
In the woods, kept away from care
Between abolitionist, regulationist and prohibitionist positions, it is difficult to navigate. The subject is angry and does not seem to find any political consensus. On the ground, however, most of the associations that come to meet prostitutes have decided: it will be pragmatism.
“Very concretely, apart from any moral argument, it should be understood that the penalization of customers has the same deleterious effects as the crime of soliciting, explains Fred Bladou, activist for the AIDES association. These measures force sex workers to hide. They move away from the city center and the places in which they are identified, to isolate themselves in the countryside, the national roads and the deep woods ”.
There, they lose all contact with associations which, during their marauding, do prevention, distribute condoms, and come to their aid if necessary. This essential associative action has also been recognized in an IGAS report as one of the few having, to date, proven a certain effectiveness in terms of health of prostitutes, in a perfectly powerless institutional framework.
Listen to Fred Bladou, activist for the association AIDES : “Now you have to travel 40 kilometers around town to find them … By stigmatizing prostitutes, you don’t encourage them to take care of their health. “
Increased risk of Sexually Transmitted Infections
Hell is paved with good intentions, they say … By seeking to protect prostitutes, the government could well expose them to increased risks of developing Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs). In March 2013, an InVS report showed that, despite declining overall health, prostitutes tend to protect themselves during sex.
“It is a condition that they will be able to negotiate less and less if the customer is penalized,” specifies Fred Bladou. When they are isolated, clients are rarer – at least, for street prostitution – and they have to keep the same level of income, to provide for themselves. When you have the choice of client and prices, when you feel safe, it is much easier to impose condoms ”.
Move prostitution
In fact, the penalization of the client would have no effect on prostitution, if it is not to better hide that which is practiced in the street, warn the associations. And the much praised Swedish model would be a lure. “It is said that prostitution has drastically decreased in the country since the penalization of customers; it’s wrong. However, it is less visible, it has moved on the Internet and in apartments, ”warns Irène Abudaram, coordinator at Médecins du Monde.
The pimps have understood this well. “When they send a girl to Stockholm, they rent her an apartment, it’s that simple. As a result, they are much more vulnerable to violence from clients. On the contrary, when they are together, in a group, some can come to the aid of others in the event of aggression… ”
Listen to Irène Abudaram, coordinator at Médecins du Monde : “The law does not match the reality of prostitution. Why take the risk of making the people we seek to protect less accessible? “
The argument is indeed taken up by several international institutions – UNAIDS, WHO… In July, a series of studies published in the journal The Lancet concluded that the repression in terms of health security and human rights was ineffective. Its authors called for the decriminalization of prostitution to better combat it, if such is the will of governments.
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