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There are (at least) two competing views on prostitution: Prostitution as a legitimate and acceptable form of employment, freely chosen by women; And men’s use of prostitution as a form of degrading the women and causing grave psychological damage.

In The Idea of Prostitution, Sheila Jeffreys explores these sharply contrasting views. She examines the changing concept of prostitution from White Slave Traffic of the nineteenth century to its present status as legal. The book includes discussion of the varieties of prostitution such as: the experience of male prostitutes; the uses of women in pornography; and the role of military brothels compared with slavery and rape in marriage.

Sheila Jeffreys explodes the distinction between “forced” and “free” prostitution, and documents the expanding international traffic in women. She examines the claims of the prostitutes’ rights movement and the sex industry, while supporting prostituted women. Her argument is threefold: the sex of prostitution is not just sex; the work of prostitution is not ordinary work; and prostitution is a ‘choice’ not for the prostituted women, but for the men who abuse them.