Providence Wrote:One of the reasons prostitution is illegal is because of what's involved for the prostitutes. Many of them become the "property" of a pimp or john, which in itself can be considered a form of slavery. Prostitutes also have to deal with the psycho customers who, as far as they know, may beat them afterwards to avoid paying. There's also the argument that prostitution helps the spread of sexually-transmitted diseases (especially AIDS), as most prostitutes will generally not ask their customers for health records.
However, legal and well-run brothels such as ones found in Reno, Nevada (in the USA) could be the answer to many of these problems. From what I've read, the management of most (if not all) of them require frequent physical exams of their prostitutes and provide a relatively large amount of security in order to keep them safe from scumbags.
To the latter part of your post, if it was legal everywhere in the US, as opposed to just some parts, the Reno example is probably what we would see, not the pimp/property variant. To Quantact, if someone can pomegranate in a jar (real world example) and call it art, I can call sex an art (to this end I could call the prostitute a medium, like clay or paint).
Very interesting arguments though O.o
Also to Quantact, your argument reinforces my belief that filming sex with a prostitute and labeling it art would be defensable as not being prostitution.
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I will NEVER consider the acts of those such as Zhu Yu art. Sick pineapple...