Prostitution Definition Essay

Growing up I had never understood the term “prostitution”, even all of the way through highschool I had never fully grasped the idea of what it truly means to be a prostitute. Throughout my four years of high school, I was misguided with false definitions and accusations about the term “prostitute”. However, since then I have learned the true meaning of prostitution and what goes along with being a prostitute. According to chapter 18, prostitution is the providing or receiving of sexual acts between a prostitute, a client, and sometimes the prostitute's employer in exchange for money or some other form of remuneration (Human Sexaulity, Yarber, Sayad and Strong). In high school, I thought prostitutes were along the same line as strippers, I
This quote shocked me since I was not aware that prostitution was traced back to ancient Mesopotamia and Greece. I was under the impression that prostitution was only common in today's society and could not be traced that far back. As quoted in chapter 18, “both of these ancient powers saw prostitution as an offering of their bodies to passers-by whom would make a "religious" donation”. (Human Sexaulity, Yarber, Sayad and Strong). Since I attended a catholic high school, this quote took me by surprise, because the topic of prostitution never was explained or discussed in any of theology classes, even though both ancient Mesopotamia and Greece were thoroughly discussed in my classes. From further thought, I believe this topic was ignored throughout my four years of high school because of the sexual context and whether or not my teachers were open to teaching the
From my previous knowledge, I had always thought that all prostitutes where streetwalkers, however after reading this chapter, I learned there are three types of prostitutes; streetwalkers, prostitutes and escorts. Unfortunately, streetwalkers earned the lowest income and were seen as the least desired and unvalued group among prostitutes (Human Sexaulity, Yarber, Sayad and Strong). I was taken aback because if a prostitute is in a big city, you would think they could make a large income by walking the streets looking for partners. Also noted in that section of the chapter was the quote, “that the police consider prostitution "minor" or "nuisance" crime (Human Sexaulity, Yarber, Sayad and Strong)”. After that sentence, I began to question if it is such a “minor” crime, why make streetwalking against the law? However, further reading made me realize that it should be a crime considering many of these women and men are at a greater risk of being abused, raped or sexually assaulted, all crimes that seem to be common in 2017. The role of a streetwalker is dehumanizing and unacceptable, since many of these people are powerless and cannot control their own