I also think it's important that we need to speak to the issue of the Bedford case. Ms. Bedford being a case in point for why we should criminalize the purchase of sex in order to prevent trafficking, as a nation.
While it's rarely mentioned in the media, Ms. Bedford first entered prostitution as a 16-year-old—that's trafficking—to pay for her drug addiction and that of her 37-year-old, drug-dealing boyfriend. Over the course of 14 years, Ms. Bedford engaged in prostitution of all types, indoor and outdoor. By her own admission, she was raped and gang-raped too many times to talk about. Ms. Bedford is a textbook example of the type of vulnerability that traffickers will exploit when there are men who are willing to pay for sex. Many victims come from similar backgrounds, which involve foster care, child molestation, physical abuse, group homes, etc. Today Ms. Bedford is no longer in prostitution, and various reports state that she plans to become a madam if we fully decriminalize...thus profiting from the selling of the sexual services of others.
Let's take a moment to truly understand the situation. We have a former trafficking victim turned potential madam trying to dictate national policy. Ms. Bedford says that she has the right to sell her body. Again, we don't disagree; we just think that everyone else has the right not to be trafficked.
Would full decriminalization have saved Ms. Bedford? Would more demand in the market somehow have kept her safe? How about the thousands of women like her?