I believe in legalized prostitution.
Hold your claws and hear me out. This is in response to the July 15 letters, "Prostitution column ignored available facts," and, "Response to sexual urges is an excuse for deviance."
Most readers are probably too young to remember the red light district in Superior during World War II and for some years after that. Older folks said it was convenient for sailors off the lake boats and servicemen passing through and returning home.
Although I was a young boy then, I was old enough to read the Tribune. I cannot remember reading about sex crimes the way we read about them today, almost every day.
Today's world of pimps and prostitutes, who work in a furtive manner, is a difficult world for society to control. A legalized red light district would virtually shut down the furtive pimp-and-prostitute employment opportunities.
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It took some 13 years before alcohol prohibition was declared a mistake. How long do we need to realize non-legal prostitution is a mistake?
I have no moralistic answer other than my first sentence, but this is what society's answer has been: Throw the perpetrators in jail. We do that. So end of problem, right? Wrong. The problem jumps up every day. So, folks, go back to square one -- jail. Since jail
doesn't seem to work, do you have a Plan B?
H. John Strom
Houston
