Ready to change sex laws (again)

[rickfarang]

From the Straights Times June 25, 2004.

 

(Its an erection year...I mean election year. Here we go, yet again...)

 

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Government ready to change laws on sex industry, says Thaksin

 

BANGKOK - Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra hinted yesterday that his government was ready to change the laws surrounding the country's burgeoning sex industry.

 

Mr Thaksin told a forum on Thailand's underground industries, such as gambling and prostitution, that minor penalties and small enforcement budgets to target the trade encouraged corrupt relationships between sex bosses and police.

 

 

'I wanted all of you to brainstorm on this issue and the government is ready for changes,' he told delegates to the one-day conference in Bangkok.

 

For some time, the Thai authorities have considered legalising the multi- million-dollar illicit business that has turned the country into a famous centre for sex tourism.

 

Earlier this year, an academic report claimed that 2.8 million Thais served as sex workers in the country from 1999 to 2002, and that the industry grew last year.

 

Thailand has thousands of go-go bars, massage parlours and brothels. The industry boomed during the Vietnam War when US servicemen flocked to the country's red-light districts.

 

The National Economic and Social Advisory Council reported last year that massage parlour owners in Thailand paid a staggering 3.2 billion baht (S$135 million) a year in police bribes.

 

But Thai prostitutes and academics have argued that legalising the nation's sex industry would increase child exploitation and lure more women into the trade.

 

The Thai government has been keen to stamp out Bangkok's image as a sex tourism destination and has introduced tougher measures under which bars and other entertainment venues close at 2am.

 

The most recent legislation governing Thailand's sex industry, passed in 1996, substantially increased penalties for selling children into the trade while reducing punishment for sex workers. -- AFP

[khunsanuk]

Hi,

 

"The industry boomed during the Vietnam War when US servicemen flocked to the country's red-light districts."

And once again it is reinforced that the farang was responsible. Yeah, right!

 

"But Thai prostitutes and academics have argued that legalising the nation's sex industry would increase child exploitation and lure more women into the trade."

The opposite happened in Holland after prostitution was legalized, and the prostitutes were forced to pay income (in-cum?) tax.

 

Sanuk!

[Encore]

Another press report full of generalisations and platitudes, as already pointed out by KS above.

 

>Thailand has thousands of go-go bars, massage parlours and brothels.<

 

thousands of massage parlours? maybe. Brothels, possibly, although most of those never see a falang. Thousands of Gogo? I very much doubt if there are more than a couple of hundred GoGo Bars in all of LOS

 

 

>The Thai government has been keen to stamp out Bangkok's image as a sex tourism destination and has introduced tougher measures under which bars and other entertainment venues close at 2am.<

 

I thought that was two years ago! the latest 1.00 closing doesn't seem to have had much effect.

 

so much hot air, so little substance. brainstorm away!

[Guest]

Legal sex, ahhh... I mean prostitution.

[Guest]

"The industry boomed during the Vietnam war when US servicemen flocked to the countrys red-light districts"

 

So they were alaready there (the R-L areas)!!!!

[Guest]

If you build it, they will...cum.

[Guest]

It will be regulated the exact minute the MIB and goverment heads stop lining their pockets with the 'baht the bed made'.

Until then it's all the same blah blah blah all political talking heads seem to emit from their mouths.