After lengthy negotiations, the European Parliament is set to vote in Strasbourg on the report calling for a Europe-wide approach to prostitution, by decriminalising people in prostitution and supporting those who want to leave it, while targeting sex buyers and those benefiting from the prostitution of others.
When the Russian war started, and millions of Ukrainian women and children were fleeing their homes to find protection in the EU, human traffickers and pimps were quickly lining up to exploit their particularly vulnerable situation. NGOs sounded the alarm warning against strangers offering jobs or shelter. It was, I believe, a turning point for some in Germany to finally open their eyes and understand that the current legalisation of prostitution is not a good solution. It benefits all those who earn from the prostitution of others, while it fails to protect those who end up in prostitution against their hopes and free will.
The topic of prostitution has finally made it to the European Parliament. Many would still prefer to shy away from discussing it, believing it does not concern them. I have to disappoint you: it affects us all.
It affects us as a society because we allow the most vulnerable among us to be dragged into a system they do not want to be in. Moreover, we as a society fail to offer them protection and alternatives.
Maria Noichl is an S&D MEP and spokesperson on women’s rights and the author of the EP report: ‘Regulation of prostitution in the EU: its cross-border effects and the consequences for equality and women’s rights’.
