It’s time we had a sensible chat about prostitution

One of the most unwavering let’s-not-go-there subjects in the history of let’s-not-go-there is prostitution.

It’s been around as long as humanity itself, but let’s not go there. We don’t talk about it, and we certainly don’t engage with it – the only thing we consider worse than admitting to having paid for sex is admitting to being paid for it. Of the two – men paying for it or women selling it – it is the sellers who are most reviled.

We have fixed ideas of what sex work involves. Either it’s something glamorously Belle du Jour-ish, all swanning around five star hotels earning more cash per horizontal hour than the rest of us do in a vertical week, or it’s trafficked slaves, drugged and abused and held against their will in conditions so appalling we cannot bear to even think about it.