Talk:Prostitution in the Philippines

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 7 January 2019 and 23 April 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Johnwall99.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 07:20, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Move

It will be bumpy for a week or so as we sort what goes where, however, hope this helps. Devalover 17:53, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Weak and Unbalanced Article

This article is very poor. It gives far too much prominence to violence against prostitutes (I am not denying this occurs, but not on such a scale as to justify it taking up 40% of the total article), and fails to mention sex tourism, which is a major element of the Philippine sex industry. It also says that prostitution is illegal, but neglects to give any information on how it can occur on such a scale if so. Nor does it examine social attitudes to prostitution - for example, what percentage of the population patronises prostitutes? What is the attitude of the church? What economic alternatives are open to prostitutes?

The whole article needs a lot of work to improve it. Rodparkes 06:04, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Don't worry; you're not the only one who noticed it, and this isn't the only article where this occurred. Please see my comments on this article. Thanks. --- Tito Pao 07:04, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Couldn't agree more with both of you... this is definatley a work in progress. Devalover 17:21, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

This article is ridiculously biased towards extremist feminism (it exists and is like a cancer). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.151.35.15 (talk) 07:16, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Misleading

The legalities of the article are misleading. The opening statement, "Prostitution in the Philippines is illegal. It is a serious crime..." is simply incorrect. This article is based solely upon the anti-trafficking act of 2003, as noted in footnote 1. Garden-variety prostitution is covered in the Penal Code of the Philippines. It is not a serious offense, but is included in a section along with loitering and other public nuisances. The penalty for a first offense is 200 pesos (=U.S.$4.35), with no jail time.

This article makes the common "crusader's" mistake of conflating trafficking with prostitution. Have no fear. In most of the Philippines the individual who sells his or her body out of desperation, or because s/he has no other skills, will not be harassed by the authorities. They are only cleared off the streets in "red light" areas where they compete with night clubs and other brick-and-mortar businesses. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.177.74.140 (talk) 02:35, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Depending on the activities taking place therein, the operators of those brick-and-mortar businesses might be at risk for prosecution as exploiters of persons in prostitution. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 19:26, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

RA9341

Section 3(c) of that RA9341, cited at the end of the second sentence of the lead, defines Prostitution as follows:

Prostitution - refers to any act, transaction, scheme or design involving the use of a person by another, for sexual intercourse or lascivious conduct in exchange for money, profit or any other consideration.

Section 4 of the act, however, does not criminalize the act of Prostitution itself for the prostitute(s), at least I cannot find such criminalization in there. Subsection (e) does make it illegal "To maintain or hire a person to engage in prostitution or pornography", which I would read as making it illegal to employ or to patronize a prostitute.

It seems to me therefore that prostitution in the Philippines is not officially illegal, at least not for prostitutes -- that is, it seems to me that, as far as RA9341 is concerned, it is not illegal in the Philippines to commit an act of prostitution.

RA9341 also contains provisions defining sexual exploitation and criminalizing acts related thereto.

SBN 2341

This bill is titled The Anti-Prostitution Act of 2010. Seections 3(a) and (b) would define Prostitution and "Person exploited in prostitution as follows:

"Prostitution" means any act, transaction, scheme or design involving the use or exploitation of another person, whether woman, man or child, for the sexual gratification or pleasure of another in exchange for cash, profit or other consideration, or any act that promotes or facilitates the accomplishment of the said act, transaction, scheme or design. (b) "Person exploited in prostitution" means a woman, man or child used, employed or exploited for another person's sexual gratification or pleasure, and for the monetary gain or profit of others, as defined in Section 4 of this Act.

As I read that, a self-employed prostitute who is not employed or exploited "for the monetary gain or profit of others" would not be person exploited in prostitution.

Section 4 of that bill lists punishable acts. As I read it, it would actions by employers, exploiters, and customers of persons involved in prostitution, and would not criminalize the act for prostitutes. As far as I can tell, it would not criminalize paid sexual acts by persons who don't fit the definition of persons exploited in prostitution either for the prostitute(s) or for the customer(s).

I have a hard time construing this as making prostitution illegal, even if it were enacted.

SBN 2341 was substituted by SBN 3382 on 22 January 2013 (see [1]).

SBN 3382

This bill is titled The Anti-Prostitution Act of 2012, and is very similar to or identical to SBN 2341. I have a hard time construing this as making prostitution illegal.

I have a hard time construing this as making prostitution illegal, even if it were enacted.

SBN 3382 was referred to committee on 14 January 2013, with "Committee Report Calendared for Ordinary Business" on 22 January 2013. (see [2]).

It looks to me as if the lead section of this article needs a complete rewrite. Also, details about laws and acts probably ought to be in a section headed Legal status rather than in the lead section. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 06:48, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Digging further, I see two other items:

Act No. 3815

Article 202(5) of the Revised Penal Code has long criminalized prostitution as follows:

5. Prostitutes.

For the purposes of this article, women who, for money or profit, habitually indulge in sexual intercourse or lascivious conduct, are deemed to be prostitutes.

Any person found guilty of any of the offenses covered by this articles shall be punished by arresto menor or a fine not exceeding 200 pesos, and in case of recidivism, by arresto mayor in its medium period to prision correccional in its minimum period or a fine ranging from 200 to 2,000 pesos, or both, in the discretion of the court.

RA10158

Republic Act No. 10158 amended article 202 of the Revised Penal Code by removing sections 1-4. As amended, it reads as follows:

Article 202. Prostitutes; Penalty – For the purposes of this article, women who, for money or profit, habitually indulge in sexual intercourse or lascivious conduct, are deemed to be prostitutes. Any person found guilty of any of the offenses covered by this articles shall be punished by arresto menor or a fine not exceeding 200 pesos, and in case of recidivism, by arresto mayor in its medium period to prision correccional in its minimum period or a fine ranging from 200 to 2,000 pesos, or both, in the discretion of the court.

Presuming that being deemed to be a prostitute is an "offense", it appears to me that habitual prostitution or lascivious conduct by women is and long has been criminalized. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 19:10, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Commercial sexual exploitation of children

This see also has got to go unless there is any reference to child exploitation in the article, which, currently there most certainly is not! 122.148.41.172 (talk) 16:20, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Interesting article

This article seems to claim that the prostitution/sex trade industry in the Philippines started when it became an American colony. http://english.pravda.ru/society/sex/04-10-2011/119226-sex_tourism_philippines-0/

I don't think it started then, but it could certainly be a factor in the current size of the industry. Hypershock (talk) 15:53, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Revision of Article

Hi Wikipedians! My name is Sessama7 and I plan on revising this article for my Human Development course. I plan on rewriting some of the already present information, adding additional sources as well as developing the causes,consequences and characteristics of prostitution in the Philippines. Please let me know if you have any advice or information on this topic, I would love to hear from you! Sessama7 (talk) 00:08, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 5 external links on Prostitution in the Philippines. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20071010075421/http://www.childhope.org.ph/empowering.doc to http://www.childhope.org.ph/empowering.doc
• Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/alrc/publications/reform/reform67/ALRCR67CONFRONTINGSEXUALE.html
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20121703333500/http://www.nscb.gov.ph/poverty/ to http://www.nscb.gov.ph/poverty/
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070722135606/http://feminism.eserver.org/prostitution.txt to http://feminism.eserver.org/prostitution.txt
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080516191958/http://www.hawaii.edu/hivandaids/Determinants%20of%20Extramarital%20Sex%20in%20the%20Philippines.pdf to http://www.hawaii.edu/hivandaids/Determinants%20of%20Extramarital%20Sex%20in%20the%20Philippines.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 03:17, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

Reasons, and conparison with other countries

This edit caught my eye. I don't have any reason to disagree, but I wondered about the comparison. I looked quickly at the cited supporting sources and could not find support for that comparison or for the asserted relative importance of reasons prostitutes give for for engaging in the life. Here, I've moved the supporting cites and added a {{cn}} tag. Please correct me if I missed the info in those sources or add a source which does provide clear support. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 10:26, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

(added) Looking back, I see that this seems to have come in in this 2014 series of edits. I've googled a bit in this supporting source cited there, and haven't found supporting info. The index there refers to interviews in the Philippines on pages 325-326, but those pages are not viewable online -- perhaps the info is there. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 10:46, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

In my view the whole 'Poverty' section is a suffering from over-analysis. I also can't see the relevance of the number of illegitimate children or the reasons behind that (Single mothers section) to the article. --John B123 (talk) 15:51, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Sex Trafficking

This section should be removed because sex trafficking and prostitution are not the same thing. Also, this section is the largest on the page and takes away from the focus of the article. Perhaps a small section could be kept noting the distinction between prostitution and sex trafficking. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnwall99 (talk • contribs) 14:59, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Sex trafficking is not the same thing as prostitution as you point out. However, if some prostitutes with a country are trafficked then it is a relevant topic to include within the article, especially in this article as trafficking in the Philippines is a significant problem. Not sure the distinction needs to be brought out in every prostitution article. Far better to bring out the difference in the main article sex trafficking. --John B123 (talk) 17:58, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

It seems to me that this subtopic section should focus on or be limited to content relating to the topic of the article. That is: sex trafficking as it relates to prostitution in the Philippines. That would not include persons trafficked from the Philippines for purposes of prostitution outside of the Philippines. That would seem to exclude the entire initial paragraph of the section. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 18:37, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

That seems reasonable to me. --John B123 (talk) 19:28, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Decriminalized

Pursuant to R.A. 11862

"Â Repealing Clause. — Article 202 of the Revised Penal Code, as amended by Republic Act No. 10158, is deemed repealed and Republic Act No. 9208, as amended by Republic Act No. 10364, is hereby further amended. All laws, acts, presidential decrees, executive orders, administrative orders, and rules and regulations inconsistent with or contrary to the provisions of this Act are deemed amended, modified, or repealed accordingly: Provided, That this Act shall not in any way amend or repeal the provisions of Republic Act No. 7610, otherwise known as the "Special Protection of Children Against Abuse, Exploitation and Discrimination Act."

Art. 202 of the RPC refers to prostitution. 119.111.251.92 (talk) 04:22, 12 April 2024 (UTC)